OPINION:
What do Cornell, Texas A&M., Georgetown and Carnegie Mellon universities have in common? They all receive billions of dollars of foreign funds — specifically, from Qatar.
Six-point-six billion, in fact.
And as Rep. Tim Walberg, Michigan Republican, told JNS.org: It’s what the money is buying that’s the concern.
“America’s adversaries exploit these financial ties to steal research, spread divisive propaganda, push indoctrination and undermine free speech,” he said. “Enough is enough.”
Indeed.
America has already had a problem with China’s communists flooding U.S. education facilities with money and influence. Think Confucius Institutes. Think Confucius Classrooms.
Now this? — “Qatar and the Muslim Brotherhood Funding of Higher Education in the United States,” a headline from The Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism & Policy website. The post went on to report how as far back as 2012, ISGAP’s director, Charles Asher Small, investigated the flow of money from foreign governments to U.S. universities and discovered, “for the first time, the existence of substantial Middle Eastern funding (primarily from Qatar) to U.S. universities that had not been reported to the Department of Education, as required by law.”
Parents should know what their children are learning on college campuses. And certainly, donors don’t generally donate without holding some sort of expectation of a return favor — or return on investment.
“ISGAP has uncovered and established that the foreign donations from Qatar, especially, have had a substantial impact on fomenting growing levels of antisemitic discourse and campus politics at U.S. universities, as well as growing support for anti-democratic values within these institutions of higher education,” ISGAP wrote.
That explains the months and months of radicalized protesters on campuses around the nation, all driven by the same pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel, Hamas-enabling messages.
College used to be about gathering life skills and information that would help grow the learner into a productive and successful member of society. Those days are long gone. But is it too much to expect America’s universities to stay true to American principles?
“Qatar is a major Hamas financier,” the Foundation for Defense of Democracies wrote.
“Qatar blames Israel for Hamas’s attack on October 7,” FDD wrote.
“Qatar harbors top Hamas leaders,” FDD wrote.
“Qatar hosts Hamas’s political office in Doha,” FDD wrote.
Is it too much to ask American universities to not take so many billions of dollars in donations from a country that helps Hamas?
Seems so.
“Qatar has been the largest source of foreign funding for U.S. higher education institutions, according to data displayed in a new U.S. Department of Education portal,” JNS.org wrote.
American parents, beware.
Higher education today is not the same as higher education of yesteryear. And if children are the hope of the future and the promise of society to come, then all of America, not just those with children, ought to beware.
• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on X @ckchumley. Listen to her podcast “Bold and Blunt” by clicking HERE. And never miss her column; subscribe to her newsletter and podcast by clicking HERE. Her latest book, “God-Given Or Bust: Defeating Marxism and Saving America With Biblical Truths,” is available by clicking HERE.
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