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Tag: campus

  • South Carolina university on lockdown after fatal shooting, officials say

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    South Carolina State University officials say the campus is on lockdown following a shooting that left two people dead and one person injured.The lockdown began on Thursday around 9:15 p.m. when a shooting was reported in an apartment at the Hugine Suites student residential complex. The State Law Enforcement Division, SLED, is on site and actively investigating. While the campus remains on lockdown, officers with the Orangeburg Department of Public Safety and the Orangeburg County Sheriff’s Office are patrolling along with the university’s Department of Public Safety.University officials have yet to confirm the victims’ identities or the condition of the wounded person. All classes have been canceled for Friday, and the university says counselors are available to students.

    South Carolina State University officials say the campus is on lockdown following a shooting that left two people dead and one person injured.

    The lockdown began on Thursday around 9:15 p.m. when a shooting was reported in an apartment at the Hugine Suites student residential complex.

    The State Law Enforcement Division, SLED, is on site and actively investigating.

    While the campus remains on lockdown, officers with the Orangeburg Department of Public Safety and the Orangeburg County Sheriff’s Office are patrolling along with the university’s Department of Public Safety.

    University officials have yet to confirm the victims’ identities or the condition of the wounded person.

    All classes have been canceled for Friday, and the university says counselors are available to students.

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  • South Carolina university on lockdown after fatal shooting, officials say

    [ad_1]

    South Carolina State University officials say the campus is on lockdown following a shooting that left two people dead and one person injured.The lockdown began on Thursday around 9:15 p.m. when a shooting was reported in an apartment at the Hugine Suites student residential complex. The State Law Enforcement Division, SLED, is on site and actively investigating. While the campus remains on lockdown, officers with the Orangeburg Department of Public Safety and the Orangeburg County Sheriff’s Office are patrolling along with the university’s Department of Public Safety.University officials have yet to confirm the victims’ identities or the condition of the wounded person. All classes have been canceled for Friday, and the university says counselors are available to students.

    South Carolina State University officials say the campus is on lockdown following a shooting that left two people dead and one person injured.

    The lockdown began on Thursday around 9:15 p.m. when a shooting was reported in an apartment at the Hugine Suites student residential complex.

    The State Law Enforcement Division, SLED, is on site and actively investigating.

    While the campus remains on lockdown, officers with the Orangeburg Department of Public Safety and the Orangeburg County Sheriff’s Office are patrolling along with the university’s Department of Public Safety.

    University officials have yet to confirm the victims’ identities or the condition of the wounded person.

    All classes have been canceled for Friday, and the university says counselors are available to students.

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  • News We Love: School faculty sleep on roof after fundraising success

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    WEEK WITH SUNSHINE. HELLO AND THANK YOU TO THE EARTH SCIENCE CLASSES AT MERRIMACK HIGH SCHOOL, WHO I VISITED WITH YESTERDAY. WE TALKED ABOUT THE TECHNOLOGY WE USE TO FORECAST STORMS, AND A RECAP OF THE BIG STORMS AND THE TYPES OF STORMS WE GET HERE IN NEW HAMPSHIRE. SOME GREAT QUESTIONS BY THEM ABOUT MY JOB AND YES, ABOUT THE ALARM CLOCK. AND AS YOU CAN SEE, WHEN THREE CLASSES SHOW UP IN A THEATER, THEY ALL SPREAD OUT. SO NO ONE IS IN THE FRONT ROW. WHEN YOU DO A HIGH SCHOOL KIND OF THE WAY THAT GOES, ISN’T IT? BUT A HUGE THANK YOU TO

    News We Love: School faculty sleep on roof after fundraising success

    Updated: 5:18 PM PST Dec 21, 2025

    Editorial Standards ⓘ

    Three faculty members at Lancaster County Christian School are sleeping on the roof as a reward for students surpassing their fundraising goal.At the beginning of this month, the school aimed to raise $500,000 to construct a new building on one of its campuses to alleviate overcrowded classrooms.Video above: Earth science classroomsThe school ended up earning more than $737,000.

    LANCASTER COUNTY, Pa. —

    Three faculty members at Lancaster County Christian School are sleeping on the roof as a reward for students surpassing their fundraising goal.

    At the beginning of this month, the school aimed to raise $500,000 to construct a new building on one of its campuses to alleviate overcrowded classrooms.

    Video above: Earth science classrooms

    The school ended up earning more than $737,000.

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  • Times Investigation: Ex-Trump DOJ lawyers say ‘fraudulent’ UC antisemitism probes led them to quit

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    Nine former Department of Justice attorneys assigned to investigate alleged antisemitism at the University of California described chaotic and rushed directives from the Trump administration and told The Times they felt pressured to conclude that campuses had violated the civil rights of Jewish students and staff.

    In interviews over several weeks, the career attorneys — who together served dozens of years — said they were given the instructions at the onset of the investigations. All nine attorneys resigned during the course of their UC assignments, some concerned that they were being asked to violate ethical standards.

    “Initially we were told we only had 30 days to come up with a reason to be ready to sue UC,” said Ejaz Baluch, a former senior trial attorney who was assigned to investigate whether Jewish UCLA faculty and staff faced discrimination on campus that the university did not properly address. “It shows just how unserious this exercise was. It was not about trying to find out what really happened.”

    In spring 2024, increasingly tumultuous protests over Israel’s war in Gaza racked UCLA. Jewish students and faculty reported “broad-based perceptions of antisemitic and anti-Israeli bias on campus,” a UCLA antisemitism task force found. A group later sued, charging that UCLA violated their civil rights, and won millions of dollars and concessions in a settlement.

    UCLA avoided trial, but the suit — along with articles from conservative websites such as the Washington Free Beacon — formed a basis for the UC investigations, the former DOJ lawyers said.

    “UCLA came the closest to having possibly broken the law in how it responded or treated civil rights complaints from Jewish employees,” Baluch said. “We did have enough information from our investigation to warrant suing UCLA.” But Baluch said, “We believed that such a lawsuit had significant weaknesses.”

    “To me, it’s even clearer now that it became a fraudulent and sham investigation,” another lawyer said.

    A DOJ spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment. When it announced findings against UCLA in late July, Assistant Atty. Gen. Harmeet K. Dhillon — the DOJ civil rights chief — said the campus “failed to take timely and appropriate action in response to credible claims of harm and hostility on its campus.” Dhillon said there was a “clear violation of our federal civil rights laws.” Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi said UCLA would “pay a heavy price.”

    The former DOJ attorneys’ description of their Trump administration work offers a rare view inside the government’s UC probe. For months, university officials have said little publicly about their ongoing talks with the DOJ. Their strategy has been to tread cautiously and negotiate an out-of-court end to the investigations and financial threats — without further jeopardizing the $17.5 billion in federal funds UC receives.

    Four attorneys said they were particularly troubled by two matters. First, they were asked to write up a “j-memo” — a justification memorandum — that explained why UC should face a lawsuit “before we even knew the facts,” one attorney said.

    “Then there was the PR campaign,” the attorney said, referring to announcements beginning with a Feb. 28, 2025, press release saying investigators would be visiting UCLA, UC Berkeley, USC and seven other universities nationwide because the campuses “have experienced antisemitic incidents since October 2023.”

    “Never before in my time across multiple presidential administrations did we send out press releases essentially saying workplaces or colleges were guilty of discrimination before finding out if they really were,” said one attorney, who requested anonymity for fear of retaliation.

    Jen Swedish, a former deputy chief on the employment discrimination team who worked on the UCLA case, said “virtually everything about the UC investigation was atypical.”

    “The political appointees essentially determined the outcome almost before the investigation had even started,” said Swedish, referring to Trump administration officials who declared publicly that punishing colleges for antisemitism would be a priority. She resigned in May.

    The lawyers spoke out because their formal connections to the DOJ recently ended. Many said they believed the Trump administration had compromised the integrity of the department with what they viewed as aggressive, politically motivated actions against UC and other elite U.S. campuses.

    “I think there were absolutely Jewish people on campuses that faced legitimate discrimination. But the way we were pushed so hard to investigate, it was clear to so many of us that this was a political hit job that actually would end up not helping anyone,” said one attorney who worked on UC Davis and UCLA and interviewed students.

    In a statement, a UC spokesperson said, “While we cannot speak to the DOJ’s practices, UC will continue to act in good faith and in the best interests of our students, staff, faculty, and patients. Our focus is on solutions that keep UC strong for Californians and Americans.”

    The government has not sued UC.

    But in August, the DOJ demanded that the university pay a $1.2-billion fine and agree to sweeping, conservative-leaning campus policy changes to settle federal antisemitism accusations. In exchange, the Trump administration would restore $584 million in frozen grant funding. At the time, Gov. Gavin Newsom called the proposal “extortion.”

    Last month, after UC faculty independently sued, U.S. District Judge Rita F. Lin ruled that the “coercive and retaliatory” proposal violated the 1st Amendment. Lin blocked the fine and the demands for deep campus changes.

    “Agency officials, as well as the president and vice president, have repeatedly and publicly announced a playbook of initiating civil rights investigations of preeminent universities to justify cutting off federal funding, with the goal of bringing universities to their knees and forcing them to change their ideological tune,” Lin said.

    Her ruling does not preclude UC from negotiating with the administration or reaching other agreements with Trump.

    Protests roiled campuses in spring 2024

    The federal investigations largely focused on the tumultuous pro-Palestinian campus protests that erupted at UC campuses. On April 30, 2024, a pro-Israel vigilante group attacked a UCLA encampment, resulting in injuries to student and faculty activists. Police failed to bring the situation under control for hours — a melee former Chancellor Gene Block called a “dark chapter” in the university’s history.

    During the 2023-24 UC protests, some Jewish students and faculty described hostile climates and formal antisemitism complaints to the schools increased. Some Jews said they faced harassment for being Zionists. Others said they encountered symbols and chants at protests and encampments, such as “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” which they viewed as antisemitic. Jews were also among the leading encampment activists.

    In June 2024, Jewish UCLA students and faculty sued UC, saying the encampment blocked them from accessing Dickson Court and Royce Quad. The four blamed the university for anti-Jewish discrimination, saying it enabled pro-Palestinian activists to protest. On July 29, 2025, UC agreed to pay $6.45 million to settle the federal suit.

    In response to the demonstrations and suit, UC overhauled its free speech policies, banning protests that aren’t preapproved from vast portions of campus. It said it would strictly enforce existing bans on overnight encampments and the use of masks to hide identity while breaking the law, and agreed to not prohibit campus access to Jews and other legally protected groups.

    Inside the investigations

    The nine former DOJ lawyers worked between January and June researching whether UC campuses mishandled complaints of antisemitism filed by Jewish students, faculty and staff tied to pro-Palestinian encampments. They were involved with two areas under the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division — employment litigation and educational opportunities — tasked with looking into potential discrimination faced by UC employees and students.

    The attorneys described an at times rushed process that concentrated legal staffing on probing antisemitism at UC campuses, to the detriment of other discrimination cases focused on racial minorities and people who are disabled.

    At one point, attorneys said, more than half of the dozens of lawyers in the employment litigation section were assigned solely or nearly exclusively to UC campuses, with some told specifically to research the UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine and other campus divisions. As lawyers begin to quit, the attorneys said, additional staff was brought in from other DOJ teams — those focused on tax law and immigrant employment law.

    When five lawyers in the mid-spring reported minimal findings at Berkeley, Davis and San Francisco campuses, they were reassigned to UCLA.

    “It was like UCLA was the crown jewel among public universities that the Trump administration wanted to ‘get,’ similar to Harvard for privates,” said another attorney, who requested anonymity because they feared retaliation for speaking out. “There were meetings where managers — who were career employees like us — would convey that political appointees and even the White House wanted us all on UCLA.”

