Here are two statements made this week by UCSD faculty and graduate students in response to the use of law enforcement to make arrests and break down a tent encampment in solidarity with the people of Gaza. The faculty call for Chancellor Pradeep Khosla’s immediate resignation.
UCSD Faculty Call for Chancellor’s Resignation
Faculty of the Ethnic Studies department at UC San Diego are outraged at the vicious suppression of students by our administration under the leadership of Chancellor Pradeep Khosla. This morning, May 6, 2024, Chancellor Khosla called on the UCPD, the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department, and California Highway Patrol in military riot gear to raid an encampment of peaceful demonstrators exercising their free speech to demand the University’s divestment from the genocide taking place in Gaza. The attack by police led to the violent arrest of over 65 students and other UCSD-affiliated protestors who were held for hours in the Price student center before being bused to local jails where they remain in custody.
While the Chancellor wrongly claims that the encampment threatened safety, it was the administration’s response that posed the real threat. Hostile actions by the administration and the police they ordered onto campus caused disastrous upheaval, including physical injuries and an authoritarian fracturing of peaceful student organizing and community. The deployment of police, including snipers on top of the Student Health Building, was a shocking abdication of the Chancellor’s mandate to support and protect our students. In response to the administration’s actions under Chancellor Khosla’s leadership, we make the following demands:
1. We demand the immediate resignation of Chancellor Khosla. His actions this morning placed hundreds of students in danger at the hands of aggressive, militantly organized police and resulted in arrests and injuries; violated the constitutional rights of our students to peacefully assemble and protest; and demonstrated a level of hostility against our students that has absolutely no place among University leadership. For all these reasons Chancellor Khosla is unfit to serve UCSD any longer.
2. We demand amnesty for all. The administration must grant amnesty to all students, faculty, and staff associated with the encampment–both those currently detained and any who may be the subject of future investigation–and refrain from retaliation against them through student conduct proceedings. We also demand the reversal of recent suspensions.
3. We demand police be removed from campus immediately and permanently. UCPD, San Diego County Sherrifs, California Highway Payroll, and all other police have no place on the UC San Diego campus and should never be called upon to surveil, repress, and threaten our students.
As we have seen across the country in recent weeks and in decades past, the weapons police bring onto campuses inevitably lead to escalation and grievous injury, or worse, and have no place at educational institutions. Moreover, police presence does not make students feel safer–on the contrary, the arrival of police heightens community tensions, worsens relations among community members, and is a chilling act of repression and censorship. The police presence on campus advertises to the world, including parents and prospective students, that UCSD responds to conscientious, peaceful student dissent with clubs rather than dialogue.
The Ethnic Studies department supports the demands outlined by Students for Justice in Palestine and unequivocally condemns today’s attacks by the administration and the San Diego County Sherrifs Department and the California Highway Patrol. We will be closely following the administration’s actions in the coming days and will continue organizing with colleagues to hold the UCSD administration accountable for the protection of our students and their civil rights.
Statement from UCSD Graduate Students Condemning UCSD’s Response to Student Protest
We, the graduate students of UC San Diego, unequivocally condemn the administration’s aggressive response to the peaceful protests on campus. The decision to characterize the protest as non-peaceful and to deploy law enforcement to forcefully clear the encampment is an egregious violation of the principles of justice, equity, and freedom of expression that our institution claims to uphold.
Today’s events directly contradict what we teach, including the rich history of activism at UCSD, which has long been celebrated as a beacon of social change and progress. The actions taken by the administration stand in stark contrast to these values, undermining the very ethos of our institution and betraying the legacy of those who have fought tirelessly to make UCSD a place where activism is not only welcomed but celebrated.
This blatant disregard for the rights of students to engage in peaceful protest is unacceptable. Instead of engaging in meaningful dialogue and addressing the concerns of students, the administration has chosen to escalate tensions and resort to violence.
We demand accountability from the UCSD administration. We call upon them to acknowledge the harm caused by their actions, to immediately cease all further use of force against peaceful protesters, and to engage in genuine dialogue and reconciliation with the affected members of our community.
As graduate students committed to justice and human rights, we refuse to stand idly by in the face of such injustice. We stand in solidarity with our fellow students and all those who have been impacted by these events. We will continue to speak out, to mobilize, and to fight for a campus community that values and respects the rights and dignity of all its members.
Signed,
UC San Diego Graduate Students
May 6, 2024
For a full list of signatories, please see this hyperlinked Google Doc.
Compare descriptions in the demand letters with the paultry coverage, if any, by Corporate Media Monopoly run local San Diego tv newsrooms, including KPBS, of the extensively abusive, and needlessly violent tactics accepted, condoned and administered by UCSD Administration. Boycott!
Actions have consequences. Congratulations kids, you now have your protest merit badges and an arrest record.
But I have to wonder, where was the outrage when Russia invaded Ukraine?
Good learning experience for them.
There has been a $175 Billion worth of outrage since Russia invaded Ukraine.