We at Quaker Courage applaud Penn’s leadership for swiftly announcing that Penn will appeal U.S. District Judge Gerald J. Pappert’s March 31 ruling that the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) was within its constitutional rights to demand Penn turn over the information about Jewish faculty, staff, and members of campus Jewish organizations.
The EEOC had filed suit against Penn for refusing to comply with a subpoena last November that sought detailed information about Jewish faculty, staff, and campus organizations. The subpoena was part of an investigation the EEOC began in 2023 into Penn’s treatment of Jewish faculty and staff; the agency claimed it needed this information to gather evidence from individuals who may have experienced or witnessed antisemitism at Penn.
Judge Pappert gave Penn until May 1 to provide the EEOC with the information.
Penn’s statement, issued a couple of hours after Pappert’s ruling, acknowledged that the EEOC has an important role to play in investigating discrimination but added, “We continue to believe that requiring Penn to create lists of Jewish faculty and staff, and to provide personal contact information, raises serious privacy and First Amendment concerns.”
Judge Pappas’s ruling dismissed such concerns, stating that “the constitutional claims are easily dispensed with.” He wrote that the EEOC’s pursuit of such information is not unusual when the agency investigates cases of possible discrimination. He also noted that the EEOC “no longer seeks any employee’s specific affiliation with any particular Jewish-related organization on campus.”
Members of Penn’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), which had submitted an amicus brief opposing the subpoena, said they also anticipate they will appeal Pappert’s ruling and request a stay of Pappert’s order while the case makes its way through the courts.
The legal tug-of-war between Penn and the EEOC has evidently not prevented the agency from figuring out how to reach at least some Penn community members it wishes to talk with. Alumni organization Franklin’s Forum reports that the EEOC has already begun contacting some of Penn’s Jewish Studies professors on their personal phones.
Lawyer and Wharton professor Amanda Shanor told the Daily Pennsylvanian that Pappert’s decision could set a precedent allowing the government to collect information about any minority group. “The constitutional freedoms at stake – to be able to join religious and civic groups of your choice, to attend events, and teach and research freely without worry that your name and contact information will be put on a government list – are foundational to our democracy,” she wrote.
We will continue to provide updates as this case unfolds.
[For more background on the EEOC’s subpoena and the agency’s charges of antisemitism at Penn, see our February 10, 2026 post, “Penn Seeks to Protect Privacy of Jewish Faculty and Staff.”]