The University of Pennsylvania is resisting an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission demand for lists of employees tied to Jewish faith or organizations, filing court documents that call the request unconstitutional and dangerous. Penn has provided nearly 900 pages of material about antisemitism complaints but refused to hand over names and personally identifiable data without consent. Penn argued that the EEOC’s subpoena ignores historical harms from governmental cataloging of Jewish people and that the request lacks specificity about alleged unlawful practices. The dispute centers on a July subpoena seeking names of complainants, rosters of Jewish organizations, and de‑anonymized listening‑session notes; Penn asked a federal judge to deny enforcement. The case underscores tensions between federal civil‑rights enforcement and campus privacy and First Amendment protections. Other institutions have complied with similar requests and faced backlash; Penn’s filing signals a legal confrontation that could set precedent for how universities balance disclosure and protection of employees in sensitive investigations.
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