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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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  • UC registered nurses ratify contract that guarantees a minimum 18.5% increase in pay

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    Registered nurses who work at 19 University of California facilities have ratified a new contract after voting concluded Saturday.

    The contract will cover some 25,000 registered nurses and includes protections to improve patient safety and nurse retention through Jan. 31, 2029, according to the California Nurses Assn.

    The pact includes a minimum 18.5% increase in pay, caps on healthcare increases, restrictions on UC floating RNs between facilities, improvements to meal and rest breaks and workplace violence-prevention policies, the association said.

    “University of California RNs organized for and won important patient protections at the bargaining table, like curbing the rampant misuse of floating and ensuring safeguards on artificial intelligence,” said Kristan Delmarty, an RN and member of the UC bargaining team.

    “As a result of the commitment of all CAN members, we won a contract that will improve outcomes for nurses and our patients,’’ said Marlene Tucay, an RN at UC Irvine and member of the bargaining team.

    Under the contract, RNs were guaranteed a central role in selecting, designing and validating new technology, including AI systems, the CNA stated.

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    City News Service

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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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  • UC reaches contract agreement with 21,000 employees, averting a strike

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    The University of California and a union representing 21,000 healthcare, research and technical professionals across the UC system reached a contract agreement and averted a strike, the university and union announced Saturday.

    The union, University Professional and Technical Employees (UPTE), had been bargaining with UC for 17 months for a new contract, and the two sides were in mediation for three weeks. After talks broke down earlier this week, UC said UPTE approached the mediator to re-engage with the university.

    The union was set to strike Nov. 17 and 18 and be joined by more than 60,000 supporters from two additional UC unions, AFSCME 3299 and the California Nurses Assn.

    The unions said it would have been the largest labor strike in UC history. AFSCME 3299 represents patient care technical workers, custodians, food service employees, security guards, secretaries and other workers at UC hospitals and campuses.

    UC and UPTE said details of the tentative contract, which union members must ratify, would be released next week. Prior to the agreement, UPTE workers were seeking investments from UC into retention, pay and ensuring safe working conditions to help address a staffing crisis that the union said “threatens patient care, student services, and the research mission at the heart of the UC system.”

    “The finalized agreement reflects the university’s enduring commitment and UPTE’s advocacy for our employees who play critical roles across the University,” a joint statement from UC and UPTE read. “Both parties acknowledge and appreciate the collaborative spirit that allowed us to move forward and reach a resolution that supports our valuable employees and the University of California’s mission of excellence.”

    UPTE rescinded its strike notice pending a membership ratification vote, according to a statement from Dan Russell, UPTE president and chief negotiator.

    “Our tentative agreement is a hard-won victory for 21,000 healthcare, research, and technical professionals across UC — and one that will benefit millions of UC patients and students, as well as people across the world who benefit from UC’s cutting-edge research,” Russell said. “We continue to stand with AFSCME and CNA members as they fight and strike for a similar agreement for their members.”

    Meredith Turner, the UC senior vice president of external relations and communications, said the agreement was the result of “constructive dialogue and a shared commitment to finding common ground while maintaining financial responsibility in uncertain times.”

    Turner had previously opposed the strike, saying in a video statement posted online Thursday that UC was “disappointed, but not surprised that UPTE has once again chosen disruption over dialog.”

    She said UC had been bargaining in good faith, offering “real improvements, meaningful raises, strong benefits and fair working conditions that reflect how much we value our employees.”

    UPTE previously engaged in three statewide strikes this year in addition to a fourth strike last November, which was limited to UC San Francisco.

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  • International student arrivals take a dive under Trump

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    The number of international student arrivals in the U.S. dropped by nearly a fifth at the onset of this academic year, according to federal data, the latest sign of a hit to colleges’ foreign student enrollment as the Trump administration has ratcheted up scrutiny of their visas.

    International visitors arriving in the U.S. on student visas declined 19% in August compared with the same month in 2024, according to the preliminary data released by the National Travel and Tourism Office. The numbers also declined in June and July, but August is the summer month that typically sees the most international student arrivals — 313,138 this year.

    As the federal government has clamped down on student visitors, industry groups have warned of international enrollment declines that threaten school budgets and American colleges’ standing in the world. Although the extent of the change remains to be seen, the new data suggest a turnaround in international enrollment that had been rebounding in the U.S. from a decline worsened by the COVID-19 pandemic.

