{"id":2918,"date":"2026-04-19T23:12:30","date_gmt":"2026-04-19T23:12:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jewishflorida.news\/?p=2918"},"modified":"2026-04-19T23:12:30","modified_gmt":"2026-04-19T23:12:30","slug":"jewish-students-blocked-harassed-at-james-fishback-usf-appearance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jewishflorida.news\/en\/jewish-students-blocked-harassed-at-james-fishback-usf-appearance\/","title":{"rendered":"Jewish students blocked, harassed at James Fishback USF appearance"},"content":{"rendered":"
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An alleged violation of civil rights happened during an event that coincided with Holocaust Remembrance Day.<\/div>\n
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James Fishback\u2019s<\/strong>\u00a0campaign appears to be again displaying antisemitism, apparently blocking Jewish students from accessing a talk at the\u00a0University of South Florida Marshall Student Center<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0on Tuesday, despite university rules dictating that all must be permitted at events on campus. Making matters worse, USF employees seem to have been complicit.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0Young Americans for Liberty<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0and the USF Young Republicans, both official student groups, invited Fishback. Because a student group had reserved the space, university rules required the event to be open to the public. Typically, university police manage security for these events.<\/p>\n

But neither of those things happened. Fishback\u2019s team handled security on its own, and\u00a0USF police<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0were present but not in charge. Instead, Fishback\u2019s team decided who could enter.<\/p>\n

Worse, the only students known to be denied entry \u2014 three in total \u2014 were all Jewish. One was told he was a \u201cthreat,\u201d even though he showed no threatening behavior, appearance, or tone. He was wearing a Magen David and a kippah.<\/p>\n

The other two Jewish students were told they had \u201ccut the line\u201d and could not enter, even though there was no actual line. They went to the back of the crowd and tried again, but were denied entry once more.<\/p>\n

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Fishback\u2019s team spoke with USF police and told them the three students were not allowed in. After that, USF police denied the students entry without providing a reason.<\/p>\n

In a statement,\u00a0USF<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0defended the decision to deny entry.<\/p>\n

The decision was based on information provided claiming initial entry was denied \u201cafter representatives with the event witnessed them attempting to skip the line\u201d and again \u201cafter representatives with the event reported (those attempting entry) have made threats at similar past events at other universities.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cUniversity personnel made decisions to deny access to the event strictly based on the information they received about behavior observed at the USF event and at past events. No university decisions were made based on the appearance or perception of religious beliefs or affiliations. USF does not tolerate antisemitism and any other harassment, discrimination or hateful expression targeting individuals because of their religion, shared ancestry or cultural heritage,\u201d the statement continued, adding that \u201cUSF is collecting more information, including contacting any students who were not allowed to enter\u201d to better understand the situation and determine next steps.<\/p>\n

It didn\u2019t stop there.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

While waiting to get in, the Jewish students were mocked and made fun of, even though they were the ones labeled as \u201cthreats.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another Jewish student, who was not identified as Jewish by Fishback\u2019s team, and\u00a0Sylvie Feinsmith<\/strong>, a Jewish professional on campus, were allowed in. Feinsmith witnessed behavior and heard comments she described as \u201cgoing back in a time machine\u201d because of the racist and antisemitic rhetoric.<\/p>\n

\u201cFishback touched on real problems faced by everyday American citizens, but wrapped them in a hateful package that blamed various groups,\u201d she said. \u201cHe said we have an addiction problem in this country, and it is not drugs or alcohol but\u00a0AIPAC<\/strong><\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHe claimed that Zionists, along with Russian oligarchs, are why we cannot afford houses, because Zionists want to buy their second or third home here,\u201d Feinsmith continued.\u00a0\u201cThe crowd reaction when he said these things was a roar of applause.\u201d<\/p>\n

Feinsmith also overheard people in the audience using terms like \u201cgoy slop\u201d to refer to Jews, saying \u201cI want to go to a Klan rally,\u201d and using \u201c6 million,\u201d a reference to Jews killed in the Holocaust, as an insult or a joke.<\/p>\n

She saw more than one participant give the Nazi salute.<\/p>\n

All of this happened on Yom HaShoah, the Jewish day of remembrance for Holocaust victims.<\/p>\n

Fishback is scheduled to visit\u00a0Florida Atlantic University<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0on Monday and has already been to the University of Florida (UF).<\/p>\n

While there are a lot of videos of Fishback\u2019s speech, it\u2019s not yet known if there are recordings of the Jewish students being taunted or denied entry by university officials.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, proposed funding with bipartisan support in the upcoming state budget would help combat antisemitism on campus. Sponsored by Sen.\u00a0Alexis Calatayud<\/strong>\u00a0and Rep.\u00a0Allison Tant<\/strong>, the funding\u00a0is important for protecting Jewish students on seven Florida campuses: USF, Florida State University, FAU, UF, Florida International University, University of Central Florida, and University of Miami.<\/p>\n

When the Legislature returns in June to finalize the state budget, the funding would directly impact campuses\u2019 ability to uphold the law, protect Jewish students equally, and respond to the growing hate from both sides of the political spectrum.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An alleged violation of civil rights happened during an event that coincided with Holocaust Remembrance Day. James Fishback\u2019s\u00a0campaign appears to be again displaying antisemitism, apparently blocking Jewish students from accessing a talk at the\u00a0University of South Florida Marshall Student Center\u00a0on Tuesday, despite university rules dictating that all must be permitted at events on campus. Making […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2919,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"set","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2918","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-article"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jewishflorida.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2918","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jewishflorida.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jewishflorida.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jewishflorida.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jewishflorida.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2918"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jewishflorida.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2918\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2920,"href":"https:\/\/jewishflorida.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2918\/revisions\/2920"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jewishflorida.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2919"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jewishflorida.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2918"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jewishflorida.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2918"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jewishflorida.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2918"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}