NYC’s Mayor Adams vows to protect graduations as LAPD shuts USC camp
New York Mayor Eric Adams pledged to ensure that this year’s graduation ceremonies in the city won’t be disrupted by violent protests over the war in Gaza, saying no one should be allowed to threaten commencements.
“We will make sure it’s done in a peaceful manner,” Adams said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.” Graduations are “a wonderful experience” and “I don’t think we should allow anything to get in our normal way of life,” he said. “We will do our job.”
Adams stance contrasts with the University of Southern California, which canceled its main commencement ceremony citing safety concerns after police arrested more than 90 protesters.
Los Angeles police cleared out protest camps Sunday at the University of Southern California campus, aided by USC public safety officers. The university said the campus remains closed, though smaller USC graduation ceremonies remain on the schedule this week.
Universities across the U.S. have faced wrenching decisions in dealing with a wave of pro-Palestinian campus protests as Israeli forces have pursued military assault in Gaza following an attack by Hamas on Israel on Oct. 7.
New York police entered Columbia on Tuesday to remove protesters who had occupied a university building. About 300 people were arrested at Columbia and City College. Columbia president Minouche Shafik is allowing the NYPD to stay on campus for two weeks, including commencement on May 15. New York University’s graduation is scheduled for the same day.
Representative Ro Khanna, a Democrat from California, said Sunday that the “few” protesters inciting violence or engaging in antisemitism “are diminishing the thousands of young people who simply want the war to end.”
“We have to understand that this a defining moment for this generation,” he said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.” “I’m proud of a lot of the young people who want to end the war, but they need to show the discipline.”
Khanna is among 88 House members, including prominent progressive Democrats, who urged Biden last week to threaten Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with restrictions on U.S. offensive weapons deliveries if Israel hampers humanitarian aid to Gaza.
Senator John Fetterman, a Pennsylvania Democrat who has criticized the unrest, questioned why protesters aren’t demanding that Hamas accept a cease-fire proposal that’s on the table. “The situation could end right now if Hamas just surrendered and they just sent all of those hostages home again,” he said on “Face the Nation.”
The protests have tested college administrators and prompted a range of responses.
Schools including Northwestern University and Brown University have held discussions with students about demands to divest from businesses they say support Israel. At the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, police used pepper spray to break up a camp and arrested 25 protesters on Saturday, according to the Washington Post.
About 75 protesters waved Palestinian flags and chanted anti-war messages at the University of Michigan’s commencement ceremony on Saturday, the Associated Press reported. At Indiana University, dozens of students walked out of the graduation ceremony in protest of the war, the New York Times said.
University of Florida President Ben Sasse, a former Republican senator from Nebraska, waved off calls to open up student discussions on investments.
“We just don’t negotiate with people who scream the loudest,” Sasse said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “That just doesn’t make any sense to me.”
President Joe Biden addressed the protests last week for the first time, defending the right to protest peacefully but demanding that “order must prevail.”
“Vandalism, trespassing, breaking windows, shutting down campuses, forcing the cancellation of classes and graduations — none of this is a peaceful protest,” he said.
About 1,200 people were killed and another 250 kidnapped in the attack by Hamas, which is designated a terrorist organization by the U.S. and the European Union. Israel’s response has killed at least 34,000 Palestinians, according to the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza.
The United Nations estimates that at least 75% of Gaza’s population has been displaced and more than half a million civilians are on the brink of famine.