    Dena Robinson, a former senior trial attorney, investigated Berkeley, Davis and Los Angeles campuses.

    “I was someone who volunteered on my own to join the investigation and I did so because of some of my lived experience. I’m a Black woman. I’m also Jewish,” she said. But she described concerns about fast and shifting deadlines. “And I am highly skeptical of whether this administration actually cares about Jewish people or antisemitism.”

    Lawyers described similar views and patterns in the Educational Opportunities Section, where UC investigations were concurrently taking place.

    A 10th attorney, Amelia Huckins, said she resigned from that section to avoid being assigned to UC.

    “I did not want to be part of a team where I’m asked to make arguments that don’t comport with the law and existing legal precedent,” she said.

    Huckins had been away from the job for a little more than two months when she read findings the DOJ released July 29 saying that UCLA acted with “deliberate indifference” to Jewish students and employees and threatened to sue the university if it did not come to a settlement.

    In those findings, the DOJ said, “Jewish and Israeli students at UCLA were subjected to severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive harassment that created a hostile environment by members of the encampment.” As evidence, it cited 11 complaints from Jewish or Israeli students regarding discrimination between April 25 and May 1, 2024.

    It was “as if they only talked to particular students and used public documents like media reports,” Huckins said, adding that the evidence publicly presented seemed thin. In a “normal investigation,” attorneys research “different layers of document and data requests and interviews at every level of the university system.” Those investigations, she said, can take at least a year, if not longer.

    What investigators encountered

    Attorneys described site visits at several UC campuses over the spring, including meetings with campus administrators, civil rights officers, police chiefs and UC lawyers who attended interviews — including at least one with UCLA Chancellor Julio Frenk.

    The lawyers said UC leaders were cooperative and shared campus policies about how civil rights complaints are handled as well as information detailing the way specific cases were treated, such as those of faculty who said they faced harassment.

    “There were thousands and thousands of pages of documents and many interviews,” said Baluch, referring to Berkeley and Davis. “There may have been harassment here and there, but there was not a lot that rose to the level of the university violating federal law, which is a pretty high bar.”

    “We identified certain incidents at Berkeley and at Davis that were kind of flash points. There were a couple of protests that seemed to get out of hand. There were the encampments. There was graffiti. But we just did not see a really hostile work environment,” said another attorney who visited those campuses. “And if there was a hostile environment, it seemed to have been remediated by the end of 2024 or even May or June for that matter.”

    However, at UCLA, Baluch said he and team members found “problems with the complaint system and that some of the professors were genuinely harassed and to such a severe level that it violates Title VII.” Eventually, he said “we successfully convinced the front office that we should only be going after UCLA.”

    Where UC and Trump administration stand today

    When Harvard faced major grant freezes and civil rights violation findings, it sued the Trump administration. UC has so far opted against going to court — and is willing to engage in “dialogue” to settle ongoing investigations and threats.

    “Our priorities are clear: protect UC’s ability to educate students, conduct research for the benefit of California and the nation, and provide high-quality health care,” said UC spokesperson Rachel Zaentz. “We will engage in good-faith dialogue, but we will not accept any outcome that cripples UC’s core mission or undermines taxpayer investments.”

    The calculation, according to UC sources, is simple. They want to avoid a head-on conflict with Trump because UC has too much federal money on the line. They point to Harvard — which suffered major grant losses and federal restrictions on its patents and ability to enroll international students after publicly challenging the president.

    “Our strategy before was to lay low and avoid Trump any way we could,” said a UC official, who was not authorized to speak on the record. “After the UCLA grants were pulled and the settlement offer came in, the tactic shifted to ‘playing nice’” without agreeing to its terms.

    In public remarks to the board of regents last month at UCLA, UC President James B. Milliken said “the stakes are enormous” and presented data on funding challenges: Under Trump, more than 1,600 federal grants have been cut. About 400 grants worth $230 million remained suspended after faculty court wins.

    UC “is still facing a potential loss of more than a billion dollars in federal research funding,” Milliken said.

    “The coming months may require even tougher choices across the university,” he said.

    No information about a possible UC-Trump settlement has been released. But some former DOJ lawyers said they believe a settlement is inevitable.

    “It’s devastating that these institutions are feeling pressured and bullied into these agreements,” said Huckins, speaking of deals with Columbia, Brown, Cornell and other campuses. “I would love it if more schools would stand up to the administration … I recognize that they’re in a hard spot.”

    To Baluch, who worked on the UCLA case, it appeared that the DOJ had the upper hand.

    “Cutting grants is a huge hit to a university. And the billion-dollars fine is a lot. I see why these universities feel backed into a corner to settle,” he said. “The threats, they are working.”

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    Jaweed Kaleem

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  • More California students than ever are heading out of state for college. Here’s why

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    Javier Perez, a senior at Benjamin Franklin Senior High School in Highland Park, dreams of studying computer science at Dartmouth College.

    “For me, it’s really important to be surrounded by the right people,” said Perez, who earlier this year spent two days on the New Hampshire campus during a spring college tour and said he felt a “genuine connection” with the people he met. Plus, he likes cold weather.

    He’s hardly alone. A Public Policy Institute of California report released this month found that the share of college-bound California high school graduates enrolling in out-of-state colleges has nearly doubled in the last two decades, rising from 8.5% in 2002 to 14.6% in 2022.

    West Coast and Southwest colleges in particular seek out students in population-rich California in their recruitment efforts. Making the move more enticing is that many public universities participate in a program offering Californians discounted tuition at public colleges in the West.

    In 2022, nearly 40,000 California high school grads enrolled in out-of-state colleges, roughly a third of whom flocked to Arizona, Oregon or New York, the researchers found in their analysis of enrollment data from the National Center for Education Statistics. In 2002, the number was closer to 15,000.

    In Arizona, the most popular universities included Arizona State University, Grand Canyon University — known for its online programs — and the University of Arizona. Oregon State University drew the highest number of Californians in that state.

    California grads who moved to New York for college were drawn to smaller, competitive private liberal arts colleges, usually with heftier tuitions than California’s public universities. Because of limitations in national enrollment data, the study couldn’t account for scholarships, making it hard to determine whether the California students were choosing out-of-state options because of financial aid incentives.

    The researchers found that most students leaving California attend colleges less selective on average than the competitive University of California system. About half attend colleges more selective than the California State University system, which will soon automatically admit students who meet requirements at 16 of its campuses.

    Lynda McGee, a recently retired Los Angeles Unified School District college counselor who spent more than two decades at Downtown Magnets High School, said she sees the trend as a positive development. She said she often urged students to look beyond California, as she felt out-of-state campuses would expose them to a more diverse range of people and experiences.

    Arizona State, the University of Arizona and Oregon State have strong name recognition, actively recruit in California and feel less intimidating to students because they’re relatively close to home, she said. Oregon State’s athletics programs are a particular draw.

    Under the right conditions, and after taking into account financial aid or merit-based scholarships, private colleges can sometimes end up costing less than a California public university, said Erica Rosales, executive director of College Match, a mentoring program for low-income students in Los Angeles.

    “For a low-income, first-generation student, a private institution that meets full need without loans is often the most affordable and most supportive option available,” Rosales said in an email.

    Rosales, who has spent nearly two decades helping students navigate the college admissions process, noted that Cal Grant income ceilings leave out some middle-class families unable to afford to send their children to a UC or CSU campus. Financial aid at CSU campuses typically covers tuition, not room and board, according to Rosales.

    The promise of full financial-need coverage is why Perez, who grew up in Guatemala and immigrated to the U.S. three years ago, is aiming to attend a private liberal arts college. He learned about his options through College Match. The program funded a two-week East Coast college tour this year and provided him with a laptop for his applications.

    Javier Perez, 18, takes public transit to a library. His three-hour round-trip commute to and from school involves a bike ride, two trains and a bus.

    (Kayla Bartkowski / Los Angeles Times)

    Perez said leaving California would enable him to experience life in a small college town surrounded by nature. He’d like to spend his days focusing on his studies instead of commuting to school. His current commute from his Koreatown home to his Highland Park campus takes three hours round-trip, and involves a bike ride, two trains and a bus.

    Perez, an ambitious programmer who leads his school’s competitive robotics team, intends to apply to 22 colleges, including Stanford University, Caltech and a handful of UCs and CSUs.

    But his hopes are set on moving to the East Coast, as reflected by many of the schools on his list: Middlebury College, Boston College, Bowdoin College, Columbia University, Brown University and his dream school, Dartmouth College.

    “I just want to explore as much as I can in my college life,” Perez said.

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    Iris Kwok

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  • Judge blocks Trump administration push to fine UCLA $1.2 billion for alleged antisemitism

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    A federal judge on Friday blocked the Trump administration from imposing a $1.2-billion fine on UCLA along with stipulations for deep campus changes in exchange for being eligible for federal grants.

    The decision is a major win for universities that have struggled to resist President Trump’s attempt to discipline “very bad” universities that he claims have mistreated Jewish students, forcing them to pay exorbitant fines and agree to adhere to conservative standards.

    A spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Justice did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

    The preliminary injunction, issued by U.S. District Judge Rita F. Lin of the Northern District of California, rendered moot — for now — nearly every aspect of a more than 7,000-word settlement offer the federal government sent to the University of California in August after suspending $584 million in medical, science and energy research grants to the Los Angeles campus.

    The government said it froze the funds after finding UCLA broke the law by using race as a factor in admissions, recognizing transgender people’s gender identities, and not taking antisemitism complaints seriously during pro-Palestinian protests in 2024 — claims that UC has denied.

    The settlement proposal outlined extensive changes to push UCLA — and by extension all of UC — ideologically rightward by calling for an end to diversity-related scholarships, restrictions on foreign student enrollment, a declaration that transgender people do not exist, an end to gender-affirming healthcare for minors, the imposition of free speech limits and more.

    “The administration and its executive agencies are engaged in a concerted campaign to purge ‘woke,’ ‘left,’ and ‘socialist’ viewpoints from our country’s leading universities,” Lin wrote in her opinion. “Agency officials, as well as the president and vice president, have repeatedly and publicly announced a playbook of initiating civil rights investigations of preeminent universities to justify cutting off federal funding, with the goal of bringing universities to their knees and forcing them to change their ideological tune. Universities are then presented with agreements to restore federal funding under which they must change what they teach, restrict student anonymity in protests, and endorse the administration’s view of gender, among other things. Defendants submit nothing to refute this.”

    “It is undisputed,” Lin added, “that this precise playbook is now being executed at the University of California.”

    Universities including Columbia, Brown and Cornell agreed to pay the government hundreds of millions to atone for alleged violations similar to the ones facing UCLA. The University of Pennsylvania and University of Virginia also reached agreements with the Trump administration that were focused, respectively, on ending recognition of transgender people and halting diversity, equity and inclusion efforts.

    Friday’s decision, for the time being, spares the UC system from proceeding with negotiations that it reluctantly entered with the federal government to avoid further grant cuts and restrictions across the system, which receives $17.5 billion in federal funding each year. UC President James B. Milliken has said that the $1.2-billion fine would “completely devastate” UC and that the system, under fire from the Trump administration, faces “one of the gravest threats in UC’s 157-year history.”

    This is not the first time a judge rebuked the Trump administration for its higher education campaign. Massachusetts-based U.S. District Judge Allison Burroughs in September ordered the government to reverse billions in cuts to Harvard. But that case did not wade directly into settlement negotiations.

    Those talks with UC have proceeded slowly. In a court hearing last week, a Department of Justice lawyer said “there’s no evidence that any type of deal with the United States is going to be happening in the immediate future.” The lawyer argued that the settlement offer was only an idea that had not received UC approval.

