A majority of Americans say the presidents of Harvard and MIT should resign after being humiliated over their anti-Semitism policies, and that public funding should be withdrawn from universities that aren't doing enough to tackle anti-Jewish hatred.
Those are the damning results of a poll for DailyMail.com, as the fallout from a stormy congressional hearing continues to roil the nation's most prestigious educational centers.
It has already claimed the head of the University of Pennsylvania.
And voters have a clear message for MIT President Sally Kornbuth and Harvard President Claudine Gay: Go now.
JL Partners surveyed 1,000 likely voters about their views on universities and anti-Semitism. A majority said the presidents of Harvard and MIT should resign
About 56 percent of respondents said they should resign. Only 21 percent supported them keeping their jobs.
And 65 percent, almost two-thirds, said funding should be withdrawn from universities that fail to tackle anti-Semitism.
The issue has come to the fore since the Hamas terrorist attacked Israel on October 7.
Israel responded with a fierce attack on the Palestinian territory of Gaza.
As a result, American campuses became hotbeds of pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel protests, testing universities' commitment to freedom of expression against their duty to protect students.
Sometimes students used chants such as “From the River to the Sea,” which is interpreted in some circles as a call for the destruction of Israel.
Harvard is now facing a federal investigation into allegations of anti-Semitism and Islamophobia on campus.
The issue became public this month when the three university presidents appeared before Congress.
They drew widespread condemnation as they hummed and screeched their way through questions from Rep. Elise Setfanik about whether calls for genocide against Jewish people violated campus policy.
Liz Magill resigned as president of the University of Pennsylvania four days after the successful Congressional hearing
Harvard University President Claudine Gay testifies before the House Education and Workforce Committee on Tuesday in the Rayburn Building in the U.S. Capitol
Sally Kornbluth, president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, was also condemned in a fiery White House statement demanding anti-Semitism be addressed
In one memorable conversation, UPenn President Elizabeth Magill was asked whether calling for the genocide of Jews amounted to bullying or intimidation.
“If it is targeted, severe and pervasive, it is harassment,” she responded.
“So the answer is yes,” Stefanik said.
“It's a context-dependent decision,” Magill responded.
She resigned four days later.
James Johnson, co-founder of JL Partners, which conducted the poll of 1,000 likely voters, said: “Americans are clear that college presidents' behavior on anti-Semitism does not meet the standards they expect.
'These findings highlight the gap between the university elite and most of the public.
“For the public, it's quite simple: It doesn't take a college degree and a fancy title to identify anti-Semitism, and it shouldn't be ignored or underestimated. If so, America's position is just as simple: the presidents must go.”
A billboard at Harvard demands the resignation of President Claudine Gay. The billboard showed New York Rep. Elise Stefanik ripping into Gay after she failed to condemn a blatantly anti-Semitic statement
Pro-Palestinian protesters at Harvard put up a sign reading 'Stop the Genocide in Gaza'
More than 1,600 Jewish alumni have threatened to withdraw donations from Harvard University in response to pro-Palestinian protests on campus
The head of Harvard apologized for her comments to Congress in an interview with the Harvard Crimson.
But Gay, who is in her first semester as the university's first Black president, is under additional pressure amid allegations that she has plagiarized other academics throughout her career.
A university subcommittee cleared her of wrongdoing but said she lost her Ph.D. dissertation to add acknowledgments for the work of others.
Last week, it emerged that after the slew of controversies, Harvard had received the lowest number of early admission applications in years.