Battenfeld: Democratic pols must do more now to stop Jewish hate and protect students

With college campuses erupting throughout the city and state, here’s a basic question for Gov. Maura Healey, Boston Mayor Michelle Wu and Attorney General Andrea Campbell:

What are you doing to protect Jewish students and citizens in Massachusetts?

Healey, Wu and Campbell should hold a press conference today and demand that colleges and universities come up with a plan to ensure the safety of students and faculty and punish anti-Jewish hate.

Rhetoric and boilerplate doesn’t cut it. Now’s the time to step up. Climate change and more bike lanes can wait. This can’t wait.

There is rampant antisemitism and anti-Jewish rhetoric on campuses throughout the state. Students are nervous about their safety.

It’s not hysteria to say there’s an imminent threat to Jewish students.

If you’re a Jewish person in Massachusetts, do you feel secure?

The governor needs to use her bully pulpit and political power to reduce simmering tensions on campuses and protect Jewish students who are afraid to go to class or wear a yarmulke.

Wu has 250,000 college students in Boston.

Get Commissioner Michael Cox out of his office and come up with a safety plan.

But here’s what Wu and Healey have been doing instead.

Wu announced a grant to revitalize Boston’s nightlife and is getting ready to go with Healey to the Vatican climate conference junket.

Healey celebrated a right whale license plate and designated four new green communities to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Campbell, in charge of enforcing the law, apparently has done nothing, at least on her public schedule, to address the protests and tensions on campuses from Emerson to Harvard.

Healey is trying to walk a fine line between coming out against antisemitism and appeasing pro-Palestenian protesters who are part of her Democratic Party constituency.

The governor this week gave a lukewarm statement on WBUR that there’s “absolutely” a way to allow protests and protect Jewish students.

“There has to be,” she said. “We’re a free country and people have the right to express their views and protest within the bounds of the law, of course. And that’s where you see some of the tension and some of the problems arise.”

She did say “you need to protect the safety and well-being of students” but where’s the plan to do that?

Why isn’t the governor having a press conference with state police saying we won’t tolerate this, and promise to crack down on students and colleges that aren’t enforcing the law?

And Mayor Wu, what do you have to say about the hundreds of protestors in the middle of Boston at Emerson College who set up tents in an alley and wrote slogans in chalk on the sidewalk? Will you promise to clear out the illegal tents and keep the Jewish students and faculty and Emerson safe?

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Wu should be doing something proactive to prevent tensions from boiling over. She could be a catalyst for forcing colleges to address these issues.

And where is the all-Democratic congressional delegation? Ayanna Pressley is still talking about student loans and abortion.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who has been no profile in courage, is busy railing against corporations the way she usually does and criticizing Israel.

It’s not enough. It’s incumbent on schools to protect students from hate crimes but what is the delegation doing about it?

Students and citizens look to the government to enforce the law and protect them. Right now it’s questionable whether that’s happening.

A woman walks past a sign where students protest at an encampment on the campus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Tuesday, April 23, 2024, in Cambridge, Mass. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

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