Thirty-three House Democrats joined all but two Republicans on Sept. 3 to pass a bill that would strip federal student aid from colleges and universities that commercially boycott Israel.
The Protect Economic and Academic Freedom Act (HR 4795) passed 237–169.
The bill was written by Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.), chairwoman of the House Education and the Workforce Committee, and Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.).
It will now head to the Senate.
The bill would amend the Higher Education Act of 1965 to require colleges to certify that they are not participating in what the legislation calls a nonexpressive commercial boycott of Israel, defined as refusing to deal with or terminating business with the country or Israeli-regulated entities without a valid business reason.
Institutions that do not certify would lose eligibility for Title IV federal student aid, including Pell Grants and federal student loans.
A second section conditions Title VI international education and foreign language funding on an annual certification that students and faculty are not obstructed from participating in academic programs in Israel.
The Department of Education would publish a list of institutions that decline to certify.
A total of 167 Democrats voted against the bill, including House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), Minority Whip Katherine Clark (D-Mass.), Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar (D-Calif.), and Reps. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and James Clyburn (D-S.C.).
Reps. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Warren Davidson (R-Ohio) were the only Republicans to oppose the bill.
Massie said in a statement on X after the vote: “Congress did one and only one thing today. The House passed a bill to withhold money from universities if they don’t play nice with Israel.
“I voted No. It’s not proper for our federal government to coerce universities into engaging with any particular foreign country.”
A total of 27 members did not vote, among them Gottheimer, who did not cast a vote on his own bill and whose office has not said why.
Gottheimer’s office did not respond to a request for comment by The Epoch Times on Friday regarding the missed vote.
Jeffries issued a statement explaining his opposition.
“Our Jewish brothers and sisters deserve safety and security on campuses across the nation, and I continue to oppose the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement,” Jeffries said.
“Unfortunately, HR 4795 is a poorly written Republican bill that does not achieve that goal.”
He added that instead, he believed the bill would provide the president with the power to “punitively launch political attacks on our colleges and universities.”
He said House Democrats would advance their own anti-Semitism legislation if they win the majority in November’s midterm elections.
The Democrats voting yes included Reps. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.), Jared Moskowitz (D-Fla.), Ritchie Torres (D-N.Y.), Tom Suozzi (D-N.Y.), Henry Cuellar (D-Texas), Brad Schneider (D-Ill.), Jared Golden (D-Maine), and Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (D-Wash.).
Golden and Gluesenkamp Perez were referred to the Committee on Caucus Rules this week by Democratic leadership after they supplied the decisive votes for a Republican procedural rule on Sept. 1.
That rule set the terms of debate for HR 4795 and one earlier in the week on condemning socialism.
Rep. Tim Walberg (R-Mich.), who chairs the Education and Workforce Committee, managed the bill on the floor.
He said campus campaigns to boycott Israel have pressured schools to cut financial, commercial, and academic ties with Israeli companies and institutions, restricting study abroad, research partnerships, and academic exchanges, and that they have contributed to a rise in anti-Semitism.
“Our universities should not use taxpayer-funded federal programs to discriminate against Israeli students, faculty, institutions, or businesses simply because they are Israeli,” Walberg said.
Foxx said the movement’s own founders have described their goal as the end of Israel, quoting the American Jewish Committee’s report of what BDS co-founder Omar Barghouti had allegedly said regarding the dismantling of the Israeli state.
“I want every member of the House that is about to vote on this measure to reckon with this fact,” she said on the floor on Thursday.
BDS’s website says it has three goals: For Israel to end its occupation and colonisation of all Arab lands occupied since 1967 and dismantle the wall; recognizing the fundamental rights of the Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality; and respecting, protecting, and promoting the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties, as stipulated in U.N. Resolution 194.
Foxx rejected the argument that campus boycotts have not materialized.
She cited an administrative agreement at Evergreen State College addressing divestment from companies profiting from the occupation of Palestinian territories; a committee investigation into Northwestern University administrators she said were willing to accommodate encampment organizers; at least 86 BDS resolutions considered by student groups and faculty unions in the 2023–2024 academic year; and the American Studies Association’s 2013 endorsement of an academic boycott.
Rep. Burgess Owens (R-Utah), the committee’s vice chairman, said the Combat Anti-Semitism Movement recorded 531 incidents on U.S. campuses in 2025.
Rep. Bobby Scott (D-Va.), the committee’s ranking Democratic member, led the opposition and argued the bill targets something that has not happened.
“We have yet to see a single college or university in the United States adopt the BDS movement or institutional boycott policies contemplated in the bill,” Scott said.
He also argued the bill cannot reach its target, because a university announcing it had joined BDS would be engaged in expressive activity protected by the First Amendment and therefore outside the bill’s scope.
He entered statements from J Street and the American Federation of Teachers opposing the bill into the record.
Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), who described Israel as a genocidal apartheid state, said boycotts are protected speech with a history in the campaigns against South African apartheid and American segregation, and that many campus divestment efforts are led by Jewish students.
Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) said the bill’s language covers Israeli settlements in the West Bank and applies a standard that exists for no other place.
“If a university in Texas decided tomorrow to stop doing business with a company in South Carolina, or California, or Idaho, it would face no consequences under American law,” Castro said.
“But make the same decision about Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, and this bill strips American students of their Pell Grants and American veterans of their hard-earned benefits.”
He cited NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware, in which the Supreme Court held that a politically motivated boycott is protected expression, and said the word “nonexpressive” was written into the bill to work around that ruling.
Gottheimer wrote on X that the bill was an important step toward ensuring academic freedom for all students and that he would press the Senate to take it up so it can become law.
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