President Donald Trump will sign an executive order Wednesday declaring Judaism as a nationality, according to multiple reports.

White House officials told The New York Times and CNN confirmed that the Trump administration is seeking to define Judaism as a nationality, not just a religion, to help fight anti-Semitism on college campuses. The order would also aim to combat anti-Israel movements by requiring colleges and universities to treat them as discriminatory in order to keep their funding.

Anti-Semitic incidents rose by 57 percent in 2017, according to the Anti-Defamation League, the highest tally that the Jewish civil rights group has counted in more than two decades. Colleges rocked by hate speech incidents include Syracuse University, where Theta Tau fraternity members were caught on video using numerous racist and anti-Semitic slurs in 2018; frat brothers claimed it was satire.

According to Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Education Department can withhold funding from any educational institution that discriminates “on the ground of race, color, or national origin." The Times points out that religion was not included among the protected categories, so Trump’s order will effectively establish Jewish people as a race with a collective national origin in the Middle East, like Italian Americans or Polish Americans.

The Times reports Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law and a senior White House adviser, pushed for the move. Kushner is Jewish and his wife, Ivanka Trump, converted to Judaism.

According to Business Insider, the move angered many American Jews. Halie Soifer, Executive Director at the Jewish Democratic Council of America, called it the “height of hypocrisy.”

“If President Trump truly wanted to address the scourge of anti-Semitism he helped to create, he would accept responsibility for his role emboldening white nationalism, perpetuating anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, and repeating stereotypes that have led to violence targeting Jews,” she said in a statement. “President Trump is more interested in symbolic gestures that politicize Israel and use Jews as political pawns than actually doing something meaningful to ensure our security and that of Israel... The timing of this signing reveals this is a PR stunt, plain and simple.”

“American Jews” and #Judaism became trending topics as others shared their concerns on social media.

It is really, *really* frightening for us to be defined as a nationality. The trope of "dual loyalism" is classic antisemitism. It encourages people to view American Jews as professing greater loyalty to Israel than to the United States-- thereby making us untrustworthy. https://t.co/PyuqK1lLZX — Rabbi Emily Cohen (@ThatRabbiCohen) December 10, 2019

JUDAISM IS NOT A NATIONALITY.



AMERICAN JEWS ARE AMERICAN.



PERIOD. — Sergio Síano 🆘 (@siano4progress) December 11, 2019

Don’t compare Trump to Hitler, they said.



Trump: American Jews are officially a separate nationality.



If you’re not alarmed now, you’re not paying attention. — JRehling (@JRehling) December 11, 2019

Trump also further raised concerns days after Jewish groups criticized the president’s speech Saturday to the Israeli American Council National Summit in Florida. Trump was accused of using anti-Semitic stereotypes, suggesting attendees were wealthy and would thus support him in 2020

“A lot of you are in the real estate business because I know you very well. You’re brutal killers, not nice people at all. But you have to vote for me, you have no choice,” Trump said. He also accused some Jewish Americans of not loving Israel “enough" and said Jews wouldn’t vote for “Pocahontas” (Elizabeth Warren) because “you’re not going to vote for the wealth tax.”

The Hill reports the Jewish Democratic Council of America said his remarks were “deeply offensive” in that they repeated “negative stereotypes that have been used historically to target Jews.” The group repeated its past claims that Trump is the “biggest threat to American Jews."

We’re not going to hold our breath waiting for Trump's supporters to speak out. We are going to work tirelessly to defeat this president and those who’ve enabled him 11 months from now. — J Street (@jstreetdotorg) December 8, 2019

Last month, the Trump administration reversed four decades of American policy by declaring the U.S. no longer considers Israeli settlements in the West Bank to be a violation of international law, further undermining the Palestinians’ effort to gain statehood. Israeli leaders welcomed the repudiation of the 1978 State Department legal opinion, while Palestinians and other nations warned that it undercut any chance of a broader peace deal.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told reporters that the Trump administration believes any legal questions about settlements should be resolved by Israeli courts and that declaring them a violation of international law distracts from larger efforts to negotiate a peace deal.