YAF Files Federal Civil Rights Complaint Against Davidson College
National conservative group reveals it represents two alumnae in federal civil-rights filing
Editor’s note: This article has been updated to include a follow-up statement from YAF Chief Communications Officer Spencer Brown on behalf of attorney Madison Hahn.
On October 15, the national conservative advocacy group Young America’s Foundation (YAF) announced that its legal team had filed a federal civil rights complaint on behalf of alumnae Cynthia Huang ’25 and Hannah Fay ’25, alleging violations of Title VI, Title IX, and President Trump’s recent executive orders.
The filing was originally submitted by Huang and Fay, who first announced their complaint in The Daily Signal earlier this month. YAF’s latest article clarifies that its legal team now represents the two alumnae in pursuing the case.
Huang and Fay were leaders of the campus chapter of Young Americans for Freedom, a chapter of YAF, and were recently recognized by the national organization as “Rookie Chapter of the Year” for their on-campus events and unrelenting advocacy efforts. The Davidson filing is one of several civil-rights complaints YAF has filed against colleges nationwide in recent months.
The 23-page complaint requests the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights to open an investigation and withhold federal funds from Davidson. It also calls for the DOE to compel Davidson to “apply appropriate remedial actions,” naming President Douglas Hicks, Director of Student Rights and Responsibilities Makenzie “Mak” Tompkins, and Director of Student Activities Emily Eisenstadt.
When The Lux asked Huang and Fay’s attorney, Madison Hahn, to clarify what “remedial actions” might entail, Hahn said the federal government could require Davidson to repay funds used “during the term of its discrimination” and compel administrators “to explain publicly why they chose discrimination over the protection of civil rights.”
The complaint raises five allegations against Davidson College. The first three invoke Title VI, claiming the college discriminated against Huang and Fay for their pro-Israel expression. Though neither student is Jewish or of Israeli descent, the complaint claims Davidson officials perceived them as part of that group because of their pro-Israel advocacy and discriminated against them on that perceived basis. YAF argues that, for the purposes of Title VI, the students were effectively treated as Jewish and thus subjected to identity-based harassment.
The final two allegations fall under Title IX, asserting that the college’s handling of a YAF Instagram post about Algerian boxer Imane Khelif—whom the post suggested was male—amounted to impermissible regulation of sex-based speech.
Allegation 1: Discrimination Against Pro-Israel Messages
The first allegation asserts that Davidson violated Title VI by permitting pro-Palestinian expression while restricting comparable pro-Israel speech, which YAF contends constitutes discrimination on the “basis of identity.”
In October 2024, YAF leaders Cynthia Huang and Hannah Fay distributed The Five Myths About Israel Perpetrated by the Pro-Hamas Left by Robert Spencer to counter what they saw as one-sided campus discourse. The pamphlet denounced the pro-Palestine movement as rooted in “Jew-hatred” and had a controversial claim that “[t]here is no such thing as a Palestinian people.”
According to YAF, soon after copies appeared around campus, the Director of College Union and Student Activities, Emily Eisenstadt, ordered Huang to stop distributing them. YAF frames this as evidence of a double standard. The filing contrasts the restriction on the Spencer pamphlet with the college’s approval of Students Against Imperialism’s materials at the January 2025 Winter Student Activities Fair. That group distributed the pamphlet “International Intifada: An Urgent Call to Participate in the Colonizer’s Execution,” which included the line, “No amount of killing of Americans, Brits, and Israelis will free us from colonial domination.”
The complaint argues that Davidson allowed the anti-Israel pamphlet without intervention while banning YAF’s pro-Israel pamphlet, and characterizes the discrepancy as discrimination on the basis of perceived identity.
Allegation 2: Harassment of Pro-Israel Students
The second allegation claims that Director of Student Rights and Responsibilities Mak Tompkins violated Title VI by “harassing, intimidating, and threatening” Cynthia Huang on the basis of her pro-Israel advocacy. The complaint characterizes Tompkins’s handling of the matter as an effort to suppress Huang’s expression under the guise of a neutral disciplinary process.
