At Harvard-Hosted 'Wikipedia Edit-a-Thon,' Law Students Target the Pages of Firms That Criticized School's Response to Anti-Semitism

Anti-Israel Harvard Law School students organized a workshop on the Ivy League campus earlier this month to edit the Wikipedia pages of more than a dozen prominent law firms, singling out some that threatened to stop recruiting at the school over its failure to rein in anti-Semitic activity.

Harvard’s National Lawyers Guild chapter, a left-wing legal advocacy group, hosted the "Wikipedia Edit-A-Thon" on April 2 at Harvard Law’s WCC student center, according to an announcement on Harvard Law’s website.

Third-year Harvard Law student Corinne Shanahan, an organizer with Harvard Out of Occupied Palestine, organized the clinic for students to "gather data to edit the Wikipedia pages of Big Law firms to reflect cases they have recently argued."

Two days later, Harvard Law student Aashna Avachat edited the Wikipedia pages of 14 law firms, mostly to add details of their representation of clients that the activist students deemed to be unsavory, according to a Washington Free Beacon review of Wikipedia edit logs.

Avachat edited the pages for the firms Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, and Simpson Thacher & Bartlett to soften the language about anti-Semitic activity on college campuses. Amid a wave of anti-Semitic protests following the Hamas attack on Israel, the two firms warned Harvard Law and others that they would cut back on recruiting on their campuses for failing to rein in anti-Semitic incidents.

The edit logs show Avachat changed the term "antisemitic incidents" to "pro-Palestine protests," and reworded references to "incidents targeting Jewish students" to incidents that the law firms "described … as antisemitic." Avachat herself was involved in one incident at Harvard in which her law school classmate, Ibrahim Bharmal, accosted and shoved a Jewish student during an anti-Israel "die-in." Avachat said she witnessed the incident and claimed Bharmal was protecting "peaceful protesters" against an "aggressive" Jewish student. Both Bharmal and another student activist, Elom Tettey-Tamaklo, were charged in connection with the "die-in," a case that Harvard delayed by refusing to cooperate with local prosecutors.

Jeff Neal, a spokesman for Harvard Law School, said the Wikipedia workshop "was organized by a student-run organization and does not represent the views of Harvard Law School."

But it comes at a tumultuous time for Harvard and its law school, which saw its ranking fall to its lowest on record amid concerns about anti-Israel activity on campus. The Trump administration is reviewing $9 billion in federal funding to Harvard for failing to snuff out anti-Semitic activity on campus. As part of a settlement, Harvard has agreed to crack down on student organizations involved in anti-Semitic activity.

By facilitating the event, Harvard Law could also risk alienating the country’s largest law firms, which recruit heavily at the school and are represented on its various advisory boards.

Davis Polk, one of the targets of the Wikipedia spree, is an "institutional sponsor" for Harvard Law School’s Center on the Legal Profession. Avachat added a section to the firm’s page referring to its "Defense of Segregation," based on the views of firm cofounder John Davis, who died in 1955.

Many of the edits take the law firms to task for representing corporate clients widely opposed by liberals. Avachat edited the page of Jenner & Block to critique the firm for representing Uber in a lawsuit over whether its drivers should be classified as employees or contractors. Gibson Dunn is faulted for representing the city of Grants Pass, Ore., in litigation to allow the removal of homeless encampments, according to Avachat’s edit log.

Avachat, who uses the Wikipedia name "Aashnaavachat," edited the page of Latham & Watkins, accusing the firm of having "eroded" federal agencies’ abilities to protect civil rights because of the firm’s involvement in the landmark Chevron case. Sidley Austin’s page was edited to ding the firm for filing an amicus brief in opposition to President Joe Biden’s student debt forgiveness plan.

Kirkland & Ellis is criticized for representing the New York State Pistol Association to broaden concealed carry laws, and Jones Day over its work for Walmart and gun maker Smith & Wesson, the logs show. Avachat also edited the pages of Arnold & Porter, Covington & Burling, Cravath Swaine & Moore, and Paul Weiss, the edit logs show.

Avachat and Shanahan did not respond to requests for comment.

Both are part of a faction of Harvard Law students who have pledged to forgo careers in corporate law after graduation. They signed an open letter last month to boycott Harvard’s Early Interview Program, in which hundreds of law firms meet with students to discuss prospective jobs.

The anti-Israel activities have put both students in the media spotlight.

In October 2023, the Free Beacon reported that Avachat defended Bharmal, her law school classmate, after video showed him accosting a Jewish student during an anti-Israel protest days after the Hamas attack on Israel. Avachat criticized a "far-right tabloid"—an apparent reference to the Free Beacon—for publishing video of the altercation and identifying Bharmal as one of the assailants.

Shanahan is heavily active in left-wing activities on campus, and serves as an organizer for Law Students for a Free Palestine and Harvard Out of Occupied Palestine, an anti-Israel group that has called for a "student intifada" in the fight for "Palestinian liberation." She protested earlier this year to urge Harvard to divest from Israel over its war against Hamas, saying that "it is our moral imperative to use every tactic and push every boundary in our demands for human dignity."

She has accused Harvard of enabling "Israel’s genocide in Palestine," and claims the Ivy League school was "built on genocidal displacement and enslaved labor."

"Harvard is the rotting heart of a dying empire," she said.

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