Dive Brief:
- The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission filed a joint resolution agreement along with the University of Pennsylvania on Thursday, dropping agency efforts to enforce a subpoena seeking identification and personal contact information of Penn’s employee population, per a court filing (EEOC v. The Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania).
- In exchange, Penn agreed to dismiss its appeal to the 3rd Circuit as moot and not to seek vacatur of the district court’s opinion in the case.
- The filing represents a simmering down of tensions in a case that stemmed from a December 2023 commissioner’s charge filed by Andrea Lucas, now-chair of the commission. That charge alleged the university subjected staff to and failed to address antisemitic harassment.
Dive Insight:
EEOC filed the subpoena enforcement action in November 2025, requesting Penn identify “witnesses to and victims of the religious-based harassment” and provide their contact information.
Penn pushed back on the subpoena request in a January court filing, saying it had already provided nearly 900 pages of information to the agency but that its workers’ privacy interests outweighed the agency’s need for access to the information.
In its January opposition to EEOC’s enforcement request, Penn said the “sole dispute” over the subpoena was in relation to the agency’s demand for lists that compiled workers by their Jewish faith, association with Jewish organizations and studies, participation in Jewish programming and de-anonymized responses to surveys on antisemitism, alongside personal contact information.
A spokesperson for Penn told HR Dive the university sought the consent of the community members whose information EEOC requested. Where given consent, the university passed the information along, it said. Where employees did not consent, Penn did not provide their information.
“The EEOC insists that Penn produce this information without the consent — and indeed, over the objections — of the employees impacted while entirely disregarding the frightening and well-documented history of governmental entities that undertook efforts to identify and assemble information regarding persons of Jewish ancestry,” Penn wrote at the time.
On March 31, Pennsylvania District Court Judge Gerald Pappert ruled Penn would have to comply with the subpoena and turn over the information, although without revealing any employee’s affiliation with a specific organization. Pappert called comparing EEOC’s efforts to protect Jewish workers to the Holocaust and Nazis’ lists of Jews “unfortunate and inappropriate.”
Roughly one month later, however, the same judge granted Penn a stay while the university appealed to the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court. The parties filed the resolution agreement before the 3rd Circuit had considered the case.
While the court filing ends the legal battle over the subpoena, the agreement did not specify an end to EEOC’s investigation.
“With the support of many members of the community who have stood with Penn throughout, the University has been able to protect its employees’ rights and none of the subpoenaed personal contact information was disclosed,” a spokesperson for Penn told HR Dive. “Penn remains committed to fighting antisemitism and all other forms of discrimination, to ensure everyone it serves can learn, work, and thrive.”
EEOC declined to add anything on the case beyond court filings.
