Business leaders pressed NYC Mayor Adams to disperse Columbia protesters: report

A group of wealthy business owners and investors pressed New York City Mayor Eric Adams to disperse anti-Israel protesters at Columbia University in the city, according to a report by the Washington Post.

Business leaders urged Adams to use his influence with Columbia's president and board of trustees to get permission to send police to the campus and disperse the protesters. Those protests, which have been criticized as being antisemitic and raising security concerns, have prompted the university to cancel its main commencement ceremony.

The Post reported that business leaders created a WhatsApp group chat in the wake of Hamas' terror attack on Israel on Oct. 7, which prompted Israel to retaliate with an incursion into Gaza aimed at rooting out Hamas from its stronghold and eliminating the group as a military force.

Among the executives who raised their concerns in the group chat reviewed by the outlet included former Starbucks CEO Howard Shultz, Dell founder and CEO Michael Dell, hedge fund billionaire Bill Ackman and Thrive Capital founder Joshua Kushner, who is the brother of Jared Kushner, the son-in-law of former President Trump.

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The chat group, which reportedly has about 100 members and was started by an aide to billionaire real estate investor Barry Sternlicht, includes more than a dozen members of the Forbes annual list of billionaires, according to the Post.

The outlet reported that it obtained communications from people with direct access to the chat's logs that were shared on the condition of anonymity. It also said that members of the group verified the chat's existence and their comments within it.

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Several executives held a Zoom call with Adams on April 26, about a week after he first sent the NYPD to Columbia's campus, per the report. The call included Daniel Lubetzky, founder of snack food company Kind, as well as hedge fund manager Daniel Loeb, billionaire Len Blavatnik and investor Joseph Sitt.

The Post reported that the chat shows the group discussed potentially hiring private investigators to aid the NYPD in addressing the campus protests, as well as donations to Adams' campaign.

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However, it noted the city said it has not and is not using private investigators and rejected the notion that the NYPD's efforts to break up protests at Columbia were due to donors' requests, saying it was in response to a request from campus administrators.

The group also discussed efforts to raise awareness of Hamas' atrocities on Oct. 7 by arranging screenings of a roughly 40-minute film compiled from body cameras and cellphone recordings made by Hamas militants participating in the terror attack. Some members of the group also said they received briefings from the Israeli government, according to the report.

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The chat group was shut down this month because the activities had expanded beyond the original intent of the group and that those who had launched it weren't actively participating about seven months after the group launched, the Post reported.