A Michigan-based Muslim group filed a federal complaint against the University of Michigan on Thursday, alleging the school has created a “racially hostile environment” for Arab students and their allies by “actively ignoring its obligations under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act.”
The complaint also cites what appears to be leaked audio of University of Michigan president Santa Ono discussing “unbalanced” political pressure from Congress and “powerful groups” to crack down on antisemitism on campus, but not Islamophobia.
“The government could call me tomorrow and say in a very unbalanced way, ‘The university is not doing enough to combat antisemitism.’ And I could say, ‘It’s not doing enough to combat Islamophobia,’ and that’s not what they want to hear. So the whole situation is not balanced,” Ono said in the audio, which was released by the Tahrir Coalition earlier this week.
“There are powerful groups, you may know that my peers from presidents of other universities have been in the hot seat in Congress,” Ono appears to say in the recording.
“The question from Congress is not balanced. It’s focused almost entirely on antisemitism, which I think is an issue, but there’s also Islamophobia as well. And so you can see, they’re a very powerful group, who are not shy to say that they will hold the whole institution accountable for not addressing antisemitism. And to have the government say something like, ‘Well we will withhold your $2 billion in funding, if you don’t address antisemitism.’”
On Tuesday, a spokesperson for the University of Michigan declined to confirm whether the audio is accurate, and if so, in what context it was recorded.
“The University of Michigan is steadfastly committed to ensuring our community remains a safe and supportive environment, where all students – regardless of race, religion, ethnicity or other identities – have the opportunity to learn and thrive,” the spokesperson said via email.
“President Santa J. Ono has spoken out repeatedly against antisemitism and Islamophobia, and he will continue to do so, as any form of discrimination or hate is an affront to our community.”
The Tahrir Coalition, a group of more than 100 student groups at the University of Michigan, declined to say how it obtained the recording and when it was made, beyond saying it came from an anonymous tip.
Amy V. Doukoure, the staff attorney for The Council on American Islamic Relations - Michigan (CAIR-MI) which filed the federal complaint, said they have “been able to confirm that it is a valid audio recording and we have a general time frame for when it was recorded.”
"We believe that those statements, coupled with what's taking place on campus, are a clear indication that the University of Michigan and President Ono have buckled to that pressure," she said.
“We had reached out to the university for several months, actually with no response, outlining several concerns we have with the way that students were being treated, especially Muslim students, Arab students and those students who are allied with Muslims and Arabs,” Doukoure said on Stateside on Thursday.
“And so we had general concerns anyways that it appeared that University of Michigan was ignoring rampant Islamophobia on campus, and was sort of painting Muslims and Arab students as being sort of aggressive and problematic. When in reality, their concerns were being ignored.
"So the audio recording kind of verified for us what we already believed, which was there was a push to ignore what was happening to Muslims on campus.”
Last month, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel announced charges against 11 individuals, mostly students and alumni, stemming from encampment protests at the University of Michigan’s diag in May.
And at a protest on campus earlier this week, some Pro-Palestinian protestors were pepper sprayed by police, and one was detained and later released, according to reporting from the Michigan Daily.
Doukoure said video clips on social media from the October 7 protest appeared to show law enforcement “were heavily antagonizing the pro-Palestinian protesters and very, very violently clearing them from the diag, while they allowed the counter-protesters who were not lawfully present because they didn't have a permit to be there that day, stand around, cheer them on and really cause chaos,” she said.
“And they were not targeted for any type of law enforcement interaction and removal from the diag, unlike what was happening with the pro-Palestinian protesters. And this is kind of a pattern that we've seen over and over and over again.”
A spokesperson for the University of Michigan Department of Public Safety & Security did not immediately return a request for comment.
A federal consent agreement
In June, the University of Michigan reached a consent agreement with the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights, in response to an OCR investigation of complaints alleging the school discriminated against Jewish or Israeli students “by failing to respond to incidents of harassment during the 2023-2024 school year consistent with the requirements of Title VI.”
(The Office of Civil Rights released a list of complaints that resulted in investigations of schools for “alleged discrimination involving shared ancestry or ethnic characteristics.” Two were filed about the University of Michigan, alleging antisemitism on campus.)
The agreement established a series of steps the University will take “to ensure compliance with the requirements of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VI)...which prohibit discrimination on the bases of race, color, and national origin, including shared ancestry or ethnic characteristics.”
That includes completing a report with “conclusions about the climate at the University, separately addressing the climate for students of shared Jewish or Muslim/Arab ancestry among other student groups at the University.”
The federal complaint filed by CAIR-MI alleges the University is failing to meet the terms of that consent agreement, and asks the OCR to investigate “whether or not the University of Michigan is in compliance with their obligations under Title VI to ensure that Muslims, Arabs, Palestinians, South Asians and allied students are not subjected to a hostile environment based on their real or perceived shared identity or ethnic characteristics,” according to the complaint.
“We believe that the further incidents that have happened since that date, and also the statements made by President Ono, are a clear indication that they're not upholding their end of the bargain on that consent resolution,” Doukoure said.
Asked if both Jewish and Muslim students may simultaneously be unsafe or mistreated on campus, Doukoure said that's possible.
“The tensions are very, very high and emotions are very, very high and very real,” she said. “And I don't think that inherently one has to be true while the other has to be false. And I think that the University of Michigan, through President Ono’s statements that were leaked, and also through the fact that they entered into a consent resolution, which inherently and expressly states that they didn't do enough to create a more safe environment for Jewish and Muslim students on campus, is an acknowledgment that those two things are are equal.
"The problem is when it comes to addressing those situations, the manner in which the university is acting to address those situations has been, quite frankly, as president said, unbalanced.”
A spokesperson for the University of Michigan did not respond to requests for comment on the CAIR-MI federal complaint before deadline.