    About 1.1 million international students were in the United States last year — a source of key revenue for tuition-driven colleges. International students are not eligible for federal financial aid, and many pay full tuition.

    The picture in California

    Many California campuses, including the University of California system, have not yet released data on fall enrollment but prepared for potential hurdles in attracting internationals.

    For fall 2025 admissions — not enrollment — UC said its nine undergraduate campuses had offered seats to 3,263 more first-year international students, an increase of 17% over last year, according to data reported over the summer. UC also admitted 100,947 first-year California students, up more than 7% from last year,

    UC said it increased international admits because of “rising uncertainty of their likelihood of enrollment.” It noted that the share of accepted internationals who choose to enroll is generally “substantially lower” than that of California residents and that the cost of being a non-Californian at UC has gone up. Last year, the UC Board of Regents approved a 10% increase of the “nonresident” tuition fee from $34,200 to $37,602.

    At USC, the California campus that typically attracts the largest share of internationals in the state, there were also concerns over a potential dip in foreign student enrollment.

    The campus saw a small decline in overall international enrollment, from 12,374 last academic year to 11,959 this fall. Chinese and Indian students made up more than half of the total foreign population, matching trends statewide.

    But USC also grew its first-year international community, according to university data about this fall’s new undergraduate class.

    Of the 3,759 new first-year students enrolled this fall, about 21%, or 789, are internationals. Last year, about 17% of the 3,489 first-years — 593 — were in the U.S. on visas.

    California usually attracts the largest international college community of any state. In 2024, in addition to USC, the biggest draws were UC Berkeley, which enrolled 12,441 students; UC San Diego, 10,467 students; and UCLA, 10,446 students, according to data from the Institute of International Education. STEM fields — science, technology, engineering and math — were the most popular.

    Visa challenges and travel bans blocked some students

    Nationally, many students who had plans to study in the U.S. could not enter the country because of difficulty lining up visas. In late May, the State Department paused the scheduling of visa interviews for foreign students, which resumed three weeks later with new rules for vetting visa applicants’ social media accounts.

    The timing of the pause had “maximum possible impact” for visa issuances for the fall semester, said Clay Harmon, executive director of the Assn. of International Enrollment Management, a nonprofit membership association.

    A travel ban and other restrictions for 19 countries that the Trump administration announced in June created even more uncertainty for some students. Most of the countries included in the ban were located in Africa, Asia and the Middle East.

    The federal data on international dips show those regions experienced the largest declines in international student arrivals this August, with drops of 33% from Africa, 17% from the Middle East and 24% from Asia — including a 45% decrease from India, the country that sends the most students to the U.S.

    The data include new as well as returning students, but some who were already in the U.S. avoided traveling outside the country this summer for fear of problems reentering.

    Students have concerns about the political climate, research funding and cost

    Some international students and their families have been wary of the Trump administration’s wider crackdown on immigration. In the spring, the federal government stripped thousands of international students of their legal status, causing panic before the Trump administration reversed course. Trump also has called for colleges to reduce their dependence on foreign students and cap international enrollment.

    Syed Tamim Ahmad, a senior at UCLA who grew up in Dubai, said he was considering applying to medical school in the U.S. before last spring, when sudden student visa cancellations and government suspensions of research funding to Harvard and other elite campuses began to intensify.

    “When I was a freshman, it seemed that out of every country the U.S. provided the most opportunities in terms of access to research funding and resources,” said Ahmad, whose major is physiological science. “But by my senior year, a lot of these pull factors became push factors. Funding was cut down, affecting labs, and there is fear among international students about what they put on social media and what they put online. That sense of having freedom of speech in the U.S. isn’t the same.”

    Ahmad is now planning to enroll at medical school in Australia.

    “There is a similar feeling among many students — that if they are going to graduate school or continuing their studies they should go outside the U.S.,” said Ahmad, who previously served in UCLA’s undergraduate student government as an international representative. “But it’s not everyone. There are also still many people who believe that there are good opportunities for them in the United States.”

