UMich anti-Israel activists repeatedly block student budgets, school provides funds to keep student gov running

A University of Michigan student government meeting failed to overturn a budget veto by the anti-Israel president, but the organization still received funds from the school so it could function properly. 

The Central Student Government’s (CSG) president, Alifa Chowdhury, belongs to the Shut It Down party, which vowed to block funding for student life activities until UMich cuts off financial ties with Israel. Chowdhury has repeatedly vetoed budgets in service of her party’s campaign against the Jewish state. 

In response to Chowdhury’s veto, university administrators bypassed her obstruction and supplied the necessary funds through the Dean of Students Office. The Shut It Down party condemned the move in a statement issued by Chowdhury and CSG Vice President Elias Atkinson, calling it the “result of a few assembly members circumventing democratic, assembly-wide decision-making processes and directly approaching administration with a request for temporary funding.”

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The statement continued, asserting: “This is no longer just about student organization funding—it’s about using our positions to challenge and disrupt the status quo, to refuse complicity, and to hold our institutions accountable for their role in global oppression. We must prioritize collective liberation over individual comfort, and recognize that our fight is not just within these walls but against the imperialist forces that impact lives far beyond them.”

The party concluded its statement with “From the River to the Sea,” a slogan that has widely been perceived as a genocidal call for the destruction of the Jewish people in Israel.

The Shut It Down party platform, which the group posted to Instagram on March 20, claims that “[e]very dollar coming out of this university is blood money.” 

The platform asserts that the school’s student government “merely serves as an extension of an institution that has perpetuated systems of oppression by maintaining the current status quo of neocolonial capitalism.”

“Despite decades of student advocacy for Palestinian liberation and for divestment from the apartheid state of Israel and companies violating Palestinian human rights, the Regents have made it clear that they only heed the student government when it aligns with their financial interests,” the platform continues. 

Other student movements have also pushed their respective schools to divest from Israel, sometimes achieving success. 

[RELATED: UGA anti-Israel students claim attack on free speech as university upholds disciplinary actions against student protesters]

This August, San Francisco State University announced it will divest from companies with ties to Israel. One student boasted of the anti-Israel activists’ success, saying: “By standing with us, we were able to be the first university that was able to divest from major weapons manufacturers Lockheed Martin, Caterpillar, Palantir and Leonardo.”

Schools that have stayed firm against student activist pressure include Chapman University and the University of Minnesota.

Students at the University of Oklahoma held a divestment sit-in one day after the anniversary of 9/11. “As the semester starts back up we continue to call on our university to cut all ties with the weapons manufacturers, fossil fuel companies, and intelligence companies that profit off of genocide, occupation, and war,” the group said.

Campus Reform contacted the University of Michigan and the Central Student Government for comment. This story will be updated accordingly.