    Because of that, he said, a lawsuit was inappropriate. Lin disagreed.

    “Plaintiffs’ harm is already very real. With every day that passes, UCLA continues to be denied the chance to win new grants, ratcheting up defendants’ pressure campaign,” she wrote. “And numerous UC faculty and staff have submitted declarations describing how defendants’ actions have already chilled speech throughout the UC system.”

    The case was brought by more a dozen faculty and staff unions and associations from across UC’s 10 campuses, who said the federal government was violating their 1st Amendment rights and constitutional right to due process. UC, which has avoided directly challenging the government in court, was not party to the suit.

    “This is not only a historic lawsuit — brought by every labor union and faculty union in the UC — but also an incredible win,” said Veena Dubal, a UC Irvine law professor and general counsel for one of the plaintiffs, the American Assn. of University Professors, which has members across UC campuses.

    Dubal called the decision “a turning point in the fight to save free speech and research in the finest public school system in the world.”

    Asked about Friday’s outcome, a spokesperson said UC “remains focused on our vital work to drive innovation, advance medical breakthroughs and strengthen the nation’s long-term competitiveness. UC remains committed to protecting the mission, governance, and academic freedom of the university.”

    Zoé Hamstead, chair of external relations and legal affairs for the Council of UC Faculty Assns., said she was “thrilled that the court has affirmed our First Amendment rights.”

    The organization is an umbrella group of faculty associations across UC campuses that sued.

    Hamstead, an associate professor of city and regional planning at UC Berkeley, said she was “deeply proud to be part of a coalition that represents the teachers, researchers, and workers of the University of California who are challenging rising authoritarianism in federal court.”

    Anna Markowitz, an associate professor in UCLA’s School of Education and Information Studies and president of the Los Angeles campus faculty association, said her chapter was “extremely pleased with this decision, which will put a pause on the current federal overreach at UC.”

    “UCLA faculty are honored to stand with this coalition, which continues to show that when faced with an administration targeting the very heart of higher education, fighting back is the only option,” Markowitz said.

    Lin’s injunction is not the final say on the case, which will proceed through the legal process as she determines whether a permanent injunction is warranted. The government also could appeal to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals as it has done for other cases, including one filed by UC researchers that restored funding from the National Institutes of Health and National Science Foundation among other agencies.

    An appeals court hearing in that case was held Friday; a decision is pending.

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    Jaweed Kaleem

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  • 2 Massachusetts men arrested in explosion on Harvard University medical campus

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    Two men were arrested in connection with an explosion on Harvard University’s Longwood Medical Campus, federal officials said Tuesday. The explosion happened Saturday just before 3 a.m. on the fourth floor of Harvard’s Goldenson Building, which is on the university’s medical campus.Special agents and officers with the FBI Boston’s Joint Terrorism Task force and Harvard University Police Department arrested the Massachusetts men, who were not identified. A news conference is planned for 1 p.m.There was no structural damage to the building in the aftermath, and all labs and equipment remained fully operational. “It’s a shame that people do things like that,” said Boston police commissioner Michael Cox. “I’m pretty confident we will hold people accountable for that.”University police released photos of two suspects in the explosion, saying that the two were seen running from the building when police arrived at the scene.Cleaning crews were at the site of the explosion on Sunday, ensuring everything was cleared and fully operational. A sweep of the building was done, and no additional devices were found.”I haven’t heard anything like that going on here, so to hear that is wild,” said student Therese Lipscombe. “Big-name people are going to listen. So whatever their motive was, I’m sure they thought people were going to hear about it.””I do feel like this is a safe area. There’s a hospital nearby and a school, and just a lot of people in general,” said Lindsey Birmingham, who works nearby. “So I usually feel safe. I think I do still feel safe, but it definitely raises a lot of questions and alarms.”A person who lives nearby says they heard two explosions about five minutes apart.No one was injured in the incident.There will be an increased police presence at Harvard’s Longwood campus as officials continue to investigate. There is no threat to the public.

    BOSTON —

    Two men were arrested in connection with an explosion on Harvard University’s Longwood Medical Campus, federal officials said Tuesday.

    The explosion happened Saturday just before 3 a.m. on the fourth floor of Harvard’s Goldenson Building, which is on the university’s medical campus.

    Special agents and officers with the FBI Boston’s Joint Terrorism Task force and Harvard University Police Department arrested the Massachusetts men, who were not identified.

    A news conference is planned for 1 p.m.

    There was no structural damage to the building in the aftermath, and all labs and equipment remained fully operational.

    “It’s a shame that people do things like that,” said Boston police commissioner Michael Cox. “I’m pretty confident we will hold people accountable for that.”

    University police released photos of two suspects in the explosion, saying that the two were seen running from the building when police arrived at the scene.

    Hearst OwnedHarvard University

    Cleaning crews were at the site of the explosion on Sunday, ensuring everything was cleared and fully operational. A sweep of the building was done, and no additional devices were found.

    “I haven’t heard anything like that going on here, so to hear that is wild,” said student Therese Lipscombe. “Big-name people are going to listen. So whatever their motive was, I’m sure they thought people were going to hear about it.”

    “I do feel like this is a safe area. There’s a hospital nearby and a school, and just a lot of people in general,” said Lindsey Birmingham, who works nearby. “So I usually feel safe. I think I do still feel safe, but it definitely raises a lot of questions and alarms.”

    A person who lives nearby says they heard two explosions about five minutes apart.

    No one was injured in the incident.

    There will be an increased police presence at Harvard’s Longwood campus as officials continue to investigate. There is no threat to the public.

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  • Israel and Hamas have a ceasefire deal. But college protesters say activism won’t stop

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    At California universities Monday, the ceasefire in Gaza — and the accompanying hostage and prisoner exchange — emerged as an inflection point for the future of a student-led protest movement that for two years has roiled campuses.

    The activism, along with its contentious aftermath, continues to reverberate as pro-Palestinian organizers and Jewish community leaders reckon with the tumult touched off by Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel.

    For months in 2024 — shortly after the onset of the deadliest and most destructive war between Israelis and Palestinians in history — college campuses in the U.S. convulsed in often confrontational protests. Pro-Palestinian demonstrations surged in the spring of that year with encampments where activists demanded campus policy changes, including U.S. university divestment of billions of dollars from weapons companies.

    On this front, their activism largely foundered. In California, not one major university agreed to full divestment demands, which included boycotts of partnerships with Israeli universities. And campus policies did change — with university officials cracking down on protests and enforcing zero-tolerance policies against rule-breaking.

    But David N. Myers, a UCLA professor of Jewish history, said student protesters appear to have helped change American views on Palestinians and Israel.

    “Is the protest movement a failure? Well, if the measure is universities have cracked down, maybe,” Myers said. “But if the measure is general trend lines in American public opinion, I’m not so sure. And that should be a wake-up call to the pro-Israel movement.”

    Amid the protests, allegations of antisemitism surged on campuses and Jewish students and faculty protested violations of their civil rights. Their complaints have prompted aggressive investigations by the Trump administration that are at the center of his goal to overhaul higher education to adhere to a sweeping conservative agenda that goes far beyond protections for Jewish communities.

    Pro-Palestinian activists vow to continue

    In interviews, pro-Palestinian students who participated in last year’s encampments and protests this year said the ceasefire was welcome news, but only fulfilled part of what led them to take to campus greens.

    “While the news of a ceasefire is welcome, nothing fundamentally changes at UCLA or colleges in general,” said Dylan Kupsh, a doctoral computer science student at UCLA who was part of an encampment last year that was attacked by pro-Israel vigilantes.

    “Our university is still invested in the oppression of Palestine. Students won’t rest until the university divests,” said Kupsh, who has faced student discipline procedures for participating in actions that the university alleges violated campus policies.

    Student organizers in California said the ceasefire will infuse new energy into their activism, which has been accused of minimizing the plight of Israeli hostages and being antisemitic.

    “We can momentarily feel a little bit of happiness, there is at least momentary end to the genocide,” said Ryan Witt, president of Students for Justice in Palestine at Cal State Channel Islands, which held a campus protest and vigil in support of Palestinians last week.

    “There have been pictures of children in Gaza celebrating. I’m not dismissing that. But also recognizing that we need to keep fighting,” said Witt, who is Jewish.

    Amanda, a student at USC who participated in pro-Palestinian encampments, said concerns remain on her campus.

    “We see that our school, like all the others, is very worried about being seen as antisemitic by the government, so they are even stricter about protests and speech than they used to be,” she said.

    Graeme Blair, a professor of political science at UCLA, said the climate for pro-Palestinian activism on campuses had worsened, and the government now aggressively treats pro-Palestinian speech as being antisemitic.

    “The Trump administration is using every federal lever from the Justice Department to the Education Department to the State Department to crack down on antisemitism,” Blair said. “Universities like UCLA are, on their own and because of Trump pressure, continuing to arrest, discipline and fire people speaking out.”

    For Jews on campus, ‘a chapter is ending’

    Myers, who is Jewish, said the release of Israeli hostages felt like “the door to a very dark chamber has been opened and light has begun to peek out. At the same time, I can’t help but think of the next frame, which is the frame of pictures of Gaza, which is in a state of complete and total devastation.”

    Among pro-Israel Jewish communities on campuses nationwide, there is also a sense of relief.

    Jewish student groups had regularly gathered on campuses, including last week, for candlelight vigils, songs and prayer services to honor dead and living hostages in Gaza and their families two years after the Oct. 7 attack.

    Many Jewish students have ties to Israel, whether from visiting or through family members who lived there and knew victims of the Hamas attack that killed about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took roughly 250 hostages. About 20 living hostages were back in Israel this week, while Israel released roughly 1,900 Palestinian prisoners. According to the Gaza Health Ministry, more than 67,000 Palestinians were killed during Israel’s war.

    Sophia Toubian, an information studies graduate student at UCLA, said she hoped the hostages’ release is “actually a chapter ending.”

    “I hope that it is a long-lasting peace, and it doesn’t just start right back up again — and that that translates into our experience here, both at school and just in the world.”

    Toubian, who is Jewish and pro-Israel, said the pro-Palestinian protest movement had achieved at least some of its objectives.

    “Every building that I go into on campus … without fail, I’m seeing something up on the wall about Palestine — supportive of Palestine,” she said.

    “It wasn’t there before, and … it’s kind of up there in a way, like, ‘Yeah, of course, we all agree that this is the way that this should be, and so we’re going to show support of this thing.’ In that sense, it does feel like a success.”

    And yet, UCLA senior Gal Cohavy, who is pro-Israel, said the tenor in Westwood has improved in recent months.

    Cohavy said he hoped that the hostages’ release and the stop in fighting could allow people across the ideological spectrum to find common ground.

    “I wouldn’t be surprised to see more real conversation going on, and perhaps bridging a gap between the two sides and seeing cultural progress,” he said.

    In a statement, Ha’Am, a Jewish student-run publication at UCLA, said now the “atmosphere has changed.”

    “Since October 7, 2023, Jewish spaces have been places of grief, quiet, and emotional support for a community in turmoil. Today, as we enter those same spaces, the atmosphere has changed. There is a genuine sigh of relief in the air, a collective exhale, and the comforting knowledge that our brothers and sisters on the other side of the world are finally safe once again,” it said.

    Lasting consequences among students

    While pro-Palestinian and pro-Israel students expressed approval over the events in the Middle East, both have faced lasting consequences of divisions on campus.

    Reports of antisemitism as well as anti-Muslim and anti-Arab incidents have increased at colleges since 2023. Arrests, suspensions and expulsions of pro-Palestinian students and groups have also grown, though the vast majority of Los Angeles students detained by police during last year’s protests did not face criminal charges.

