An update on protests at PSU, UO

Gaza war protesters at two Oregon universities have made progress on their demands after weeks of demonstrations

On Friday, the Associated Students of Portland State University and PSU President Ann Cudd released a joint statement condemning the violence in Gaza and announcing new initiatives on campus. At the University of Oregon, a deal has been struck to disband the encampment students established more than three weeks ago. Tiffany Camhi is the higher education reporter for OPB. Nathan Wilk is a KLCC reporter. They join us to share details about what is happening on the two university campuses.

Note: This transcript was computer generated and edited by a volunteer.

Dave Miller: This is Think Out Loud on OPB. I’m Dave Miller. Gaza war protesters at two Oregon Universities have made progress on their demands after weeks of demonstrations. On Friday, the Associated Students of Portland State University and PSU President Ann Cudd released a joint statement condemning the violence in Gaza and announcing new initiatives on campus. At the University of Oregon, a deal has been struck to disband the encampment students established more than three weeks ago. We’ll hear what’s happening in Eugene in just a few minutes, but we start with PSU and with OPB’s higher education reporter Tiffany Camhi. Tiffany, welcome back.

Tiffany Camhi: Hi.

Miller: I want to start with this latest news. What can you tell us about the deal that was struck on Friday? It’s news that may have gone under the radar a little bit right before the Memorial Day weekend.

Camhi: Yeah, that’s true. The school sent out a press release at 4pm on Friday when many people were already on their three day weekend. What was released in the press statement was PSU’s student government and PSU’s President Ann Cudd called for a ceasefire in Gaza. And that was one of the main demands from student protesters, and it’s also something that Cudd had resisted doing in previous weeks. It also announced that the university will host a Palestinian scholar in 2025, and create a scholarship for students who have been impacted by the fighting in Gaza.

Cudd also said that she would seriously consider faculty proposals for new curriculum that would break down Islamophobia, antisemitism, anti-Palestinian, and anti-Arab rhetoric. And it also acknowledged that there have been a lot of peaceful protests on Portland State’s campus, but it also condemned all the destruction of school property and some of the violence that’s taken place during some of the demonstrations.

Miller: What about the day before? What happened on Thursday night at a protest before that announcement?

Camhi: There was a protest on campus Thursday night. Two protesters chained themselves to a university administration building and they refused to leave. A crowd of about 30 protesters surrounded them, shielding them from law enforcement who responded. PSU’s campus safety officers responded and the Portland Police Bureau responded. They asked the two protesters to leave, they refused, and then there was a scuffle that ensued after that. Some students were pushed around, shoved to the ground. PSU’s campus police chief Willie Halliburton was also there, and he suffered a medical emergency and had to be transported to hospital. It’s unspecified what that medical emergency was.

In the end, seven people were arrested, including the two that were chained to the building, and three of those people were Portland State students.

Miller: Can you just remind us briefly what happened with earlier protests?

Camhi: So I should specify, for Portland State, the protesters are not all students. It’s included a lot of people outside of the PSU community. So things really started heating up about a month ago in late April, there were some demonstrations, a small encampment formed in downtown park blocks, which goes right through the Portland State University campus. That was broken down pretty quickly by law enforcement.

The big disruption was the occupation of Millar Library. Protesters vandalized the building, they damaged furniture. No books were damaged that we know of right now. A few days in, police entered the library, dispersed the protesters. A lot of them left on their own. The demonstration then moved to the streets where pepper spray was used, it also became kind of physically violent there [and] 30 people were arrested. Now that library is closed because it needs to be restored, and a university spokesperson said there is about $750,000 in damages, in the initial assessment. They’re hoping to open it again in the fall.

Miller: What had students been asking for?

Camhi: Boycott, divest, sanction. You may have heard this – “BDS.” It echoes a lot of the calls for BDS against Israel that a lot of student protesters at other campuses across the US have been calling for. Student protesters at PSU had 13 demands, and most are focused on the university cutting ties with Boeing because it supplies military equipment to Israel. And of course, there was the call for a ceasefire which was announced last Friday.

Miller: How had the administration been responding?

Camhi: Well, Cudd did agree to pause its relationship with Boeing in late April. And she promised a debate on the ethics of the university having a relationship with Boeing. And that is scheduled for next month. I should say that PSU has no financial investments with Boeing, but it has accepted donations from the company.

Miller: To pay for things like scholarships.

Camhi: Yes, and some buildings have been named. Cudd also called in law enforcement kind of early according to some people, like the Portland Police Bureau. A lot of people are divided on that.

Miller: What, broadly, have you been hearing recently from folks on campus, from students, from staff, from faculty?

