Congress keeps coming up with creative end-runs around the constitutional right to boycott.
asserted
Congress → come → right
In 2017 and 2018, members of Congress from both parties unsuccessfully pushed a bill that would use export control laws to make encouraging boycotts of Israel punishable by 20 years in prison.
asserted
encouraging → push → prison
Last year, a bipartisan coalition tried to ban "furnishing information" to an international boycott movement against Israel, only to postpone the vote due to opposition from the libertarian-leaning Rep. Thomas Massie (R–Ky.) and other Republicans.
asserted
coalition → try → Massie
On Thursday, the House of Representatives passed the Protect Economic and Academic Freedom Act, sponsored by Reps. Virginia Foxx (R–N.C.) and Josh Gottheimer (D–N.J.).
asserted
House → pass → Foxx
The bill would require federally funded universities to certify that they "will not engage in a nonexpressive commercial boycott of a major strategic partner of the United States."
asserted
they → require → States
It cites only one definition of "major strategic partner," Section 4 of Public Law 113–296, which states: "It is the sense of Congress that Israel is a major strategic partner of the United States."
asserted
Israel → cite → States
The bill still has to pass the Senate to reach the president's desk.
asserted
bill → have → desk
Foxx stated that the bill "severs any possible taxpayer support of these concrete campaigns of antisemitism in the form of BDS and academic boycotts of Israel," using the acronym for the Palestinian-led Boycott, Divest, Sanctions movement.
asserted
bill → state → movement
But Lara Friedman, president of the nonprofit Foundation for Middle East Peace, points out that the bill goes far beyond controlling taxpayer funds.
asserted
bill → point → funds
The bill would create a cause for lawsuits under the False Claims Act against universities accused of boycotting U.S. partners, Friedman writes.
uncertain
Friedman → create → partners
By making universities "prove a negative" to avoid getting sued, the bill will force them into "prioritizing maximal engagement" with those partners, she adds.
asserted
she → make → partners
In other words, the Protect Economic and Academic Freedom Act would create a kind of affirmative action for foreign nations.
asserted
Act → create → nations
And the congressional report attached to the bill is an all-out attack on Americans' constitutional right to withhold their money.
asserted
report → attach → money
It argues that the First Amendment "protected the expressive activities accompanying a boycott, not the commercial decision itself to refuse to do business with a particular entity."
asserted
Amendment → argue → entity
Friedman calls it "an alarming and novel interpretation of the Supreme Court's prior decisions," which "renders the whole notion of a 'right to boycott' meaningless, with alarming implications going far beyond Israel-Palestine issues."
asserted
notion → call → issues
Several supporters of Israel who otherwise oppose BDS came out against the Protect Economic and Academic Freedom Act, including Rep. Jerry Nadler (D–N.Y.) and the lobby group J Street, which stated that it "believes the most effective way to counter antisemitism on college campuses is through open debate, education, and renewed efforts to achieve a peaceful resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict—not through punitive legislation aimed to curb the freedom to boycott."
asserted
way → oppose → freedom
Friedman, Nadler, and J Street also pointed out that the bill's definition of "Israel" would seem to include Israeli settlements in the Palestinian territories, making selective boycotts of a specific Israeli policy illegal.
asserted
boycotts → point → policy
When the ice cream company Ben & Jerry's announced in 2021 that it would pull out of the settlements while continuing to do business inside Israel proper, several states punished Ben & Jerry's under their own state-level anti-boycott laws.
asserted
states → announce → laws
A decade ago, the Israeli government began an all-out campaign to counter the BDS movement in America, especially on college campuses.
asserted
government → begin → campuses
In 2015, the Israeli parliament held a hearing on the international threat of BDS, and future Foreign Minister Yair Lapid warned that a foreign boycott of settlements could "de-facto create a boycott on Israel in all kinds of places."
uncertain
boycott → hold → places
The newly created Ministry of Strategic Affairs was given a $36 million budget to combat BDS, and the 2019 documentary The Lobby USA found the ministry coordinating with campus-focused activist groups in America.
asserted
ministry → create → America
Several American student councils have voted to cut ties with Israel in response to the war in Gaza—including at Yale University and several University of California campuses—although none of those schools followed through.
asserted
none → vote → schools
The Protect Economic and Academic Freedom Act would specifically forbid universities from pulling out of "conferences, teaching exchanges, cultural exchanges, study abroad programs, joint research, and other collaborative educational activities" with U.S. partners.
asserted
Act → forbid → partners
After the 2024 wave of campus protests, Foxx and Gottheimer took up the mantle of fighting anti-Israel student activism.
asserted
Foxx → take → activism
Foxx has been investigating whether the protesters "have financial ties to designated Foreign Terrorist Organizations," her office told Reason in May 2024.
uncertain
office → investigate → May
Meanwhile, Gottheimer pushed the Department of Education to investigate high schoolers for antisemitism and tried to force social media companies to stamp out "terrorist" content.
asserted
Gottheimer → push → content
The Trump administration also used executive powers against the BDS movement.
asserted
administration → use → movement
Most notably, it imposed economic sanctions on Italian academic Francesca Albanese, who wrote a report for the United Nations advocating boycotts and legal actions against companies that do business with the Israeli military.
asserted
that → impose → military
Albanese, who is suing the U.S. government over the sanctions, was banned from visiting her American children and had her husband's apartment in Washington seized by the U.S. Treasury.
asserted
apartment → sue → Treasury
While these measures have been focused on Israel's opponents, they've opened the door to force Americans to do business with all kinds of entities.
asserted
they → focus → entities
States have built on their anti-BDS laws to ban boycotts of the fossil fuels, mining, agriculture, timber or firearms industries, or even companies with anti-LGBT and anti-abortion policies.
asserted
States → build → policies
"The road to erasing [the] US right to free speech/protest of ANYTHING in the US is quite literally being paved with laws to protect/promote Greater Israel/Israeli impunity," Friedman writes.
asserted
Friedman → erase → impunity