    At UCLA, two Students for Justice in Palestine groups were banned this year for vandalizing the Brentwood home of a UC Board of Regents member who is Jewish with imagery that Jewish community leaders said used antisemitic tropes.

    Among California universities, Stanford endured one of the more charged episodes.

    A group of pro-Palestinian students there face felony vandalism and trespassing charges after they were accused of breaking into and vandalizing the university president’s office during a 2024 protest. This month, a Santa Clara County grand jury indicted the remaining 11 students, which pushes the case toward a trial.

    Staff writer Karen Garcia contributed to this report.

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  • 1 dead, 2 injured in shooting at Alcorn State

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    1 dead, 2 injured in shooting at Alcorn State University

    1 dead, 2 injured in Alcorn State University shooting; MBI investigating.

    Updated: 10:11 PM EDT Oct 11, 2025

    Editorial Standards ⓘ

    The Mississippi Bureau of Investigation has been called in to investigate a shooting on the campus of Alcorn State University that left at least one person dead and two injured.According to MBI, the shooting happened around 6:30 p.m. Saturday near the Industrial Technology Building on campus. No arrests have been made at this time. Investigators are continuing to gather evidence, and MBI says details remain preliminary and could change as the investigation develops.

    The Mississippi Bureau of Investigation has been called in to investigate a shooting on the campus of Alcorn State University that left at least one person dead and two injured.

    According to MBI, the shooting happened around 6:30 p.m. Saturday near the Industrial Technology Building on campus.

    No arrests have been made at this time.

    Investigators are continuing to gather evidence, and MBI says details remain preliminary and could change as the investigation develops.

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  • Newsom threatens to cut state funding to universities that sign Trump’s political compact

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    Gov. Gavin Newsom on Thursday threatened to cut “billions” in state funding, including to USC, from any California campus that signs a Trump administration compact and agrees to sweeping and largely conservative campus policies in exchange for priority access to federal funding.

    “If any California University signs this radical agreement, they’ll lose billions in state funding — including Cal Grants — instantly,” Newsom said. “California will not bankroll schools that sell out their students, professors, researchers, and surrender academic freedom.”

    The bold statement came less than a day after the White House asked the University of Southern California and eight other major universities throughout the country to shift to the right and agree to Trump’s views on gender identity, admissions, diversity and free speech among other areas — in exchange for more favorable access to federal research grants and additional funding.

    While USC is the only California university to be sent the Trump proposal, a White House official said universities sent the agreement were a first round among potentially several more campuses that could receive the request. All UC and CSU campuses — in addition to Stanford — are under federal civil rights investigations that could result in federal funding clawbacks.

    Universities were asked to sign a “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education” committing them to adopt the White House’s conservative vision for America’s campuses. The letter, sent out Wednesday, also suggests colleges should align with Trump’s views on student discipline, college affordability and the importance of hard sciences over liberal arts.

    The request represents the latest tactic by the Trump administration to aggressively reshape universities — which he says are bastions of liberalism that are intolerant of Republicans — by leveraging federal funding to force campuses to adhere to his conservative ideals.

    Newsom’s response echoed a similarly forceful statement over a $1.2-billion Trump fine against UCLA for alleged civil rights violations in August, when he said UC should sue and not “bend the knee” — no suit by the university system has been filed. His quick swing back ratchets up his strident push against the Trump administration — including mocking Trump’s social media. Newsom’s statement Thursday threatening Cal Grants and other funding was issued in all-capital letters, mirroring the president’s social media style.

    Cal Grants, the state’s largest financial aid program to public and private universities, are awarded based on income. Students become eligible through the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) or California Dream Act Application. In 2024-25, $2.5 billion in Cal Grants were doled out.

    The compact would also severely restrict international student enrollment to 15% of a college’s undergraduate student body and no more than 5% could come from a single country, a provision that would hit hard at USC, where 26% of the fall 2025 freshman class is international. More than half of those students hailing from either China or India.

    Full-fee tuition from international students is a major source of revenue at USC, which has undertaken hundreds of layoffs this year amid budget troubles.

    In a statement released before the Newsom announcement, USC said only that it was “reviewing the administration’s letter.” Officials did not immediately respond to a renewed request for comment.

    “No self-respecting university should sign on to this proposed compact,” said state Assemblymember Al Muratsuchi (D-Torrance), who chairs the Assembly Education Committee. “Universities will never be able to live down a reputation of selling out their principals of academic freedom and free speech on these enticements of preferential treatment.”

    The proposal, which would change many policies at one of the nation’s largest and most prominent private universities, caught several USC deans and administrators off-guard after they learned of White House request from news reports, according to USC employees and staffers who were not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.

    Parts of the compact are similar in language and ideology to a sweeping federal proposal sent in August to UCLA that offered to re-instate hundreds of millions of dollars in research grants to the campus if the University of California agreed to federal demands and pay a $1.2-billion fine for how UCLA responded to alleged antisemitism on campus.

    But the White House letter to USC and other campuses, including the University of Arizona, takes a different approach than the punitive actions against UCLA and other elite universities. Instead of offering to restore suspended government funding in exchange for campus policy overhauls, the government says it will dole out new money and give preference to the universities over others that do not agree to the terms.

    Signing on would give universities priority access to some federal grants, but government money would not be limited solely to those schools, according to a White House official. Colleges that agree would also have priority access to White House events and discussions with officials.

    The compact asks universities to accept the government’s definition of gender and apply it to campus bathrooms, locker rooms and women’s sports teams. It says colleges would stop considering race, gender and a wide range of other student demographics in the admissions process and to require undergraduate applicants to take the SAT or ACT.

    USC, since a 2023 Supreme Court decision, is not allowed to consider race in admissions, and public California universities have been barred from doing so under state law since 1997. USC is “test optional” in its application process and students can decide whether or not to submit scores.

    “It’s upsetting as a faculty member and a teacher and a product of higher education to see this administration trying to dismantle academic freedom and free speech in such a systematic way,” said Devin Griffiths, a USC associate professor of English and comparative literature. Griffiths said he would “push hard for our university to forcefully reject this and I would hope that there is space here for the universities that are targeted by this order to take a collective stand.”

    Sanjay Madhav, an associate professor of practice at the USC Viterbi engineering school, said the compact appeared to be “blatantly in violation of the First Amendment since it states that the federal government is going to give preference to universities that align with its political views.”

    In an email sent to colleagues Thursday and shared with The Times, USC Cinematic Arts school professor Howard Rodman summed up his position: “It is abundantly clear that either the universities stand together and refuse the gift of ‘prioritized grants,’ or higher education in the United States will become a wholly owned subsidiary of MAGA, LLC…. I would urge USC to remember that when you lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas.”

    Liam Wady, a junior at USC, said students were openly talking about it as the news broke.

    “It’s a good balance of confusion and concern,” Wady said. He said he was involved in the pro-Palestinian protests at USC and was left feeling like the university failed to protect him. Now, he said he’s worried the university will go along with Trump’s compact.

    “I just wouldn’t be surprised if the school would end up adopting Trump’s political priorities just because of the way they treated us in the past,” Wady said.

    The 10-page proposed agreement was sent Wednesday to public and private universities, including some of the most selective institutions in the county. In addition to USC and the University of Arizona, it went to Vanderbilt, the University of Pennsylvania, Dartmouth College, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Texas, Brown University and the University of Virginia.

    It was not clear how these schools were selected or why, and whether similar offers might go out to other colleges.

    Some of the schools are in red states that have been more friendly to Trump’s higher education priorities. Texas officials endorsed the compact.

    Leaders of the Texas system were “honored” that the Austin campus was chosen to be a part of the compact and its “potential funding advantages,” according to a statement from Kevin Eltife, chair of the Board of Regents. “Today we welcome the new opportunity presented to us and we look forward to working with the Trump Administration on it,” he said.

    USC has largely maintained a low-profile stance and has avoided making public statements on the president’s higher education agenda.

    In April, when more than 220 university leaders signed onto an American Assn. of Colleges and Universities statement against “undue government intrusion in the lives of those who learn, live, and work on our campuses,” former USC President Carol Folt said publicly that she declined to sign.

    In February, after the Department of Education released guidance opposing race and ethnicity-themed scholarships, graduations and other programs, USC closed down its diversity offices and renamed related websites while many other California universities refused to comply.

    USC also faces a difficult financial outlook. In a July campus letter, interim President Beong-Soo Kim said that a budget deficit surpassing $200 million coupled with federal funding challenges would require layoffs and other cost-cutting measures. More than 600 layoffs have hit the campus since then, according to Morning, Trojan, an independent outlet that monitors USC news.

    The administration has used its control of federal funding as leverage at several high-profile institutions, cutting off research money at UCLA, Harvard and Columbia as it has sought changes to the schools’ governance and policies.

    University of California leaders are negotiating with the Department of Justice over federal demands, although the urgency for talks has slowed after a federal judge ordered nearly all of the $584 million in suspended health and science research grants at the Los Angeles campus to be restored. Trump said this week that he was “close to finalizing” a deal with Harvard that would include it paying $500 million for a “giant trade school” run by the university.

    Schools that sign on would have to cap tuition for U.S. students for five years and the wealthiest campuses would not charge tuition at all for students pursuing “hard science programs.”

    On free speech, schools would have to commit to promoting a wide range of views on campus. That includes “transforming or abolishing institutional units that purposefully punish, belittle, and even spark violence against conservative ideas,” according to the compact.

    Each school would have to commission an annual poll of students and faculty to evaluate the campuses’ adherence to the pact. The terms would be enforced by the Justice Department, with violators losing access to the compact’s benefits for no less than a year. Following violations bump the penalty to two years.

    “Institutions of higher education are free to develop models and values other than those below,” the compact said, “if the institution elects to forego federal benefits.”

    Kaleem and Gutierrez are Times staff writers. Madhani reports for the Associated Press in Washington. Collin Binkley of the Associated Press also contributed to this story.

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    Jaweed Kaleem, Melody Gutierrez, Aamer Madhani

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  • Seven HBCUs across the country on lockdown for threats

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    Seven Historically Black Colleges and Universities are closed or on lockdown because of terroristic threats, according to Hearst sister stations and NBC affiliates.Alabama State University was briefly on lockdown Thursday morning because of a “terroristic threat” aimed at the campus.The university sent a statement to WVTM, stating that campus operations had been shut down that morning into the afternoon: “Alabama State University has received the all-clear from law enforcement and University officials. While the immediate threat has been resolved, all non-essential day-to-day operations remain suspended for the remainder of the day, and the campus is still closed to the public. We are still asking all students to shelter-in-place in their residence halls until further notice. The safety and well-being of our Hornet family continues to be our top priority.”FloridaIn Florida, Bethune-Cookman University is on lockdown and classes have been canceled after “a potential threat to campus safety” was made, the school told sister station WESH.GeorgiaClark Atlanta University received threats and is on lockdown, causing Spellman College to also go under lockdown because of proximity, according to a post on its social media page.”At this time, no threats have been directed toward Spelman’s campus. However, we have increased security presence across campus and at our two main entrances,” Spellman posted.LouisianaSouthern University is on lockdown due to a potential threat, according to NBC affiliate WAFB. VirginiaVirginia State University and Hampton University closed for terroristic threats, according to our NBC affiliates WWBT and WAVY. This is a developing story and will be updated as information becomes available.

    Seven Historically Black Colleges and Universities are closed or on lockdown because of terroristic threats, according to Hearst sister stations and NBC affiliates.

    Alabama State University was briefly on lockdown Thursday morning because of a “terroristic threat” aimed at the campus.

