The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) gave UCSB a grade bump from a D (“Deficient Approach”) to a B (“Better than Most”) in their latest Campus Anti-Semitism Report Card for 2026.
In a statement, ADL Santa Barbara/Tri-Counties Regional Director Joshua Burt said that UCSB’s promotion “was earned through diligent improvements in campus policies, enforcement, and outreach to the Jewish community.”
The ADL is a U.S.-based Jewish civil rights and lobbying group that spent almost $1.5 million on domestic policy in 2025. Founded in 1913 to protect against Jewish discrimination, the ADL describes itself as “the leading anti-hate organization,” stating on their website that they “speak out on behalf of all marginalized communities across the country and around the globe.”
For the past three years, the ADL has been issuing report cards for universities based on three criteria: “Publicly Disclosed Administrative Actions,” “Jewish Life on Campus,” and “Campus Conduct and Climate Concerns.” Despite earning a D on the previous report card, UCSB was ranked “excellent” for Jewish Life on Campus in 2025 and maintained that rating for 2026.
UCSB earned “above expectations” marks in the category assessing campus administration. The organization commended campus leadership’s response to anti-Semitic acts against Jewish fraternity Alpha Epsilon Pi as recently as January 10, when two people broke into the fraternity and defaced a bathroom mirror with a shaving-cream swastika.
“Chancellor [Dennis] Assanis and his administration responded quickly and appropriately to address the incidents and open timely investigations,” stated Joshua Burt.
Out of the 135 universities ranked in 2025, almost 50 percent improved their scores in 2026. These institutions “adopt clearer anti-Semitism definitions, expand training, formalize accountability structures, enforce policies consistently, and integrate anti-Semitism into broader non-discrimination and campus safety frameworks.”
Back in 2024, the Department of Education opened a Title VI investigation on UCSB following anti-Zionist messages were posted in the MultiCultural Center, which was scheduled to be used for a Shabbat dinner. By December, the department issued an outline of actions that the university must take to address anti-Semitism on campus. In December 2025, former Associated Student Body President Tessa Veksler, who was targeted in the 2024 MultiCultural Center incident, filed a Title VI lawsuit against UCSB alleging months of harassment due to her Jewish identity and failure by campus leadership to protect her from discrimination.
In July 2025, Chancellor Assanis announced the formation of two new advisory committees: one focused on anti-Semitism, the other on Islamophobia and anti-Palestinian bias.
The category that UCSB leaves room for improvement is “campus conduct and climate concerns.” The ADL notes concern for the number of severe anti-Zionist incidents on and around campus, and the level of “hostile aniti-Zionist” student group, faculty, and staff activity.
The ADL lists groups such as Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) — which both have chapters at UCSB — in their Center on Extremism. The mission of this center is to “track extremist trends, ideologies, and groups across the ideological spectrum,” and keeps a staff that “strategically monitor, expose, and disrupt extremist threats.”
In recent years, the ADL has faced backlash by both ends of the political spectrum. Questions and concerns arose both internally and externally about what the organization considers anti-Semitism after ADL CEO Johnathan Greenblatt stated that “anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism” at the organization’s National Leadership Summit in 2022.
Following the attacks of October 7, 2023, progressive advocacy groups, such as the Center for Constitutional Rights, have claimed that the ADL has pushed for U.S. anti-terrorism law to be expanded to include advocates for Palestinian liberation, sparking freedom-of-speech concerns, particularly on college campuses. After ADL included Turning Point USA — a conservative advocacy group founded by the late Charlie Kirk with a chapter at UCSB — in its “Glossary of Extremism and Hate,” FBI Director Kash Patel severed the FBI’s ties with the ADL in October 2025.