    Zeynep Bowlus, a higher education consultant in Istanbul, said interest in U.S. universities among the families she works with had been declining over the last few years largely because of financial reasons and skepticism about the value of an American degree. Policy changes in the U.S. are adding to their concerns, she said.

    “I try not to make it too dramatic, but at the same time, I tell them the reality of what’s going on and the potential hurdles that they may face,” Bowlus said.

    Institutions in other countries have seized the opportunity to attract students who might be cooling on the U.S. Growing numbers of Chinese students have opted to stay in Asia, and international applications to universities in the United Kingdom have surged.

    Elisabeth Marksteiner, a higher education consultant in Cambridge, England, said she will encourage families looking at American universities to approach the admissions process with more caution. A student visa has never been guaranteed, but it is especially important now for families to have a backup plan, she said.

    “I think the presumption is that it’s all going to carry on as it was in the past,” Marksteiner said. “My presumption is, it isn’t.”

    Kaleem is a staff writer for The Times. Seminera and Keller write for the Associated Press.

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    Jaweed Kaleem, Makiya Seminera, Christopher L. Keller

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  • UC must publicly release Trump administration’s $1.2-billion settlement proposal

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    UCLA must release the Trump administration document that outlines the terms of the $1.2 billion settlement proposal at the center of talks between the University of California and the federal government, the California Supreme Court ruled Friday.

    The decision is a win for UCLA faculty who have pushed for more transparency in the negotiations over the future of the nation’s premier public university system. UC has until the end of the day to disclose the 28 pages of federal demands for far-reaching policy changes at UCLA that are in line with President Trump’s vision for higher education.

    UCLA asked the high court to take two actions: block a lower court’s ruling that ordered UC to turn over the document to faculty and force the appeals court that declined to review the lower court decision to release a detailed explanation of its reasoning.

    “The petition for review and applications for stay are denied,” said brief Supreme Court decision, signed by Chief Justice Patricia Guerrero. The court did not elaborate on the matter.

    The proposal will be shared with the UCLA Faculty Association, an independent campus group which sued UC. Faculty leaders have said they intend to distribute the document publicly.

    “We’re excited that the Supreme Court agreed with us that every Californian has a right to see this letter and understand the scope of federal interference into our state institutions,” said Anna Markowitz, president of the UCLA Faculty Assn. and an associate professor in UCLA’s School of Education and Information Studies.

    UC did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

    What’s at stake for each side

    UC said in court filings that it would “suffer irreparable harm” to negotiations with the Trump administration if the document became public. It also said disclosure would hurt future settlement negotiations with other parties.

    University lawyers argued that releasing the proposal would invite “every member of the entire public to express each one’s views on every settlement” for an “uncontrollable public fray” around negotiations.

    The UCLA Faculty Association said that the document’s disclosure is required under the Public Records Act. The association argued that the information is a matter of public interest to faculty, staff, students, UCLA Health patients and Californian’s whose tax dollars support the UC system.

    Faculty sued after UC and UCLA denied public records requests. UC said it was not bound by public records law to share details of confidential settlement discussions.

    “The intense public reaction to disclosure at an early stage of an initial proposal could easily end any opportunity for discussion at its inception and hamper the ability to fully and fairly evaluate a response,” UC wrote a court filings.

    A lower court’s Oct. 14 ruling ordered UC to release the proposal to the association within 10 days. On Wednesday, an appeals court declined to reverse the decision before UC sought emergency relief from the state’s highest court.

    The Trump administration sent the more than 7,000-word settlement proposal in August, after the Department of Justice accused UCLA of violating the law in its handling of antisemitism complaints, admissions practices and gender identity on campus. Citing those alleged violations, the federal government suspended $584 million in medical, science and energy research funding to UCLA. The vast majority of the funds are now restored as the result of the a lawsuit filed by UC-wide faculty.

    UCLA has maintained that its policies comply with state and federal laws,. Its chancellor, Julio Frenk, has said the “far-reaching penalty of defunding life-saving research does nothing to address any alleged discrimination.”

    What’s in the document

    The Times reviewed the settlement proposal and, in September, published a detailed account of its demands.

    They include proposed changes to admissions to prevent alleged affirmative action, stricter protest rules and a ban on gender-affirming healthcare for minors at UCLA medical facilities.