    The university sent a statement to WVTM, stating that campus operations had been shut down that morning into the afternoon:

    “Alabama State University has received the all-clear from law enforcement and University officials. While the immediate threat has been resolved, all non-essential day-to-day operations remain suspended for the remainder of the day, and the campus is still closed to the public. We are still asking all students to shelter-in-place in their residence halls until further notice. The safety and well-being of our Hornet family continues to be our top priority.”

    Florida

    In Florida, Bethune-Cookman University is on lockdown and classes have been canceled after “a potential threat to campus safety” was made, the school told sister station WESH.

    Georgia

    Clark Atlanta University received threats and is on lockdown, causing Spellman College to also go under lockdown because of proximity, according to a post on its social media page.

    “At this time, no threats have been directed toward Spelman’s campus. However, we have increased security presence across campus and at our two main entrances,” Spellman posted.

    Louisiana

    Southern University is on lockdown due to a potential threat, according to NBC affiliate WAFB.

    Virginia

    Virginia State University and Hampton University closed for terroristic threats, according to our NBC affiliates WWBT and WAVY.

    This is a developing story and will be updated as information becomes available.

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  • FBI says Charlie Kirk shooter is college age, blended into university as he fled

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    OREM, Utah — Authorities said Thursday they have fresh leads in their massive manhunt for a college-age shooter who killed influential right-wing activist Charlie Kirk with a single bullet as he spoke at a Utah college campus.

    No suspects were in custody Thursday, more than 18 hours after the shooting, and officials have yet to identify the gunman. However, Robert Bohls, the special agent in charge of the F.B.I.’s Salt Lake City office, said that investigators recovered the weapon they believe was used to kill Kirk — a high-powered bolt-action rifle they found in a wooded area near the campus — as well as the suspect’s footprints and palm prints.

    “We are and will continue to work nonstop until we find the person that has committed this heinous crime, and find out why they did it,” Bohls said.

    A close ally of President Trump who founded the conservative youth group Turning Point USA, Kirk was killed Wednesday by a single shot fired from the rooftop of a nearby building as he addressed a question about mass shootings at a Utah Valley University campus in Orem.

    Investigators are tracking a suspect who appeared to be college age and blended in on the university campus, Bohls said at a Thursday morning news conference. They have scoured dozens of feeds from campus security cameras and collected footwear impressions, a palm print and forearm imprints for analysis.

    Video of the crowd captured by an attendee shows a lone figure in black dashing across the rooftop of the Losee Center, a building about 150 yards from where Kirk was speaking.

    Beau Mason, commissioner of the Utah Department of Public Safety, said investigators “are confident in our abilities to track” the shooter and had “good video footage” that they were not ready to release.

    “We are working through some technologies and some ways to identify this individual,” he said.

    After scouring camera security footage, investigators believe the shooter arrived on campus at about 11:52 am and moved through the stairwells, up to the roof, across the roof to the shooting location, Mason said.

    “We were able to track his movements as he moved to the other side of the building, jumped off of the building and fled off of the campus and into a neighborhood,” Mason said. “Our investigators worked through those neighborhoods, contacting anybody they can, with doorbell cameras, witnesses, and have thoroughly worked through those communities trying to identify any leads.”

    Bohls said investigators recovered a high-powered, bolt-action rifle in a wooded area where the shooter had fled. Bohls did not answer reporters’ questions whether the rifle had been traced to an owner.

    The Utah Department of Public Safety said Wednesday night its State Crime Lab is working “multiple active crime scenes” — from the site where Kirk was shot to the locations he and the suspect traveled — with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Utah County Attorney’s office, the Utah County Sheriff’s office, and the local police departments.

    Hope for a speedy capture of the suspect faded Wednesday night after the F.B.I. released the man its director, Kash Patel, had said was a subject of the investigation. After thanking local and state authorities for taking into custody “the subject for the horrific shooting,” Patel announced that the man had been released after an interrogation by law enforcement.

    “Our investigation continues,” Patel said.

    Another man who was taken into custody a few hours earlier was later released after being booked by Utah Valley University police on suspicion of obstruction of justice.

    Speaking at the Pentagon Thursday at an event commemorating the Sept. 11 attacks, President Trump said he would posthumously award the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Kirk.

    “Charlie was a giant of his generation, a champion of liberty and an inspiration to millions and millions of people,” Trump said.

    The shooter is believed to have fired about 20 minutes after Kirk began speaking Wednesday on a grassy campus courtyard under a white canopy emblazoned with the slogan “PROVE ME WRONG.” The event, attended by about 3,000 people, was the first stop on Kirk’s American Comeback Tour of U.S. campuses.

    Some experts who have seen videos believe that the assailant probably had experience with firearms, given the precision with which the single shot was fired from a considerable distance.

    Videos shared on social media show Kirk sitting on a chair, taking questions in front of a large crowd of people.

    “Do you know how many mass shooters there have been in America over the last 10 years?” an audience member asks.

    “Counting or not counting gang violence?” Kirk responds.

    Almost immediately, a shot rings out. Kirk falls back, blood gushing his neck. Video show people screaming and fleeing from the event.

    The killing — the latest incident in a spate of violent attacks targeting American politicians on the left and the right — led to swift condemnation of political violence from both sides of the ideological divide. But it also led to a blame game.

    After President Trump celebrated Kirk as a “patriot who devoted his life to the cause of open debate” and “martyr for truth and freedom,” he said in an evening video broadcast from the Oval Office that “‘radical left” rhetoric was “directly responsible for the terrorism that we’re seeing in our country today.”

    Trump — who did not mention recent acts of political violence against Democratic lawmakers — called for a crackdown on leftwing groups.

    Even as the House of Representatives observed a moment of silence for Kirk Wednesday when he was still in critical condition, the floor descended into chaos when some Democrats pushed back on a Republican legislator’s request that someone lead the group in prayer.

    Florida Representative Anna Paulina Luna, a former conservative influencer and close friend of Kirk, pointed angrily at Democrats. “You all caused this,” she shouted.

    Kirk, 31, was one of the Republican Party’s most influential power brokers.

    The founder of the influential conservative youth organization Turning Point USA, Kirk had a vast online reach: 1.6 million followers on Rumble, 3.8 million subscribers on YouTube, 5.2 million followers on X and 7.3 million followers on TikTok.

    During the 2024 election, he rallied his online followers to support Trump, prompting conservative podcast host Megyn Kelly to say: “It’s not an understatement to say that this man is responsible for helping the Republicans win back the White House and the U.S. Senate.”

    Just after Trump was elected for a second time to the presidency in November, Kirk frequently posted to social media from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, where he had firsthand influence over which MAGA loyalists Trump named to his Cabinet.

    Kirk was known for melding his conservative politics, nationalism and evangelical faith, casting the current political climate as a state of spiritual warfare between a righteous right wing and so-called godless liberals.

    At a Turning Point event on the Salt Lake City campus of Awaken Church in 2023, he said that gun violence was worth the price of upholding the right to bear arms.

    “I think it’s worth it to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the 2nd Amendment to protect our other God-given rights,” he said. “That is a prudent deal. It is rational.”

    He also previously declared that God was on the side of American conservatives and that there was “no separation of church and state.” In a speech to Trump supporters in Georgia last year, he said that “the Democrat Party supports everything that God hates” and that “there is a spiritual battle happening all around us.”

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    Grace Toohey, Jenny Jarvie, Richard Winton

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  • Conservative activist Charlie Kirk assassinated at Utah university; shooter still at large

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    Charlie Kirk, a conservative activist and close ally of President Donald Trump who played an influential role in rallying young Republican voters, was shot and killed at a Utah college event in what the governor called a political assassination.Authorities say Kirk was killed with a single shot from a rooftop on Wednesday. Whoever fired the gun then slipped away amid the chaos of screams and students fleeing the Utah Valley University campus. Federal, state and local authorities were still searching for an unidentified shooter early Thursday and working what they called “multiple active crime scenes.”“This is a dark day for our state. It’s a tragic day for our nation,” said Utah Gov. Spencer Cox. “I want to be very clear this is a political assassination.”Two people were detained Wednesday but neither was determined to be connected to the shooting and both were released, Utah public safety officials said.Authorities did not immediately identify a motive, but the circumstances of the shooting drew renewed attention to an escalating threat of political violence in the United States that in the last several years has cut across the ideological spectrum. The assassination drew bipartisan condemnation, but a national reckoning over ways to prevent political grievances from manifesting as deadly violence seemed elusive.Videos posted to social media from Utah Valley University show Kirk speaking into a handheld microphone while sitting under a white tent emblazoned with the slogans “The American Comeback” and “Prove Me Wrong.” A single shot rings out and Kirk can be seen reaching up with his right hand as a large volume of blood gushes from the left side of his neck. Stunned spectators are heard gasping and screaming before people start to run away.Kirk was taking questions about gun violenceKirk was speaking at a debate hosted by his nonprofit political youth organization, Arizona-based Turning Point USA, at the Sorensen Center courtyard on campus. Immediately before the shooting, Kirk was taking questions from an audience member about mass shootings and gun violence.“Do you know how many transgender Americans have been mass shooters over the last 10 years?” the person asked. Kirk responded, “Too many.”The questioner followed up: “Do you know how many mass shooters there have been in America over the last 10 years?”“Counting or not counting gang violence?” Kirk asked.Then a single shot rang out.The shooter, who Cox pledged would be held accountable in a state with the death penalty, wore dark clothing and fired from a building roof some distance away.Madison Lattin was watching only a few dozen feet from Kirk’s left when she said she heard the bullet hit Kirk.“Blood is falling and dripping down and you’re just like so scared, not just for him but your own safety,” she said.She said she saw people drop to the ground in an eerie silence pierced immediately by cries. Lattin ran while others splashed through decorative pools to get away. Some fell and were trampled in the stampede. People lost their shoes, backpacks, folding chairs and water bottles in the frenzy.When Lattin later learned that Kirk had died, she said she wept, describing him as a role model who had showed her how to be determined and fight for the truth.Trump calls Kirk ‘martyr for truth’Some 3,000 people were in attendance, according to a statement from the Utah Department of Public Safety. The university police department had six officers working the event, along with Kirk’s own security detail, authorities said.Trump announced the death on social media and praised the 31-year-old Kirk who was co-founder and CEO of Turning Point as “Great, and even Legendary.” Later Wednesday, he released a recorded video from the White House in which he called Kirk a “martyr for truth and freedom” and blamed the rhetoric of the “radical left” for the killing.Utah Valley University said the campus was immediately evacuated after the shooting, with officers escorting people to safety. It will be closed until Monday.Meanwhile, armed officers walked around the neighborhood bordering the campus, knocking on doors and asking for any information residents might have on the shooting. Helicopters buzzed overhead.Wednesday’s event, billed as the first stop on Kirk’s “The American Comeback Tour,” had generated a polarizing campus reaction. An online petition calling for university administrators to bar Kirk from appearing received nearly 1,000 signatures. The university issued a statement last week citing First Amendment rights and affirming its “commitment to free speech, intellectual inquiry, and constructive dialogue.”Last week, Kirk posted on X images of news clips showing his visit was sparking controversy. He wrote, “What’s going on in Utah?”Condemnation from across the political spectrumThe shooting drew swift condemnation across the political aisle as Democratic officials joined Trump, who ordered flags lowered to half-staff and issued a presidential proclamation, and Republican allies of Kirk in decrying the violence.“The attack on Charlie Kirk is disgusting, vile, and reprehensible,” Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who last March hosted Kirk on his podcast, posted on X.“The murder of Charlie Kirk breaks my heart. My deepest sympathies are with his wife, two young children, and friends,” said Gabrielle Giffords, the former Democratic congresswoman who was wounded in a 2011 shooting in her Arizona district.The shooting appeared poised to become part of a spike of political violence that has touched a range of ideologies and representatives of both major parties. The attacks include the assassination of a Minnesota state lawmaker and her husband at their house in June, the firebombing of a Colorado parade to demand Hamas release hostages, and a fire set at the house of Pennsylvania’s governor, who is Jewish, in April. The most notorious of these events is the shooting of Trump during a campaign rally last year.Former Utah Congressman Jason Chaffetz, who was at Wednesday’s event, told the Fox News Channel that he didn’t believe Kirk had enough security.“Utah is one of the safest places on the planet,” he said. “And so we just don’t have these types of things.”Turning Point was founded in suburban Chicago in 2012 by Kirk, then 18, and William Montgomery, a tea party activist, to proselytize on college campuses for low taxes and limited government. It was not an immediate success.But Kirk’s zeal for confronting liberals in academia eventually won over an influential set of conservative financiers.Despite early misgivings, Turning Point enthusiastically backed Trump after he clinched the GOP nomination in 2016. Kirk served as a personal aide to Donald Trump Jr., the president’s eldest son, during the general election campaign.Soon, Kirk was a regular presence on cable TV, where he leaned into the culture wars and heaped praise on the then-president. Trump and his son were equally effusive and often spoke at Turning Point conferences.

