Tim Tai

Student organizers with the pro-Palestine Sumud Coalition filed a legal complaint on Wednesday claiming that Yale’s continued investments in military weapons violate state law.

The 42-page complaint asked Connecticut Attorney General William Tong to investigate whether the Yale Corporation has breached its fiduciary duties under the state’s Uniform Prudent Management of Institutional Funds Act, or UPMIFA. Thirty other student and community organizations across Yale and New Haven have endorsed the complaint.

“As stewards of the endowment, state law imposes clear duties on the fiduciaries of charitable trusts, like the Corporation, including the duty to invest with consideration of the institution’s charitable purpose, the duty of loyalty, and the duty of good faith,” organizers wrote in the complaint. “We believe that the Corporation has breached all three.”

The UPMIFA requires tax-exempt nonprofit organizations such as universities to invest with charitable interests in mind. The Yale Corporation is also governed by its own ethical investment guidelines, which define a standard of grave social injury as the prerequisite for divestment from a given company or industry. Yale has previously reviewed and upheld its investments in military weapons manufacturers, stating that weapons manufacturing can contribute to authorized purposes for military and law enforcement and thus does not meet this standard.

The University spokesperson wrote to the News that Yale is reviewing the complaint and expressed confidence that the University is in compliance with the UPMIFA and its own investment guidelines.

The attorney general’s office has expressed hesitation at intervening in Yale’s investment practices. 

“The Office of the Attorney General does not believe it is lawful or appropriate for the government to use its law enforcement authority to control the financial decisions or policy choices of private universities,” Elizabeth Benton, a spokesperson for the attorney general, wrote to the News.

The complaint recapitulates arguments from previous organizing efforts against Yale’s military weapons investments, asserting that the destruction caused by military weapons companies is opposed to charitable interests and that investments in such companies are “deeply incompatible” with Yale’s investment guidelines.

The complaint is one of student activists’ latest efforts to pressure the University to divest from military weapons, especially those that arm the Israeli military. Previously, the Sumud Coalition spearheaded a student body referendum on divestment from weapons, which overwhelmingly passed in December but did not result in changes to Yale’s investment practices. In the complaint, the coalition also claims that the Yale Corporation has failed to act loyally and in good faith by ignoring sustained calls from community members to divest from military weapons manufacturers and suppliers.

Sumud Coalition organizers also allege in the complaint that a “limited review” shows that at least $4 billion of the University’s endowment is invested with asset managers with histories of investing in military weapons manufacturers and suppliers. The News has not been able to independently verify this figure, and Yale’s relationships with its asset managers do not necessarily translate to direct holdings in military weapons companies.

Yale’s February SEC filings, which account for under 0.002 percent of the University’s $41.4 billion endowment, show that the school holds $792,814 in the iShares Core S&P Total U.S. Stock Market Exchange Traded Fund. 3.25 percent of the fund’s portfolio is invested in military contracting, per Morningstar, meaning around $25,800 of Yale’s publicly available holdings is exposed to military weapons companies.

The other 99.998 percent of the Yale endowment is held in private companies and related organizations, making it difficult to determine whether and how much Yale invests in weapons companies beyond its publicly disclosed amount.

The Sumud Coalition’s complaint is similar to a complaint filed in 2022 by the Endowment Justice Coalition, a member group of the Sumud Coalition. The EJC’s 2022 complaint to Attorney General Tong alleged that Yale’s investments in fossil fuel companies also violated the UPMIFA. 

EJC organizers met with representatives of the attorney general’s office to discuss their complaint in December 2022. However, it is unclear whether the attorney general’s office ever opened an investigation into Yale’s fossil fuels investments.

When asked if the Sumud Coalition plans to continue pushing their current complaint through a long legal process, organizer Isabel Matos ’28 wrote to the News that the coalition plans to keep on building pressure “from above and below” until Yale divests from military weapons companies.

Yale’s endowment grew by $2.3 billion in the 2024 fiscal year.