    The document calls for UCLA to publicly announce that it does not recognize transgender people’s gender identities, prevent the admission of “anti-Western” international students and to pay the costs for an outside monitor to oversee the agreement.

    The offer also says that “the United States and its consultants and agents will have full and direct access to all UCLA staff, employees, facilities, documents, and data related to the agreement, in coordination with legal counsel for UCLA, except any documents or data protected by work product or the attorney-client privilege.”

    UC President James B. Milliken has said fine — a $1-billion payment to the government and a $172-million claims fund for people who say they faced discrimination — would be near impossible to pay.

    He has been less detailed on the other federal demands, leading to faculty complaints over how UC has handled negotiations and communicated updates to employees. Milliken has broadly said that UC will protect academic freedom as well as its mission and values in any potential Trump agreement.

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    Jaweed Kaleem

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  • UC, CSU released troves of personal employee information to the feds. Now the backlash

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    California universities are facing intense backlash for handing over employees’ personal contact information to the Trump administration as it investigates allegations of campus antisemitism, amping up tensions over government incursions into higher education.

    At Cal State, a faculty union filed suit Friday in state court after learning the personal phone numbers and email addresses of 2,600 Los Angeles campus employees were turned over to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which is investigating employee complaints of campus antisemitism. In addition, the EEOC is contacting Jewish faculty across the 22-campus system, prompting campus demonstrations against cooperating with Trump.

    At UC Berkeley, protesters recently converged on campus after University of California leaders said they released files from their civil rights office and UC police incident reports containing the names and contact information of 160 faculty and staff to the Education Department, which is also investigating alleged campus antisemitism.

    UC-wide faculty senate leaders are demanding to know whether there have been other campus disclosures. UC has not publicly announced similar actions outside of Berkeley — but has not denied the possibility.

    Gov. Gavin Newsom has intervened. The governor said he received a report last week from UC leadership on the data release that made a “compelling case” that UC was legally required to share information with the government. Newsom said he was still “reviewing” the report. The governor also said he may similarly scrutinize CSU’s actions.

    Federal requests for campus data are not unusual in civil rights or employment discrimination investigations, legal experts say. But what is exceptional is the large-scale nature of the demands. CSU was ordered under subpoena to release employee information. UC says it negotiated over government asks to provide employee data — first offering redacted files — before relenting.

    The orders come against the backdrop of President Trump’s aggressive campaign to force higher education institutions to align with his conservative agenda. The administration has suspended billions in research grants and has offered to absolve alleged campus violations in exchange for hefty fines and sweeping policy changes.

    Broad size and scope

    Legal experts said they were not surprised investigations were taking place, citing campus civil rights complaints over the years and Trump administration declarations that prioritize combating antisemitism.

    Brian Soucek, UC Davis law professor, worried the antisemitism investigations — which involve nearly every California public university — are “a witch hunt.”

    The EEOC has powers to subpoena relevant information needed “to advance some lawful purpose,” said Soucek, who teaches about equality and free speech law. “The question is whether these [actions] are overly broad.”

    Ted Mitchell, president of the American Council on Education, said “asking for information about individuals and groups of individuals in the course of an investigation is about as unusual as traffic on the 405. But it is entirely appropriate to mistrust the Trump administration.” Mitchell, whose group represents 1,600 campuses, said schools are “between a proverbial rock and hard place.”

    Spokespeople for the Education Department and EEOC did not reply to requests for comment.

    UC and CSU’s views

    Caught between the government and faculty are campus administrators, some who have expressed distrust of Trump’s civil rights investigations. But they fear that resisting would not only be illegal but could result in devastating funding cuts.

    In recent faculty meetings, UC President James B. Milliken has declined to say whether other campuses aside from Berkeley have shared personal information of employees or students. Speaking at a UC-wide academic senate meeting Thursday, Milliken said he understood employee concerns and argued that data sharing was routine across presidential administrations.

    He said the university was not handing over lists of faculty names but that broader documents shared with the government contained personnel information.

    Milliken said UC is also working to fulfill data sharing requirements under a December 2024 agreement with the Biden administration that has carried over to this year.

    That agreement resolved civil rights complaints — over antisemitism and bias against Muslim, Arab and pro-Palestinian students — at the Davis, Los Angeles, San Diego, Santa Barbara and Santa Cruz campuses. It required UC to share “an electronic sortable spreadsheet” with details on who reported civil rights complaints and who they were lodged against for the 2023-24 and 2024-25 academic years.