    OREM, Utah —

    Charlie Kirk, a conservative activist and close ally of President Donald Trump who played an influential role in rallying young Republican voters, was shot and killed at a Utah college event in what the governor called a political assassination.

    Authorities say Kirk was killed with a single shot from a rooftop on Wednesday. Whoever fired the gun then slipped away amid the chaos of screams and students fleeing the Utah Valley University campus. Federal, state and local authorities were still searching for an unidentified shooter early Thursday and working what they called “multiple active crime scenes.”

    “This is a dark day for our state. It’s a tragic day for our nation,” said Utah Gov. Spencer Cox. “I want to be very clear this is a political assassination.”

    Two people were detained Wednesday but neither was determined to be connected to the shooting and both were released, Utah public safety officials said.

    Authorities did not immediately identify a motive, but the circumstances of the shooting drew renewed attention to an escalating threat of political violence in the United States that in the last several years has cut across the ideological spectrum. The assassination drew bipartisan condemnation, but a national reckoning over ways to prevent political grievances from manifesting as deadly violence seemed elusive.

    Videos posted to social media from Utah Valley University show Kirk speaking into a handheld microphone while sitting under a white tent emblazoned with the slogans “The American Comeback” and “Prove Me Wrong.” A single shot rings out and Kirk can be seen reaching up with his right hand as a large volume of blood gushes from the left side of his neck. Stunned spectators are heard gasping and screaming before people start to run away.

    Trent Nelson/The Salt Lake Tribune/Getty Images

    Charlie Kirk speaks at Utah Valley University on September 10, 2025 in Orem, Utah. Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA, was speaking at his “American Comeback Tour” when he was shot in the neck and killed.

    Kirk was taking questions about gun violence

    Kirk was speaking at a debate hosted by his nonprofit political youth organization, Arizona-based Turning Point USA, at the Sorensen Center courtyard on campus. Immediately before the shooting, Kirk was taking questions from an audience member about mass shootings and gun violence.

    “Do you know how many transgender Americans have been mass shooters over the last 10 years?” the person asked. Kirk responded, “Too many.”

    The questioner followed up: “Do you know how many mass shooters there have been in America over the last 10 years?”

    “Counting or not counting gang violence?” Kirk asked.

    Then a single shot rang out.

    The shooter, who Cox pledged would be held accountable in a state with the death penalty, wore dark clothing and fired from a building roof some distance away.

    Madison Lattin was watching only a few dozen feet from Kirk’s left when she said she heard the bullet hit Kirk.

    “Blood is falling and dripping down and you’re just like so scared, not just for him but your own safety,” she said.

    She said she saw people drop to the ground in an eerie silence pierced immediately by cries. Lattin ran while others splashed through decorative pools to get away. Some fell and were trampled in the stampede. People lost their shoes, backpacks, folding chairs and water bottles in the frenzy.

    When Lattin later learned that Kirk had died, she said she wept, describing him as a role model who had showed her how to be determined and fight for the truth.

    Trump calls Kirk ‘martyr for truth’

    Some 3,000 people were in attendance, according to a statement from the Utah Department of Public Safety. The university police department had six officers working the event, along with Kirk’s own security detail, authorities said.

    Trump announced the death on social media and praised the 31-year-old Kirk who was co-founder and CEO of Turning Point as “Great, and even Legendary.” Later Wednesday, he released a recorded video from the White House in which he called Kirk a “martyr for truth and freedom” and blamed the rhetoric of the “radical left” for the killing.

    Utah Valley University said the campus was immediately evacuated after the shooting, with officers escorting people to safety. It will be closed until Monday.

    Meanwhile, armed officers walked around the neighborhood bordering the campus, knocking on doors and asking for any information residents might have on the shooting. Helicopters buzzed overhead.

    Wednesday’s event, billed as the first stop on Kirk’s “The American Comeback Tour,” had generated a polarizing campus reaction. An online petition calling for university administrators to bar Kirk from appearing received nearly 1,000 signatures. The university issued a statement last week citing First Amendment rights and affirming its “commitment to free speech, intellectual inquiry, and constructive dialogue.”

    Last week, Kirk posted on X images of news clips showing his visit was sparking controversy. He wrote, “What’s going on in Utah?”

    Condemnation from across the political spectrum

    The shooting drew swift condemnation across the political aisle as Democratic officials joined Trump, who ordered flags lowered to half-staff and issued a presidential proclamation, and Republican allies of Kirk in decrying the violence.

    “The attack on Charlie Kirk is disgusting, vile, and reprehensible,” Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who last March hosted Kirk on his podcast, posted on X.

    “The murder of Charlie Kirk breaks my heart. My deepest sympathies are with his wife, two young children, and friends,” said Gabrielle Giffords, the former Democratic congresswoman who was wounded in a 2011 shooting in her Arizona district.

    The shooting appeared poised to become part of a spike of political violence that has touched a range of ideologies and representatives of both major parties. The attacks include the assassination of a Minnesota state lawmaker and her husband at their house in June, the firebombing of a Colorado parade to demand Hamas release hostages, and a fire set at the house of Pennsylvania’s governor, who is Jewish, in April. The most notorious of these events is the shooting of Trump during a campaign rally last year.

    Former Utah Congressman Jason Chaffetz, who was at Wednesday’s event, told the Fox News Channel that he didn’t believe Kirk had enough security.

    “Utah is one of the safest places on the planet,” he said. “And so we just don’t have these types of things.”

    Turning Point was founded in suburban Chicago in 2012 by Kirk, then 18, and William Montgomery, a tea party activist, to proselytize on college campuses for low taxes and limited government. It was not an immediate success.

    But Kirk’s zeal for confronting liberals in academia eventually won over an influential set of conservative financiers.

    Despite early misgivings, Turning Point enthusiastically backed Trump after he clinched the GOP nomination in 2016. Kirk served as a personal aide to Donald Trump Jr., the president’s eldest son, during the general election campaign.

    Soon, Kirk was a regular presence on cable TV, where he leaned into the culture wars and heaped praise on the then-president. Trump and his son were equally effusive and often spoke at Turning Point conferences.

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  • Beverly Hills superintendent overrules plan to display Israeli flag on campuses

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    The superintendent of the Beverly Hills Unified School District overruled a plan approved by the Board of Education to display Israeli flags on all campuses during Jewish American Heritage Month, citing concerns about student safety.

    On Tuesday, the board voted 3 to 2 in favor of the flag display, which was part of a resolution on combating antisemitism that also called for greater education on Jewish history and recognizing remembrance days for the Holocaust and Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel.

    On Friday, Beverly Hills Unified Supt. Alex Cherniss announced that he was using his executive authority to stop the flag display.

    “In light of heightened safety concerns around the displaying of flags on our campuses I have made the decision to take immediate action for the safety and security of our students,” he said in a statement. “Until further notice, no flags will be displayed on our campuses other than the flag of the United States of America and the flag of the State of California.

    Cherniss cited a board policy that allows the superintendent to act on behalf of the district when immediate action is necessary to avoid risk to the school community or school property.

    The motion to display the Israeli flag had stirred controversy inside and out of the Beverly Hills school community.

    Several board members and community members lauded the display as a way to signify support of the Jewish community amid a surge in antisemitism. Critics, on the other hand, said that the flag symbolizes support of the Israeli state and that this is inappropriate in a public school setting.

    Some also raised concerns about the display signifying approval of the Israeli military’s actions in Gaza, where more than half a million people are living in famine amid the ongoing war.

    Board President Rachelle Marcus voted against the resolution because of concerns that displaying the Israeli flag would make campuses a target.

    “I can’t, in all good conscience, put something in front of the school that will add stress to our safety, for the student body, to the faculty, to everybody that works in the school,” she said at Tuesday night’s board meeting. “I just can’t do it.”

    Board member Amanda Stern also voted no, saying that singling out a specific national flag to display is inappropriate in a public school setting. She also said she listened to concerns from community members who said that being against antisemitism does not mean they support the Israeli government.

    “I love Israel,” Stern said. “But I don’t think it [the flag] belongs here.”

    Board member Russell Stuart, on the other hand, pushed back on the sentiment that the flag display carries political significance.

    “The display of a flag during Jewish American Heritage Month is not a direct endorsement of the Israeli government,” he said. “It is a support for our Jewish students and the Jewish community. I really don’t see this as being so difficult.”

    Board member Sigalie Sabag urged her fellow board members to pass the resolution, saying that it was important to do everything in their power to combat the ongoing surge in antisemitic attacks.

    “This is a time right now that Jews are being killed and slaughtered on the street and threats are happening,” she said. “So enough, we need to stand up and not do what the Jewish Germans did in Nazi Germany. They were too scared to speak up.”

    The Anti-Defamation League reported a 360% surge in antisemitic incidents in America in the three months following Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack compared with the same period the previous year. Last year, there were 9,354 antisemitic incidents reported across the U.S., representing a 893% increase over the last 10 years, according to the ADL.

    The Los Angeles chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace, a coalition of anti-Zionist American Jews, issued a statement urging the use of means other than the Israeli flag to recognize Jewish American Heritage Month and promote the safety of the Jewish people.

    “[Displaying the] Israeli flag equates Judaism with Zionism and the state of Israel,” JVP L.A. said in a statement. “Yet, there is so much more to our faith, community, and history than a flag that has now become a symbol of genocide.”

    Although the Beverly Hills Unified Board of Education initially approved a plan to display Israeli flags on campuses, there was never any intention to fly them from a flagpole, according to a district spokesperson.

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    Clara Harter

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  • Teens 16 and 17 get to vote in two Alameda County school board races

    Teens 16 and 17 get to vote in two Alameda County school board races

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    OAKLAND —  Candidates seeking to lead the Oakland Unified School District faced a barrage of tough questions one recent evening — an interrogation led by an enthusiastic group of new voters suddenly endowed with political power: 16- and 17-year-old high school students.

    In a first for California, teens in two Alameda County school districts, Berkeley and Oakland, were granted suffrage in school board races for the first time this November.

    About 1,000 Oakland students had registered as of Oct. 22. And to court their newest and youngest constituents, several Oakland candidates assembled before a packed auditorium in East Oakland for a grilling.

    “What ideas do you bring to the table to improve school safety for the schools in your district?” Ojiugo Egeonu, 16, a junior at Oakland Technical High School, asked the candidates. There had already been “several school shootings in the last year” on high school campuses, she added. Fremont High School, the site of the Oct. 22 candidate forum, was placed on lockdown in 2023 after two people were shot near campus.