Camhi: Overall, people feel that free speech has been stifled and trust has broken down among the community, and no one really feels safe. People who worked in the library, I think there’s about 60 staff there, they don’t feel safe after it was occupied. People who identify as Jewish and are part of the Portland State community feel like there’s been a lot of antisemitism on campus and they can’t speak out. And of course, on the pro-Palestine side, those students also feel like their free speech has been stifled. So now the administration has a lot of work to do to rebuild trust.

Miller: So what’s next?

Camhi: Well, we should not expect the protests to end. PSU is still in classes and the weather is getting nicer, so there’s probably going to be a few more demonstrations, a few more rallies. Classes end the first week of June. PSU is preparing for possible protests at their commencement ceremonies. They have two big ones at the Moda Center in mid-June. And we don’t really know what to expect, but at other campuses across the US, commencement ceremonies have been disrupted by chanting from students, people waving Palestinian flags, and of course walkouts.

Miller: Tiffany, thanks very much.

Camhi: Thank you.

Miller: Tiffany Camhi is OPB’s higher education reporter.

Nathan Wilk is a reporter for KLCC in Eugene. He joins us now to talk about what’s been happening at the University of Oregon. Nathan, welcome back.

Nathan Wilk: Thanks so much.

Miller: I mentioned at the beginning that the encampment at the U of O started three or four weeks ago. How big was it at its peak?

Wilk: At its peak, estimates for the number of tents at UO’s encampment hovered around 140 to 150 tents. This took up a large amount of space and a large number of students were involved.

Miller: When we talked a few weeks ago about this, you explained that the encampment was on a really central part of campus, intentionally so, [and] that it was hard for folks just driving by or walking by to not see it. But I understand that it actually moved recently. What happened?

Wilk: Negotiations had stalled between the university and the students around the ultimatum that they said they would not leave at that point if UO did not agree to divest or start the process of divesting from Israel. So on May 16th, the encampment was moved into another location that is relatively central on campus. Still along the main 13th Road, but the new site was both a lawn across from Johnson Hall, which is the main administrative building at the University of Oregon, and also on the lawn and on the steps of Johnson Hall. When I spoke to organizers, they felt at that time that their demands would be being ignored and they wanted to be in a more central space for UO administrators, somewhere where the administration could not ignore them, could not be in their building without noticing their presence close by.

Miller: How has the administration approached the question of calling in law enforcement, calling in police officers?

Wilk: Very early on, the University of Oregon said that it did not want to call in police. As well, there were several faculty groups and the UO Senate in advance spoke about trying to discourage that office as far as the administration. And we did not see a significant police presence during this entire encampment.

I think there are a couple main mitigating factors there. When I spoke to the UO’s president, he said that student safety was a priority. As well, the university told the encampment very early on that it needed to only allow students to actually stay overnight and not community members. And so the university was able to keep this to a process that was based on student conduct and not law enforcement with outside community members.

Of course as well, students did not occupy any buildings during this encampment. There were points at which they went inside a few halls as well as the administrative building briefly. But all of those were contributing factors to UO not introducing a police presence here during the almost month that this encampment was in place.

Miller: What did protesters and the administration finally agree to recently?

Wilk: Similar to what happened at PSU, there are several new educational offerings that the UO is promising to increase, scholarships for displaced students from Gaza. But additionally, there are two key points here. The first is that the president of the University of Oregon had previously spoke about being very committed to institutional neutrality, not wanting to call for a ceasefire in Gaza. And he did switch that position in the May 22nd agreement, and did call for a ceasefire there. Additionally, the UO Senate has agreed to include students in a task force that will look at the university’s investments. And what student organizers I spoke to really see this as a middleman, a fair third party, that will help them keep contact with administration moving forward and work towards disclosure of UO’s investments.

Miller: What did you hear from student organizers or protesters about how taking part in these protests have affected them?

Wilk: They spoke about it as, first of all, an exhausting and stressful experience, particularly when they weren’t certain about police presence, as they felt a presence of UO surveillance on them. But on the flip side, what organizers I spoke to are really hopeful about moving forward is that they had a front-facing protest that was very visible on campus for many weeks and many students got involved. So they feel as they continue to try to work towards disclosure and divestment, that they have more numbers now, more people that were never involved in pro-Palestinian activism before on UO’s campus, that have now become committed organizers.

Miller: Commencement is about three weeks away. What are people that you talked to expecting?

Wilk: I’ve seen no indication that pro-Palestinian protesters are planning any sort of large scale action at commencement thus far, or at least releasing that information publicly. UO President Karl Scholz, in his letter celebrating the fact that this was a peaceful resolution to this encampment, did speak about how he was looking forward towards graduation and the end of the school year with this resolved.

Miller: Nathan, thanks very much.

Wilk: Thank you so much.

Miller: Nathan Wilk is a reporter for KLCC in Eugene.

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