    “Failure to comply with government oversight could result in a very significant loss of funding, potentially jeopardizing tens of thousands of jobs, the education of our students, the research careers of thousands of faculty, and the care afforded by our health enterprise,” Milliken recently wrote to campuses.

    Administrators at both systems said they tried to resist or minimize government requests and have made strides to protect privacy while complying with the law.

    At CSU, officials told the EEOC that the Los Angeles campus would only turn over publicly available data — such as university email addresses. But then the campus was subpoenaed for personal data.

    Over the spring, the EEOC also subpoenaed UC for information on hundreds of employees who had signed letters in 2023 and 2024 expressing concern about the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel and the campus climate for Jewish people, according to faculty contacted by EEOC investigators who they said informed them about the legal order.

    The EEOC’s systemwide CSU investigation has not yet involved a subpoena for other Cal State campuses.

    Tensions grow

    Faculty, staff, students and unions have pushed back, saying university leaders should have rejected government demands, moves many say weaponize antisemitism charges for ideological goals.

    “Rather than taking a stance against an authoritarian regime, CSU leadership has chosen to be complicit,” said the California Faculty Association, which represents 29,000 employees.

    The union’s suit in state court asks for a judge to order CSU to avoid disclosing union members’ personal information in response to federal subpoenas without giving notice to affected employees and offering a chance for faculty to reject the request.

    Peyrin Kao, a pro-Palestinian electrical engineering and computer science lecturer, was among those who UC Berkeley notified that their names were in files given to the government.

    “They didn’t tell me why I was reported,” said Kao, who suspects the move was tied complaints in 2023 over an optional lecture he gave against Israel’s war in Gaza and UC’s investments in weapons companies. After the lecture, the university issued him a warning about potential violation of a policy against “political indoctrination.”

    “Showing everyone that you can get reported for pro-Palestine speech does have a chilling effect,” Kao said.

    Jewish voices

    Ryan Witt, president of the CSU Channel Islands chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, agreed. Witt, who is Jewish and organized a recent protest against the investigation and “repressive” CSU free speech policies, felt that antisemitism was not a “major issue” on campus.

    Other Jewish community members elsewhere differed.

    Jeffrey Blutinger, director of Jewish Studies at Cal State Long Beach, filed an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission complaint against the university.

    (Gary Coronado/For The Times)

    Referring to Trump’s higher education policies and antisemitism, Cal State Long Beach Jewish Studies professor Jeff Blutinger said he “shouldn’t be required to choose which threat I ignore.”

    Blutinger made a report last summer to the commission about a February 2024 an incident where police shut down a guest lecture he presented at San Jose State University after protesters demonstrated in the hallway outside the classroom. He laid blame on the university and police for not protecting his right to speak about Israelis and Palestinians.

    But he said the EEOC investigator he spoke to last month told him the probe was not tied to that complaint, which was closed for being too old. Instead, it was about a May 2024 public letter to CSU leaders that Blutinger signed, expressing worry over the “well-being of Jewish and Israeli students, staff, and faculty.”

    Another signatory the EEOC contacted last month is Arik Davidyan, an assistant professor of physiology at Sacramento State University. Davidyan said he told the investigator that “our administration has worked a lot with the Jewish community to address our concerns.”

    Tackling discrimination

    Some leaders at UC and CSU have expressed frustration, saying efforts to combat discrimination and anti-Israel sentiment have gone unnoticed by the government.

    At UC, protest rules have been revamped with bans on encampments, masking to hide identity while breaking the law, and student government boycotts of Israel. New training programs on antisemitism are underway.

    CSU also revamped protest policies and in the last fiscal year spent nearly $16 million to expand systemwide and campus-level civil rights programs. In the coming months, it is rolling out a new case management system to track discrimination complaints.

    “We’re working as hard as we possibly can to address antisemitism and to address any of the protected characteristic discrimination issues that may arise,” said Dawn S. Theodora, the system’s interim executive vice chancellor and general counsel. “We take it very seriously.”

    Staff Writer Howard Blume contributed reporting.

