The attorney representing three graduates of Columbia University and two current students in a suit against pro-Palestinian protest organizers said his Jewish clients had a “jarring” experience when the Ivy League campus was occupied by protestors during the Spring semester.
The five plaintiffs sued students, activists, unions, and three members of Congress on Aug. 5, alleging they were denied access to in-person classes, campus facilities, and graduation and experienced bullying and harassment.
“The students described feeling so unsafe that they organized text groups to make sure that no Jewish student had to cross campus alone,” the plaintiffs’ attorney, Daniel Suhr from Hughes & Suhr LLC, told The Epoch Times on Aug. 16.
The Columbia University campus became the epicenter of student anti-war protests for Gaza on April 17. Other universities nationwide followed with rallies of their own for the same cause.
“What happened at Columbia was not a spontaneous organic event,” Suhr said. “It was part of a nationwide strategy of well-networked, well-coordinated radical organizations that don’t care about breaking the law to advance their agenda.”
The class action lawsuit names federal lawmakers Reps. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), and Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) as defendants.
None of the organizers or the lawmakers have responded to requests for comment from The Epoch Times on the allegations.
Nationwide Movement
The encampment occupied the lawn in the middle of Columbia’s campus, where graduation ceremonies were scheduled to take place on May 15. The protest, which included vandalism and occupation of buildings and classrooms, was not completely disbanded until June 2. As a result, the main commencement ceremony for the graduating class that was scheduled for May 15 was canceled.“A jury of everyday people, of parents and grandparents, can put a value on missing graduation, and those are going to be real dollar figures,” Suhr said. “They’re going to be significant and when you multiply it across the class, it will be in the tens of millions easily.”
The proposed class consists of some 36,000 Columbia University students.
Last week, President Nemat “Minouche” Shafik became the third Ivy League chief to resign over criticism of the university administration’s handling of the protests.
Groups and their representatives, such as Columbia Students for Justice in Palestine, Columbia-Barnard Jewish Voice for Peace, Within Our Lifetime, the People’s Forum, and Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine, are also named as defendants, along with the SWC-UAW Local 2710.
“Students for Justice in Palestine, which is both a Columbia and national network, was behind the encampments on all of the campuses but then it extends to the faculty who facilitated and enabled them,” Suhr said. “Those faculty were organized by and through their union, the Student Workers of Columbia, which represents the adjunct faculty and teaching assistants.”
The UAW Region 9A, which includes UAW Local 2710, is one of 28 unions that signed a joint statement posted on Twitter on April 23 in support of the Columbia students and student workers who were participating in the encampment and related protests.
Columbia University spokesman Ben Chang declined to comment.
Individuals who were visible and may have spoken at daily campus press conferences are also named as defendants. None of the individual defendants or groups contacted by The Epoch Times responded to requests for comment.
Three of the plaintiffs are returning to Columbia this fall while the other two plaintiffs are graduates from the class of 2024.
“The students who are going back to Columbia are very apprehensive about what they’re going to find,” Suhr said.