Nearly a year after the pamphlet’s distribution, Huang received a “Notice of Investigation” from Director of Student Rights and Responsibilities Mak Tompkins on February 28, 2025. The letter stated that the Dean of Students Office had received several complaints alleging that YAF’s pro-Israel pamphlets contained “misinformation that promotes Islamophobia.” It further stated that such material could violate the college’s harassment policy under the Student Code of Responsibility by creating a hostile or offensive educational environment.
Tompkins then presented Huang with two “resolution options”—a Mutual Resolution Agreement, which required accepting responsibility and an accountability plan, or a Code of Responsibility Council hearing, where a panel would determine guilt and impose sanctions. The complaint contends that these options were framed as mandatory, effectively pressuring Huang to admit fault or face a public trial.
Huang rejected both, calling the agreement “a false admission of wrongdoing” and the hearing “a kangaroo court.” She repeatedly asked Tompkins what would happen if she declined to participate. Emails cited in the complaint show that Tompkins ignored the question several times before finally acknowledging that Huang could, in fact, decline the process entirely.
Finally, Tompkins sent Huang a nondisciplinary “warning” citing Davidson’s harassment policy and noting that several students said the pamphlets “made it more difficult for them to feel safe or welcome on campus.” YAF denounces this as a de facto punishment, arguing that the warning effectively laid the groundwork for future discipline if Huang circulated similar materials again and that “censorship in and of itself is punishment.”
Allegation 3: Unequal Enforcement of Complaints
The third allegation addresses the college’s response to reported death threats. According to the complaint, when other students reported Huang after the distribution of the YAF pamphlet, Tompkins responded by initiating disciplinary action. By contrast, when Huang later reported that she had been subject to death threats as a result of the same controversy, the filing asserts that the college did not take comparable action.
The complaint further describes email correspondence between Huang and President Douglas Hicks. Initially, both parties welcomed a private in-person meeting to discuss the threats and the alleged discriminatory treatment. But the meeting never occurred after Hicks declined Huang’s request to include her mother and instead proposed that only Huang and a faculty advocate of her choice attend. As a result, the filing notes, Huang’s concerns were never presented to the president in person.
The complaint argues that the difference in administrative response supports the claim that the college’s enforcement, or non-enforcement, was dependent on the students’ pro-Israel expression rather than on consistent policy application.
Allegation 4 & 5: Censorship and Harassment Over Biological-Sex Expression
The complaint also raises a separate Title IX claim tied to the chapter’s repost of a “Libs of TikTok” post, which calls into question the gender identity of Algerian boxer Imane Khelif. It states that Tompkins notified Huang that the repost could fall under the college’s harassment policy after other students reported it as transphobic and said it made them feel unsafe.
The filing argues that this was a regulation of speech relating to biological sex and cites Executive Order 14168, which stipulates that “women are biologically female” and “men are biologically male”, to assert that such expression is protected and that investigating it went beyond what Title IX permits.
In a statement to The Lux, YAF Chief Communications Officer Spencer Brown said:
“YAF is moving swiftly to remedy Davidson College administrators’ egregious, viewpoint-discriminatory actions that turned a blind eye to calls for genocide while harassing and intimidating conservative students for offering an alternative. When students are under attack for exercising their God-given rights, YAF has their back.”
Davidson’s Response
Although not every YAF-backed complaint is escalated, this one comes at a political moment when federal agencies have shown particular eagerness to intervene in college and university affairs. The Department of Education recently announced investigations into dozens of institutions over alleged antisemitism, and the Department of Justice recently found that George Washington University “acted deliberately indifferent” to antisemitic harassment and threatened punitive action unless remedial steps are taken.
If the Office for Civil Rights were to refer this complaint to the Department of Justice, Davidson could face a full investigation and possible restrictions on federal funding allocations for future years, possibly losing $5 million in federal research grants.
In a statement to The Lux, Davidson College said:
“The complaint by the two former students is without merit. While students, they and the referenced organization received the same treatment as other student organizations, including those that took the opposing view on the Gaza conflict. Davidson takes seriously its obligation to create a non-discriminatory campus environment and we comply with federal civil rights laws, including Title VI and Title IX.”