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    Jaweed Kaleem, Daniel Miller

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  • Trump seeks $1-billion fine against UCLA. Newsom says ‘we’ll sue,’ calling it extortion

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    Hours after the Trump administration demanded that the University of California pay a $1-billion fine to settle federal accusations of antisemitism in exchange for restoring frozen grant funding to UCLA, Gov. Gavin Newsom called the proposal “extortion” and said the state will go to court to protect the nation’s premier university system.

    “We’ll sue,” Newsom said during a news conference with Texas legislators over California’s effort to counter a contentious Republican redistricting plan in that state.

    President Trump is “trying to silence academic freedom” by “attacking one of the most important public institutions in the United States of America,” Newsom said, adding that he would “stand tall and push back against that, and I believe every member of California Legislature feels the same way.”

    The federal government on Friday said UC should pay the billion-dollar fine in installments and contribute $172 million to a fund for Jewish students and other individuals affected by alleged violations of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. The statute covers illegal discrimination related to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, including Jewish and Israeli identity.

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    In addition, the Trump administration demanded sweeping campus changes encompassing protests, admissions, gender identity in sports and housing, the abolition of scholarships for racial or ethnic groups, and submission to an outside monitor over the agreement, according to four UC senior officials who have reviewed the proposal.

    “He has threatened us through extortion with a billion-dollar fine, unless we do his bidding,” Newsom said.

    “We will not be complicit in this kind of attack on academic freedom on this extraordinary public institution. We are not like some of those other institutions,” he said.

    The governor appeared to be referring to controversial and costly deals the Trump administration secured from Columbia and Brown universities over charges similar to those facing UCLA, deals Newsom criticized a day earlier in public remarks.

    In a statement Friday that UC was “reviewing” the terms, UC President James B. Milliken, who oversees the 10-campus system that includes UCLA, also seemed to rebuff the demand.

    “As a public university, we are stewards of taxpayer resources and a payment of this scale would completely devastate our country’s greatest public university system as well as inflict great harm on our students and all Californians,” Milliken said. “Americans across this great nation rely on the vital work of UCLA and the UC system for technologies and medical therapies that save lives, grow the U.S. economy, and protect our national security.”

    UC Regents Chair Janet Reilly told The Times the university was still willing to negotiate with the Trump administration but not on “unacceptable” terms.

    “Demand for a $1 billion payment from UCLA, coupled with conditions that contradict the university’s values, is unacceptable,” Reilly said, describing it as a “financial burden” that would be “catastrophic for our students, research, our patients and the people of California.

    “The university remains willing to engage in a constructive and good faith dialogue with the federal government but the University of California will always stand firm in protecting the integrity and values of our institution,” Reilly said.

    A spokesperson for UCLA Chancellor Julio Frenk referred The Times to Milliken’s statement. Federal negotiations are being handled on a UC-wide level.

    UC is grappling with how to restore $584 million in frozen medical and science grant funds to UCLA. If the deal was accepted, it would be the largest settlement between a university and the Trump administration, far surpassing a $221-million agreement that Columbia University announced last month. Harvard is also reportedly considering a settlement involving a hefty fine.

    “We would never agree to this,” said one of the UC officials who is involved in the deliberations with the Trump administration. “It is more money than was frozen at UCLA. So how does that make sense?”

    But another senior UC official said the figure was understandable if it resolved all federal investigations across the system, even if UC may not ultimately agree to it. The federal proposal focuses on UCLA only, not all campuses.

    Any payment would be a political liability for the university and state leaders in deep-blue California, where Trump’s policies are highly unpopular. A billion dollars would be a financial burden for a university system that is already facing a hiring freeze, budget squeezes, deferred state funding and scattered layoffs.

    UC and individual campuses are under multiple federal investigations into alleged use of race in admissions, employment discrimination against Jews, civil rights complaints from Jewish students and improper reporting of foreign donations.

    UCLA has faced the most charges from the government of any UC or public university, many of them tied to a 2024 pro-Palestinian encampment.

    The encampment, which unsuccessfully demanded the university divest from weapons companies tied to Israel’s war in Gaza, was targeted in a violent overnight attack last spring and was later the subject of federal lawsuit by pro-Israel Jewish students. The students, along with a professor, accused UCLA of enabling antisemitism by not shutting down the encampment, which plaintiffs said blocked pro-Israel Jews from campus pathways. UCLA settled the suit for $6.45 million, including more than $2 million in donations to Jewish nonprofits.