    The school board candidates tried to reassure the students, saying they were committed to improving safety, while also protecting students’ rights. The district’s newest voters listened carefully.

    In a district facing a massive budget crisis and often abysmal test scores, students also had questions about school funding, campus safety, mental health, and college and career preparation support.

    Many students said it was about time school board candidates played more heed to them.

    “We’re not at the kids’ table anymore,” Maximus Simmons, a junior at Oakland High, said. “This is the first time young people have had a real voice in school board elections in a major city. This is only the beginning.”

    Across the country, a few small cities have made it possible for young people to cast votes in local elections.

    The first place in California to authorize youth suffrage was Berkeley, where in 2016 more than 70% of voters approved a measure allowing students to have a voice in school board races.

    Voters in Oakland followed suit in 2020 with Measure QQ. But because it took several years to work out the mechanics, officials said, youth voting will happen for the first time in both cities this month.

    “This has never been done before in California, and we had to make sure that it was done properly,” Alameda County Registrar of Voters Tim Dupuis said in a statement.

    The push is expanding to more cities. In the Bay Area, voters in Albany will vote Tuesday on a measure to grant suffrage to 16- and 17-year-olds. In Southern California, Culver City voters narrowly defeated a similar measure in 2022, while San Francisco voters also shot down such measures in 2016 and 2020.

    Sixteen- and 17- year-olds must register to vote and are sent a ballot with only the school board candidates in their district, preventing them from voting in other races.

    At the candidates’ forum at Fremont High, school board candidates took notice of their newest constituency. Seven of the eight candidates running for four open seats in Oakland attended.

    “I’m here to listen to all of you, because that is what you deserve,” Ben Salop, 20, a 2022 graduate of Oakland Technical High School, told the students. “Let’s make Oakland a truly student-led district.”

    “It’s a big deal that 16- and 17-year-olds can vote in Oakland and Berkeley school board elections, as they now influence who represents their interests,” said Laura Wray-Lake, a professor of social welfare at UCLA, who has conducted research on youth civic engagement. She emphasized that these students see school inequities firsthand and will likely vote for candidates prioritizing equity and student support, and who will “listen to their views.”

    Oakland and Berkeley could set an example for other cities, she said, by showing young people can vote responsibly. As the largest, most diverse city with a lower voting age, she says that Oakland may inspire similar movements in other cities like Newark, N.J., and a youth-led movement in Minnesota aiming to lower the voting age for school board elections.

    The Oakland district, which enrolls about 34,000 students, many of whom live in poverty, has been plagued by troubles in recent years. It faces a $95-million budget gap, shrinking enrollment, and has closed campuses amid allegations that it is failing students. It has also struggled with low test scores, particularly among Black and Latino students.

    “We started this movement because we saw our school board directors making decisions without considering student perspectives,” said Natalie Gallegos Chavez, a sophomore at UC Berkeley who was a student at Oakland High School when she first became involved in the Oakland Youth Vote Coalition at its inception in 2019.

    Gallegos said that the movement to implement Measure QQ was inspired by the school program closures, which she viewed as against the interests of students. In 2019, the Oakland School Board cut $20.2 million from its budget, including 100 jobs and several schools.

    Many students said the chance to vote on school board races has made them more engaged in politics in general.

    “I became more interested once I knew we actually might have an opportunity to have our voices be heard,” said Anne Diby, 16, a junior at Skyline High School in Oakland. “It’s opened my eyes to how government decisions are being viewed by youth.”

    Diby’s classmate Autumn Weems, 16, added that the ability to vote has motivated her to become more informed about the issues affecting her school. “We basically are now put in a position to control our education, which is something we should have been able to do in the first place,” she said.

    Tommy Lemasney, center, and other students celebrate their ability to vote in school board elections.

    (Meg Tanaka / For The Times)

    Tommy Lemasney, 17, a senior at Skyline, said voting has made him more aware of the need for youth voices to be heard in politics.

    “I want students to have more of a say, not just adults who think they know everything,” Lemasney said. “Youth voices should be heard, especially when it comes to who represents us.”

    At the event at Fremont High, many candidates rushed to agree with the students on the value of youth voting.

    Candidate Dwayne Aikens Jr. told the students he had grown up in poverty and as a victim of gun violence in Oakland. He was running to improve schools, he said, and also to “put hope and aspiration on the ballot.”

    VanCedric Williams, who is running for reelection against Aikens, encouraged students to remain vocal and continue to push for student involvement in budgeting decisions.

    “We’re gonna need to hear your voice,” he said. In response, the students showered him with loud snaps of approval and applause.

    Tanaka is a special correspondent.

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    Meg Tanaka

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  • Two major reports slam UCLA over policing, violence at pro-Palestinian protest

    Two major reports slam UCLA over policing, violence at pro-Palestinian protest

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    Two high-profile, back-to-back reports slam UCLA leaders for a confusing breakdown in its police response leading to violence at a pro-Palestinian encampment in April, with one investigation also calling out the university’s “dramatic failures in confronting antisemitism.”

    A draft report to the Los Angeles Police Commission released Friday cited a lack of coordination between UCLA, LAPD and the California Highway Patrol and smaller municipal police agencies that were hastily called to campus in the spring.

    UCLA, which has its own police force, had distanced itself from relying on the LAPD in the wake of Black Lives Matter protests four years ago, a practice that contributed to the poorly coordinated response, the report suggested. Some arriving teams of officers did not even know their way around the sprawling campus and were subjected to conflicting orders about what to do as the melee unfolded for hours in front of them the night of April 30.

    The LAPD should take the the lead on campus law enforcement ahead of future “large scale events” if university staffing isn’t adequate, the report said.

    The report to the commission, the civilian agency tasked with LAPD oversight, came on the heels of a congressional probe that pilloried the university for allowing antisemitism to foment on campus during pro-Palestinian protests.

    The Republican-led U.S. House Committee on Education and the Workforce criticized UCLA and other elite universities, including Harvard and Columbia, for “dramatic failures in confronting antisemitism.” The report — which drew upon emails between UCLA Police, UCLA administrators, UC President Michael V. Drake and UC Regents — followed explosive committee hearings in the last year that contributed to the resignations of presidents of Harvard, Columbia, Rutgers and the University of Pennsylvania.

    In a statement, UCLA Associate Vice Chancellor for Campus Safety Rick Braziel said the findings and recommendations sent to the police commission were under review.

    “Meanwhile, both UCLA and the University of California Office of the President are conducting separate reviews of the events that took place last spring, and UCLA has already been implementing a host of measures to improve campus safety,” Braziel said.

    In a separate university statement on the congressional report, UCLA said it was “committed to combating antisemitism and fostering an environment where every member of our community feels safe and welcome. We have learned valuable lessons from the events of last spring, and ahead of the start of this academic year, instituted reforms and programs to combat discrimination and enhance campus safety.”

    In August, Drake directed chancellors of all 10 campuses to strictly enforce rules against encampments, protests that block pathways and masking that shields identities amid sharp calls to stop policy violations during demonstrations.

    Early signs of trouble

    The combined narrative of both reports offer the most detailed timeline on events leading up to the night of violence that began April 30, with repercussions spanning through May 2, when a massive police sweep of the encampment led more than 200 arrests and six uses of police force.

    In a UCLA Police message thread on April 25, five days before the violence, a patrol officer suggested police should identify and remove people who were not UCLA students, staff and faculty from the recently formed encampment at Royce Quad in the center of campus, the House report said. An unidentified individual responded that UCLA had decided to “hold off.”

    Around 5 a.m. on April 25, then-UCLA police Chief John Thomas texted LAPD commanders Steve Lurie and Jonathan Tom to inform them that multiple tents were being set up on campus and that UCLA “may need some assistance as the day progresses,” said the police commission report, compiled by LAPD and submitted by Interim Police Chief Dominic H. Choi to the commission. The panel could approve it as early as its next meeting Tuesday.

    On April 25, a UCLA police lieutenant informed the then-UCLA police chief that more than 50 unidentified people were unloading wood, tents and other materials from truck at Royce Quad. UCLA closed off a nearby street to prevent further access, but the erection of tents in by Royce Quad and Powell Library continued, the House committee report said.

    The encampment grew to more than 150 people with tents surrounded by wooden pellets, with the university fire marshal warning that the use of wood was not advised, the House committee report said.

    “Over the course of the next day, it became apparent to UCPD and campus administrators that the university was underequipped,” according to the House report, which largely summarized university emails.

    “UCLA leaders worried that they would be unable to restrict access to the area or prevent further expansion of the encampment without a significant surge in manpower, with one senior administrator warning that ‘no temporary fence is going to keep these people out,’” the House report said.

    On April 27, Choi approved the deployment of two LAPD mobile response squads to campus to stand by. Thomas told Choi that Beverly Hills, Culver City and Santa Monica were also sending squads and that LAPD would be the last resort.

    The following morning, Thomas wrote in a group chat with other law enforcement leaders that more pro-Palestinian protesters planned to go to campus. A few minutes later, an LAPD lieutenant texted his colleagues to say that UCLA had “no plans” to clear out protesters, the report said.

    By 10:30 a.m. more than 1,000 pro-Israel counterprotesters arrived by the encampment.

    That morning, a single squad car from West L.A. was dispatched to monitor the protest. By 10:41 a.m., police began receiving reports that protesters and counterprotesters were “getting physical.”

    Additional LAPD officers were sent to campus. About 11:14 a.m., the LAPD lieutenant texted Lurie to say that UCLA had requested the LAPD’s help in clearing out the protesters. But he responded that the LAPD would not participate in making arrests.

    Around 1:34 p.m., Lurie texted a group of LAPD senior staff to inform them that the pro-Israel protest crowd was thinning out and UCLA administrators were discussing how and when to clear the encampment. Choi responded that the LAPD would not be involved in clearing out the area. About 90% of the pro-Israel group left within the hour.

    There were further moments of tension during the next two days, as coordination with the LAPD showed signs of being disjointed, the report to the police commission indicated.

    It exploded the night of on April 30.

    As reports of clashes began to increasingly pick up, UCLA police leaders contacted Lurie to let him know that campus police were being overwhelmed by the crowd.

    While the initial message was sent at 11:07 p.m., campus police officials didn’t make an official request for mutual aid until 11:31 p.m. and again 10 minutes later, the commission report said. The first LAPD units arrived on campus by 12:12 a.m. By about 1:45 a.m., several mobile response squads waded into the melee to try to separate protesters and counterprotesters who’d converged near a flagpole.

    But they took “no further action to clear the crowds” because they were still formulating a plan and awaiting backup, the commission report said. Under the department’s crowd control rules, officers are supposed to wait for “sufficient personnel” before entering a crowd to make arrests. It was at least another hour before CHP officers began to clear the rest of the courtyard near the encampment. By 3:48 a.m., the area was cleared although the encampment remained.

    By the next night, multiple law enforcement agencies participated in clearing the encampment with more than 200 arrests.

    The report to the commission recommended that UCPD, LAPD and other police agencies “establish procedures” for who is in control when officers in the primary jurisdiction over “overwhelmed,” as was the case at UCLA. It said combining different agencies together can be “problematic” because of “varying use of force policies and tactics.”

    It also said that LAPD officers should better coordinate with UCLA so they are more aware of how to navigate campus and that the LAPD should improve on its record keeping and training to improve response to similar future protests.

    Protests fomented antisemitism

    The House committee’s findings accuse UCLA of largely ignoring the growing encampment while being aware as early as April 27 of campus accusations of antisemitic language or acts stemming from it.

