• Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost files lawsuit against Hebrew Union College over plans to close its Cincinnati rabbinical school.
• Lawsuit alleges violation of a 76-year-old promise that led to millions in donations for the Cincinnati campus.
• College cited financial constraints and enrollment issues in decision to sunset the program by end of 2025-26 school year.
• Suit seeks to block campus sale, prevent transfer of restricted donations, and redirect assets to maintain a permanent rabbinical school in Cincinnati.
• Previous 2024 lawsuit over rare sacred texts at Klau Library resulted in an October settlement with protective guardrails.
Cincinnati, Ohio — Ohio’s Attorney General is taking legal action to prevent Hebrew Union College from closing its rabbinical school in the city’s Clifton neighborhood.
The institution decided last year to sunset its rabbinical school program based in Cincinnati and focus instead on its rabbinical schools in Los Angeles and New York. According to an email obtained by WLWT, the university also plans to phase out its PhD and Master of Jewish Studies programs at the Clifton location. The president of Hebrew Union College said the decisions were based on financial constraints as well as enrollment.
Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost says the college violated its promise to permanently keep a rabbinical school in Cincinnati. “Hebrew Union accepted millions of dollars in donations based on a 76-year-old promise it now would like to break,” Yost said. “We’re suing to keep these assets in Cincinnati where they belong.”
The lawsuit alleges the college violated its founding documents. Because of that promise, donors gave millions of dollars to support the Cincinnati campus over many decades. Yost says the college’s board voted to remove that requirement from its founding documents and close the Cincinnati school, claiming it’s a “breach of charitable trust.”
Yost also alleges the college has since diverted donations intended for the Cincinnati campus to its other locations in New York, Los Angeles and Jerusalem.
The lawsuit is asking the court to prohibit the sale of the Cincinnati campus and block the transfer of restricted donations out of state. The suit also seeks a full accounting of the college’s Ohio-based assets and a court order redirecting them to support a permanent rabbinical campus in Cincinnati.
Yost had previously sued the college in 2024 to prevent the sale of rare sacred texts housed at the Klau Library. A settlement reached in October established guardrails to protect the rare-book collection.
The college plans to shutter its rabbinical school in Cincinnati at the end of the 2025-26 school year.
This legal challenge underscores the tension between the college’s operational decisions and longstanding commitments to the Cincinnati community that helped build and sustain the institution.