    The Trump administration’s Friday offer follows a similar playbook to agreements it reached with Columbia and Brown universities to restore federal funding and resolve allegations of civil rights violations against Jewish and Israeli students.

    Trump wants to remake universities, which he has called “Marxist” hotbeds of liberalism and anti-Israel sentiment. During his second term, federal agencies have suspended or canceled billions in federal medical and science grants related to gender, LGBTQ+ issues or in response to campuses it accuses of being antisemitic. The White House has also attacked campus diversity programs and admissions practices as being illegal discrimination against white and Asian Americans.

    University leaders have challenged the notion that cutting medical research helps protect Jewish people. “This far-reaching penalty of defunding life-saving research does nothing to address any alleged discrimination,” Frenk, the UCLA chancellor, said in a campus letter this week.

    At UCLA, Trump’s demands include an end to scholarships that focus on race or ethnicity, the sharing of admissions data with the government and changes to campus protest rules. The Trump administration is also proposing that UCLA Health and the medical school cease gender-affirming care for transgender people.

    UC has already overhauled practices in some areas called for by the Trump administration — including a ban on protest encampments and the abolition of diversity statements in hiring.

    The Trump administration is also saying it wants an outside monitor to oversee the agreement.

    The proposal came one day after Newsom said UC should not bend “on their knees” to Trump. Newsom, a Democrat, has fashioned himself as a national anti-Trump figure and is considering a presidential run in 2028.

    The university system, run by Milliken — who assumed his role only last week — and the Board of Regents, is independent under the state Constitution. But the governor can exercise political sway over the regents, whose members he appoints. Newsom also holds an ex-officio seat on the board.

    Kaleem reported from Los Angeles and Wilner from Washington. Times staff Writer Taryn Luna in Sacramento and Seema Mehta in Los Angeles contributed to this report.

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    Jaweed Kaleem, Michael Wilner

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  • Newsom quashed bill. Now lawsuit aims to open UC jobs to undocumented students

    Newsom quashed bill. Now lawsuit aims to open UC jobs to undocumented students

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    After Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed a bill that would have allowed undocumented students to be hired on public universities, a legal effort has been launched to force open this doorway.

    On Tuesday, a UCLA alumnus and a lecturer filed a lawsuit accusing the University of California system of discriminating against students based on their immigration status. They are seeking a court order requiring the system to consider undocumented students for on-campus jobs.

    “As an undocumented undergraduate student at the University of California, I experienced firsthand the pain and difficulty of being denied the right to on-campus employment,” said petitioner and UCLA alumnus Jeffry Umaña Muñoz on Tuesday. “Losing these opportunities forced me to extremely precarious and dangerous living situations, always moments from housing and food insecurity.”

    The suit argues that federal law barring the hiring of undocumented people does not apply to public universities. A UC spokesperson said on Tuesday afternoon that the university system had yet to be served with the filing but will respond as appropriate when served.

    The suit is being coordinated by the Opportunity4All campaign, which led the charge behind Assembly Bill 2486, or the Opportunity for All Act, this year.

    When vetoing the bill in September, Newsom cited concerns that state employees could be found in violation of federal laws for hiring undocumented people.

    “Given the gravity of the potential consequences of this bill, which include potential criminal and civil liability for state employees, it is critical that the courts address the legality of such a policy and the novel legal theory behind this legislation before proceeding,” he said in his veto message.

    UC regents, for their part, share Newsom’s fear that offering jobs to undocumented students may run afoul of federal law.

    In January, they shelved a plan to open jobs to students who lack legal work authorization, saying UC could be subject to civil fines, criminal penalties and the potential loss of billions of dollars in federal funding. The university system receives more than $12 billion in annual federal funding for research, student financial aid and healthcare.

    The lawsuit, however, argues that although the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 bars the hiring of people without legal status, this federal law does not apply to government employers such as the University of California.

    “No court has ever interpreted IRCA the way the [UC] regents do,” Jessica Bansal, counsel for the petitioner, said at a news conference announcing the lawsuit Tuesday. “To the contrary, the U.S. Supreme Court has consistently held that federal laws regulating hiring do not apply to state employers unless they clearly and unambiguously state they do.”