    Chaired by Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.), the committee has been accused of bias. Democrats, who make up 20 of the 44 members of the committee, have criticized Republicans as not being serious in their pursuit to combat antisemitism. Members of the House minority have called the hearings an attempt by the chamber’s Republicans to use campus unrest for political gain, pointing out that equal attention has not been given to anti-Muslim or anti-Arab hatred, which have also increased since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel.

    The committee grilled former UCLA Chancellor Gene Block in the spring along with the presidents of Northwestern and Rutgers universities but questions to Block about the violence at UCLA largely came from Democrats.

    USC escapes harsh criticism

    Separately on Friday, the Los Angeles Police Commission also released a report on USC, where LAPD arrested 94 people on April 24 as police and campus safety officers cleared a pro-Palestinian encampment at Alumni Park.

    That report, which is significantly shorter than the UCLA one, was less critical. USC did not reply to a request for comment about on the finding, which said that LAPD deployed 619 officers the campus over three days between April 24 and May 5. The report’s recommendations included that police do a better job at “tracking personnel” in order to estimate costs and more closely follow reporting procedures on use of force.

    Police used force on two occasions at USC. In one, an LAPD officer fired a 40mm round at a protester, and in the other an officer used their baton. Neither incident resulted in injuries, the report said. But, the cases weren’t immediately investigated, as required by department policy, because of the department’s reliance on paper records.

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    Jaweed Kaleem, Libor Jany

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  • UCLA investigating reports of 2 students drugged at parties near campus

    UCLA investigating reports of 2 students drugged at parties near campus

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    Police at UCLA have issued a crime alert after two students reported being drugged at recent parties near campus.

    The first incident occurred Thursday, when the first victim went to three different parties along Gayley Avenue and “developed symptoms which they did not believe were from alcohol,” according to the crime alert.

    That student reported the incident a couple days later.

    The second incident occurred in the 600 block of Gayley Avenue on Saturday when a student, after being handed a drink, also developed symptoms they did not believe to be from alcohol or marijuana, according to the alert. That student went to the emergency room and reported the incident later that night.

    No suspect description was provided, and the incidents are being investigated as off-campus aggravated assaults using drugs, police said.

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    Joseph Serna

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  • 4Roots Opens Education Center on Farm Campus

    4Roots Opens Education Center on Farm Campus

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    The much-anticipated 4Roots Farm Campus opened the doors to its Education Center in Orlando to Valencia College students studying Plant Science and Agricultural Technology.

    The Education Center, the centerpiece of the first phase of the Farm Campus which includes a greenhouse and a walkable edible food forest, will serve as the “living classroom” for the Valencia students enrolled in Intro to Sustainable Agriculture.

    “From the very beginning, our vision for the Farm Campus focused on education,” explained John Rivers, President & CEO, 4Roots. “We want to teach people about the importance of healthy food, farmers about growing technologies that can enhance their crops, and students about the many careers that revolve around the agriculture industry,” he continued. “These students will be surrounded by some of the most advanced technologies in the world. I hope it inspires them to pursue a career in this exciting industry.”

    The students studying Sustainable Agriculture will be collecting data on parameters relating to soil health, followed by growing various crops throughout the semester.

    “The partnership between Valencia and 4Roots is providing cutting-edge opportunities for students to learn through working in a hands-on professional environment at one of the most high-tech and modern sustainable community farming facilities in the country,” said Dr. Lisa Macon, Launch Director, School of Engineering, Technology & Advanced Manufacturing, Valencia College. “Being able to take classes in a Learning Building Challenge building on site, such as the Education Center is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for students to experience a truly sustainable learning environment. Not only are students benefiting from the experience, but Valencia is also able to attract more students to these unique learning experiences that are in high demand by today’s socially conscious higher-ed learners,” she concluded.

    The 4Roots Education Building is the first building constructed in the state of Florida that meets the “Living Building Challenge” criteria, constructed to put more energy back into natural resources than it takes out. The building is energy and water net positive and will generate a minimum of 5% energy to be filtered through the Farm Campus or distributed through the OUC microgrid. The Education Building is also a great example to the students of how sustainability is not just how crops are grown, but something else to be considered along with various other aspects of any project.

    “This state of the art facility, including the greenhouse, classroom and permaculture area will enhance Valencia students’ experience by providing an array of diverse agricultural models on a larger scale than previously available,” said Dr. Javier A. Garcés, Professor & Program Chair, Plant Science & Agricultural Technology Program at Valencia College.

    The 4Roots Farm Campus, located in The Packing District, is in the heart of Orlando’s emerging neighborhood.

    It invites the community to gather and collaborate on the creation of a robust local food system. With a diverse range of growing systems, it offers a unique hands-on learning experience that highlights innovative and sustainable practices and technologies from around the world.

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  • Major gift accelerates transformation of old mall into UCLA research hub

    Major gift accelerates transformation of old mall into UCLA research hub

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    The reincarnation of a shuttered Los Angeles retail mecca as a sprawling UCLA research center has received a major boost from billionaire philanthropist Dr. Gary Michelson and his wife, Alya, who will give $120 million to ramp up the project.

    Michelson, a spine surgeon and inventor, said the money will help launch the California Institute for Immunology and Immunotherapy, which aims to create breakthrough discoveries that prevent and cure diseases including cancer, heart disease and Alzheimer’s.

    The institute will be a tenant in UCLA Research Park, which is under construction in the former Westside Pavilion. The indoor mall two miles south of the university at Pico and Westwood boulevards was a 1980s icon popular with shoppers and filmmakers before falling out of favor. Most of its stores closed by 2019.

    The shopping center was being converted to offices when the UC Regents bought it for $700 million in January to create the research park. Along with the California Institute for Immunology and Immunotherapy, it will house the UCLA Center for Quantum Science and Engineering, as well as other science and medicine programs.

    By purchasing the former shopping center, UCLA saved years of toil to build such a facility on its campus, which is the smallest of the nine UC undergraduate campuses and has very little room for growth.

    A courtyard view of the UCLA research center now under construction in the former Westside Pavilion shopping center.

    (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)

    “That building would have gone on the last available piece of property on the UCLA campus,” Michelson said, “and it would have been extraordinarily expensive to build there. As a real estate matter, this was just an extraordinary opportunity.”

    The immunology institute had been planned for years, while a full-scale research park was something “we’ve always dreamed of having … but we always recognized we could never find a piece of property that big close to campus. We had sort of given up on the idea many years ago — and it came alive,” said former UCLA Chancellor Gene Block, who was instrumental in the purchase of the former Westside Pavilion.

    An earlier plan to build the institute on the campus called for tearing down a parking garage, digging a hole deep enough to replace the parking and erecting a new building on top, Block said.

    The gift, through the Michelson Medical Research Foundation, designates $100 million to establish two research entities within the institute, each funded with $50 million; one will focus on rapid vaccine development and the other on harnessing the body’s microbiome to advance human health. The microbiome research will be conducted in collaboration with the new UCLA Goodman-Luskin Microbiome Center, placing it among the largest microbiome research enterprises in the world, the foundation said.

    The foundation is also funding a $20-million endowment to provide research grants to young scientists using novel processes to advance immunotherapy research, human immunology and vaccine discovery.

    The institute will have labs of different sizes meant to serve biotech researchers who can start with small teams that can grow into larger labs if they find success.

    “We’re going to create an entire ecosystem of biotech startups and they’re going to stay right here” and attract other players to the neighborhood, Michelson said. “We’re going to build out an entire ecosystem of biotech all through Westwood.”

    He envisions 5,000 people, including 500 research scientists, working in the institute. Gov. Gavin Newsom estimated in January that it would take more than three years to fully transform the 700,000-square-foot complex, but Michelson hopes to have a large portion of the immunology institute operating in half that time, he said. At 360,000 square feet, the institute will be the research park’s primary tenant.

    The former mall’s 12-screen multiplex movie theater may be converted into lecture halls or performance spaces offering programming across the arts, humanities, sciences and social sciences, the chancellor’s office said.

    Interior view of the new UCLA Research Park.

    An interior view of the UCLA research center now under construction in the former Westside Pavilion shopping center.

    (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)

    The gift is the Michelsons’ largest single donation in 30 years of philanthropy that includes $50 million to build Michelson Hall at the University of Southern California, which is home to the Michelson Center for Convergent Bioscience. The Michelson name will not be attached to the new UCLA complex, he said, because other philanthropists — perhaps one who donates more than he did — may want the recognition.

    “The gift will change countless lives here and across the globe,” UCLA interim Chancellor Darnell Hunt said.

    The institute will operate as a nonprofit medical research organization funded by a public-private partnership and governed by an independent board that includes UCLA representatives, according to a UC Regents document. The institute will pay UCLA 7.5% of the net revenues generated by the sale of new medicines and other inventions its scientists create, the document said.

    Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said the project “has the potential to fundamentally change health outcomes around the world and create good jobs in Los Angeles.”

    The purchase of the former Westside Pavilion marked the third major acquisition for the public university system in Los Angeles in less than two years.

    Seeking to expand its footprint, UCLA announced in June 2023 that it had acquired the Art Deco-style Trust Building in downtown Los Angeles and renamed it UCLA Downtown.

    Nine months prior, the school spent $80 million to buy two other major properties owned by Marymount California University, a small Catholic university that was shuttered last year. The purchase included Marymount’s 24.5-acre campus in Rancho Palos Verdes and an 11-acre residential site in nearby San Pedro.

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    Roger Vincent

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  • This California university, home of many Nobel laureates, topped 2025 party school list

    This California university, home of many Nobel laureates, topped 2025 party school list

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    A California university that’s home to a number of Nobel laureates has also gained the distinction of being the top party school in the United States, according to a recent ranking.

    UC Santa Barbara took the top spot in a list of party schools in the U.S. for 2025, released by Niche, an education research and ranking site.

    To calculate the rankings, Niche — which uses a database of nearly 500,000 student college reviews — factored in student surveys on the party scene, access to bars, athletics grade, Greek life grade and access to restaurants.

    Reviews from current and former students describe the university as “combining academic rigor with a laid-back coastal lifestyle” and praised the “vibrant student community.” More than half a dozen Nobel Prize winners in economics, physics and chemistry — including David Card, Alan J. Heeger, Herbert Kroemer and Shuji Nakamura — have taught at UC Santa Barbara over the years.

    “I used to be an over the top party guy but living in Santa Barbara/Isla Vista helped me form new healthy outdoor habits while learning out how to be more responsible,” one student wrote. “There are so many activities you can partake in around town and on campus that is not partying … It is literally heaven on earth for an 18-21 year old as long as you don’t overdo it.”

    But one person, who described themselves as the parent of an alum, rated the university only two stars, complaining that students “party all day.”

    “College kids party, but UCSB is out of control,” the person wrote.

    One of the best-known party events is “Deltopia,” an unsanctioned spring break party that unfolds in April. The party, made popular among UC Santa Barbara students who live in Isla Vista near the campus, was paused during the COVID-19 pandemic but resumed in 2022, resulting in multiple arrests and citations during the weekend-long event.

    In 2014, more than 20,000 people were estimated to have attended Deltopia, which devolved into a riot resulting in dozens of injuries and more than 100 arrests. The UC Santa Barbara student association at the time issued a statement saying that “The ‘wild party’ stereotype and image exists because we, the students, allow it to exist.”

    This year and last year, Santa Barbara County officials closed the beaches in Isla Vista in anticipation of Deltopia. Last year more than 150 people were issued citations, while 23 people were arrested.

    The most recent Deltopia marked the most citations issued in the history of the event at 256, according to The Daily Nexus, a campus newspaper.

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    Brittny Mejia

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