ADL study finds Jewish jobseekers face significant discrimination in US labor market ahead of new Trump admin

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) released a new study on Wednesday exposing significant discrimination Jewish and Israeli American job-seekers face in the U.S. labor market. 

The study, conducted by the ADL Center for Antisemitism Research and spearheaded by leading labor economist Bryan Tomlin, PhD, found that Jewish American job candidates needed to send 24.2% more applications to receive the same number of positive first responses from prospective employers as Americans with Western European backgrounds when applying for the same role. 

For resumes indicating an Israeli sounding name and professional background, applicants needed to send 39% more inquiries to receive the same number of responses from prospective employers compared to job-seekers whose names and experience suggested a more Western European background but who had otherwise matching qualifications, according to the study. 

As the ADL and FBI already track increased antisemitism through physical or verbal crimes such as assault, vandalism and harassment, ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt explained that their new study for the first time provides empirical data supporting how the concerning trend has trickled into the adverse treatment of Jews in the U.S. labor market. 

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"We see a clear pattern of discrimination through this empirical research which bears out what we had heard anecdotally," Greenblatt told Fox News Digital. "There is real implications at our labor market where Jewish and Israeli people are being discriminated against. It's a big problem that hasn't been reported on that we're just breaking right now."

"So this data is significant because we are on the cusp of a new political administration in Washington. And we're seeing the results of unaddressed antisemitism," he continued. "At ADL, we've been focused on this fight for a long time. But since October the 7th, we've seen a legitimization of anti-Jewish prejudice. We've seen an expansion of anti-Zionist bias." 

To conduct the study, Tomlin sent 3,000 inquiries to administrative assistance job postings – a field selected because it is ubiquitously in demand across geographical regions and is a "forward facing" role – across the United States between May and October using identical email text and resumes. The inquiries differed only in the name of the applicant, which was selected to "sound" Jewish, Israeli, or Western European, and adjusted with "signals" of likely Jewish, Israeli, or Western European background. 

The ADL said each posting was sent a single inquiry from a single applicant which was randomly assigned. Across specifications, the study found that "both the Jewish and the Israeli Treatments experienced a decrease in positive response rates relative to the control." 

Greenblatt argued that instances of anti-Israel protesters demonstrating on college campuses, harassing Jews in public places and blocking access to synagogues in the United States have "longer range implications," as those events have been "poisoning the environment" for job-seekers who can be readily identified as Jewish or Israeli. 

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"We know that anti-Zionism is antisemitism because it validates bias against people simply because of their national origin. And we're seeing that here. And we know that antisemitic rhetoric has real world consequences because it's resulting in, again, bigotry against people who are identifiably Jewish," Greenblatt told Fox News Digital. "We wouldn't tolerate this against any other group, and we shouldn't tolerate it here. Discriminating against people because of their faith, their ethnicity, their national origin is a violation of the law. And we hope that the Trump administration, specifically the Trump Labor Department, will take action to stop this once and for all." 

Greenblatt referenced a new complaint filed this week by the editor-in-chief of a student-run Jewish magazine at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).

The petition against the student government alleged that the UCLA commissioner of cultural affairs warned against hiring "Zionists," created a "no hire list," and that all students who wrote about their Jewish heritage – but did not necessarily mention Israel's war in Gaza in response to the Oct. 7 attacks – had their applications rejected, Campus Reform reported. 

"We've seen across different industries – therapists, entertainers, investors, authors, all being targeted, excluded, not hired simply because they are Jewish. We've seen black lists circulating trying to determine who is a, quote, Zionist. And I think what this study shows is … those kind of campaigns have a real world impact," Greenblatt told Fox News Digital. "The people pursuing these efforts are not a sort of activists. They're bigots. And they create an environment that's poisoned against anyone Jewish." 

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"And again, anecdotally, we have seen this in the past," Greenblatt said. "Now, we have the empirical data that substantiates why I hope President Trump, why I hope the White House, will step up and stop this in its tracks. When he was in the White House four years ago, President Trump signed a really important executive order tackling antisemitism. And I'm optimistic that he's going to step up in this new second term and take additional steps to demonstrate that antisemitism is un-American and has no place in our society."