    Bansal said the UC hiring policy also violates California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act, which prohibits state employers from discriminating in hiring based on immigration status.

    Although the lawsuit is directed at the UC system, counsel Ahilan Arulanantham said he hoped a favorable ruling would prompt California State University to also open employment to such immigrant students.

    California is home to one-fifth of the nation’s immigrant college students who are in the U.S. illegally, an estimated 55,500 of whom attend public colleges and universities.

    “It’s imperative for these students to have the opportunity to work and pursue career advancement,” petitioner and UCLA lecturer Iliana Perez said Tuesday. “By unlocking their potential and enabling them to contribute fully, we can rectify the missed economic opportunity and create a more inclusive and prosperous society.”

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    Clara Harter

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  • UC Berkeley seized People’s Park. The cost is in the millions and set to rocket higher

    UC Berkeley seized People’s Park. The cost is in the millions and set to rocket higher

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    UC Berkeley spent $7.8 million to deploy its own forces to wall off and secure People’s Park, the storied 2.8-acre green space that activists seized in the ’60s to serve as open space for freethinkers.

    That multimillion-dollar total is expected to grow substantially as outside police agencies submit their bills to the university.

    And the cost of keeping people out of the park continues to be high: The university pays nearly $1 million a month to station private security guards outside the park, 24 hours a day.

    The massive dead-of-night operation to clear the park and surround it with a double-high stack of 160 steel cargo containers was executed in early January, in anticipation of the Berkeley campus being cleared to build a new housing complex.

    Litigation continues to block the construction of 1,100 units of student housing, 125 units of supportive housing for homeless people and a memorial to the park south of the Berkeley campus.

    University officials hope that the state Supreme Court will hear a case about the future of the park this spring, potentially ruling by summer whether to allow construction on the property, first seized and turned into open space by activists in 1969.

    In response to a public records request, Berkeley campus officials revealed Wednesday that they spent $2.85 million to build the 17-foot-high perimeter around the park. Those funds went to pay for the shipping containers (at a cost of $972,000), for gates, lighting, other equipment and supervision ($1.27 million) and for engineering and surveying ($515,000.)

    An additional $3.77 million went to pay, house and feed the police officers and sheriff’s deputies who cleared and surrounded the park in early January. Nearly $1.5 million of that money went to pay overtime to officers from the University of California Police Department.

    The $7.8-million tally also includes $1.16 million that UC spent to move homeless people from the park to a Quality Inn, where they receive meals and other services.

    Still remaining to be submitted and/or totaled are bills from the California Highway Patrol, sheriff’s departments for Alameda and San Francisco counties and from nine other UC and Cal State University police departments. A UC spokesman said “it could take several more months” for those IOUs to arrive. It’s expected that they will add millions of dollars to the cost of the park clearance.

    In a letter accompanying the figures, UC Berkeley spokesman Kyle Gibson explained in a statement that the extraordinary operation, cloaked in secrecy, was designed to avoid the sort of conflict that had prevented the university from developing People’s Park for more than half a century.

    “Our highest priorities for the closure were safety, avoidance/deterrence of conflict, and the minimization of disruption for students and neighboring residents,” the statement said.

    The letter described the “vandalism, violence and other unlawful activities” that occurred when the university tried, and failed, to take control of the park in August 2022. That prior experience “necessitated extraordinary measures, precautions and expenditures” when UC moved in January to secure the park, Gibson’s letter said.

    Activists who fought for years to keep the park said they were outraged but not surprised at the high cost of the university’s takeover.

    “The recklessness with which UC spends the public’s money is well known to this community,” said Andrea Prichett, a member of the People’s Park Council and Berkeley Copwatch. “Think of other things that could have been done with that money. It’s a tragic waste.”

    Park activists have complained, in particular, that the university disrupted a community of homeless people who were supporting one another on the property, which lies just steps to the east of Telegraph Avenue.

    But university officials insist that the unhoused residents are better off in the Quality Inn, with food and services provided by community groups and removed from the crime that at times went unchecked in the park.

    Although opponents call the steel barricade a “monstrosity,” university officials said it had helped keep the park clear — and ready for construction — for the first time since community members planted flowers and trees there, in 1969.

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    James Rainey

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