WASHINGTON (CN) — Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee began a formal investigation this week into a university research center at the root of lawmakers’ opposition to a White House judicial nominee, accusing the program of platforming “terrorist sympathizers.”
Rutgers University’s Center for Security, Race and Rights became a flashpoint in the Judiciary Committee last month as it considered the nomination of Adeel Mangi, tapped by the White House to fill a vacancy on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals.
Republicans on the panel bristled at Mangi’s experience as a member of the center’s advisory board, a position he held from 2019 to 2023. Lawmakers were particularly critical of anti-Zionist events hosted by the program, and what they said were antisemitic statements from the center’s director, Sahar Aziz.
Mangi, a partner at New York law firm Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler, has mostly distanced himself from the Rutgers program. The nominee told lawmakers in December that the center’s advisory board met just once a year to discuss issues of potential academic focus and that he wasn’t familiar with the events in question.
Despite that, Judiciary Committee Republicans have turned up the heat on the Rutgers center, demanding in a Tuesday letter that university president Jonathan Holloway and board chairman William Best turn over details about the program’s financial backing.
The lawmakers, led by South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham, rehashed their complaints about the center, which they said sponsors “events featuring antisemitic speakers, individuals who justify violence against the State of Israel, terrorist sympathizers and advocates for domestic radicalism.”
The Republicans pointed to a series of examples they said illustrate that point, including a 2021 event sponsored by the program commemorating the 20th anniversary of 9/11. Invited to speak at that event was Sami Al-Arian, an academic scholar who was indicted in 2003 for providing material support to Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a U.S.-designated terror group.
The letter also cited an event the Center for Security, Race and Rights held in October featuring former George Washington University psychology professor Lara Sheehi. The Republicans complained that the lecture, titled “Psychoanalysis Under Occupation: Practicing Resistance in Palestine,” took place just days after Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel.
The event, part of the center’s “Humanizing the Other” lecture series, was named after Sheehi’s 2022 book of the same name. According to social media posts from the program, Sheehi had been scheduled to speak as part of the lecture series since at least August 2023.
Republican lawmakers also dialed in on Aziz, accusing her of having a “track record of promoting vile, anti-Semitic propaganda.”
“The work of the center, its promotion of terrorist sympathizers, and its platforming of radial ideologues is troubling to us as members of the Senate Judiciary Committee,” the letter read, adding that “it is appropriate to evaluate the organizational and financial backing of groups that seek to legitimize violence and provide platforms to terrorist sympathizers.”
The lawmakers requested information on whether the center is supported by federal or state funds, and if it had ever received money from government or state-funded entities. They also demanded to know whether the program has ever received funds from a foreign government, either directly or indirectly.
The Republicans further asked Holloway and Best to answer for the center’s events and Aziz’s comments, inquiring whether the university leaders “support the continued existence of the center under the leadership of Ms. Aziz.”
A spokesperson for Rutgers did not immediately return a request for comment. The Center for Security, Race and Rights also did not immediately respond to a media inquiry.
Senate Judiciary Republicans on Tuesday penned a similar letter to Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler, which Mangi told lawmakers in January had contributed at least $13,000 to the center’s law fellows program.
“We find it troubling that one of America’s premier law firms would financially support such an organization,” the letter said.
A spokesperson for Patterson Belknap did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Republican lawmakers have for weeks made the center the crux of their opposition to Mangi’s Third Circuit appointment. A group of House Republicans in January penned a letter to President Biden urging him to walk back the nomination, arguing that Mangi had not denounced the Rutgers program or its “radical ideology.”
During his December 2023 confirmation hearing, Mangi said he “unequivocally would condemn terrorism or people associated with it.”
The White House has said that it stands by Mangi and has branded Republican opposition to his appointment as “vile, unconscionable smears.”
Senate Democrats have also come to the nominee’s defense, arguing that lawmakers should not hold Mangi accountable for the actions or statements of others. New Jersey Senator Cory Booker said during a January meeting in the Judiciary Committee that his Republican colleagues were seeking “guilt by association” for the prospective jurist.
Judiciary Committee Chair Dick Durbin accused Republicans of targeting Mangi for his Muslim-American background — a charge some lawmakers aggressively rebuffed.
A spokesperson for Judiciary Committee Democrats said in an emailed statement Wednesday that Republicans' letter to Rutgers was "a fishing expedition targeting a highly qualified judicial nominee who, when confirmed, will be the first Muslim-American circuit court judge in our nation's history."
The committee spokesperson also criticized Republicans for reaching out to Mangi's law firm in what they called "an unprecedented move."
"Senate Judiciary Republicans stooped to a new low in December, hurling meritless, Islamophobic insults and unfounded lines of questioning at Mr. Mangi," the spokesperson said, "and now they've stooped even lower by attempting to intimidate his employer."
Despite Republican fury over Mangi’s nomination, the Third Circuit appointee is currently awaiting a confirmation vote on the Senate floor. The Judiciary Committee approved his nomination on a party-line vote last month.
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