Gov. Healey Could Send State Police to Clear Harvard Protest

Plus, Trump assails Biden for holding back arms to Israel

A demonstration at the 2022 Harvard Commencement.

The interim president of Harvard, Alan Garber, has placed the anti-Israel protesters occupying Harvard Yard on “involuntary leave,” but they are still there. Last night, the Harvard protesters issued a video with the message “F*** the police.”

At many other colleges, the police have been called in to clear encampments and arrest protesters for disruptive behavior or trespassing. Harvard’s leadership, so far, has been reluctant to do that. It’s not entirely clear why. Part of it may have to do with painful memories of 1969, when police cleared anti-ROTC protesters out of University Hall. Part of it may be that a faction of the faculty wants Garber to negotiate with the students rather than arrest what they see as peaceful students exercising their First Amendment free speech and assembly rights to oppose Israeli military operations that even President Biden is now holding up an arms shipment for.

Yet part of it, too, may be that the relevant police departments—the Harvard University Police Department and the City of Cambridge-controlled Cambridge Police Department—would be reluctant to implement an order to arrest the protesters and clear the encampment. The Harvard police chief, Victor Clay, was quoted in the Crimson saying, “You can see in the Yard right now — we are keeping our students safe and they are protesting peacefully and it’s their right and we are going to support that.” And the Cambridge City Council approved a resolution that “armed police on campus can endanger students” and that “the City of Cambridge is obliged by law and conscience to uphold the freedoms of speech and peaceful assembly safeguarded by the Constitutions of the United States and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.”

Any reluctance by the Harvard University Police Department or the Cambridge Police Department to clear Harvard Yard, which is private property, of the group that has seized control of it without the permission of the property owner is a potential opportunity for the governor of Massachusetts, Maura Healey.

Contemporaneous news coverage of the police clearing protesters out of University Hall back in 1969 makes it clear that the state police were the tip of the spear and the bulk of the force involved. A Harvard Magazine account reports, “225 state troopers, in half a dozen buses, were followed by 100 Cambridge policemen, 60 from Boston, 25 from the Metropolitan District Commission, and smaller detachments from Somerville, Watertown, and other adjacent communities.”

Governor Healey is a 1992 graduate of Harvard, where she was co-captain of the women’s basketball team. There was a time when governors of Massachusetts used to participate in Harvard commencements, though they haven’t done so regularly in recent years. Healey, a Democrat, is a former Middlesex County prosecutor and a former attorney general of Massachusetts; she understands the importance of the rule of law. And she’s been a consistent friend to the commonwealth’s Jewish community, showing up at a Monday, October 9, 2023, rally in Boston. “Our support is unwavering,” Healey said then. “Massachusetts stands with Israel now and always, today and on all the days ahead.”

Healey added then that she condemned Hamas terrorists “as a matter of fundamental human decency.”

Last week, Healey met with Jewish community leaders to talk about the rise of antisemitism on college campuses. The University of Pennsylvania finally cleared its anti-Israel encampment after Pennsylvania’s Democratic governor, Josh Shapiro, called for the action.

The First Amendment principle is that restrictions on public assemblies be content-neutral. Harvard, as a private institution, has more latitude, but people who think rigorously about these matters have long been skeptical that anyone’s free speech rights should be meaningfully reduced simply by walking from the sidewalk of Harvard Square, through a gate, and onto a walkway of Harvard Yard. All that said, if the governor, and Garber, want to make their own statement about “fundamental human decency,” they could do plenty worse than choosing to make Israel Independence Day, which this year begins at sundown on May 13, the moment at which the state police inform the anti-Israel protesters that their unauthorized continued presence is interfering, intolerably, with the freedom of the rest of the university to conduct its business.

Trump’s May 11 rally: President Trump had a rally Saturday evening in New Jersey, at which he sharply attacked President Biden for cutting off an arms shipment to Israel.

“If you want to know how a weak and pathetic president really is, I mean the things they do, just think about this: this week he announced that he will withhold shipping weapons to Israel as they fight to eradicate Hamas terrorists in Gaza. It was shocking to hear it, even while there are still American hostages being held by Hamas.” Trump said. “Crooked Joe’s action is one of the worst betrayals of an American ally in the history of our country. I support Israel’s right to win its war on terror…I don’t know if that’s good or bad politically, I don’t care, you gotta do what’s right.”

“Crooked Joe surrendered to the terrorists just like he surrendered to the Taliban and now he’s surrendering our college campuses to anarchists, jihadists, freaks, and anti-American extremists who are trying to tear down our American flag,” Trump said. “The chaos and violence happening on our college campuses right now is all because crooked Joe Biden doesn’t know what the hell he’s doing. Joe is weak…He does not stand up to our enemies abroad and he does not stand up to the extremists in his own party.”

“When I’m president, we will not allow our colleges to be taken over by violent radicals,” Trump said. “If you come here from another country and try to bring jihadism or anti-Americanism or antisemitism to our campuses, we will immediately deport you, you’ll be out of that school.”

Trump said he hoped to win New Jersey, Minnesota, and Virginia, and addressed himself to people who are independents or “even a registered Democrat” and said, “I’m asking for your help.”

While talking about electric cars, Trump referred to Elon Musk and said, “Elon, he’s a friend of mine, he does a good job.”

Recent work: “Jewish Newspaper Editor Cancels His New York Times Subscription, Calling Israel Coverage ‘Dangerous’” is the headline over my latest column for the Algemeiner. From the article: “Weintrob has plenty of company in deciding he no longer wants the print New York Times in his home. On May 8, the New York Times Company announced that print subscription revenues had declined, notwithstanding price increases, and that the number of print subscribers had dropped to 640,000 in the first quarter of 2024 from 710,000 in the first quarter of 2023, a nearly ten percent decline in a single year.” Please check the full article out over at the Algemeiner if you are interested.

Speaking of the New York Times, I am mentioned in this Times “news analysis” about “How Public School Leaders Upstaged Republicans and the Ivy League.”

Thank you!: We aren’t up to 640,000 yet, but we are gaining more and more subscribers each week and month. Thanks for being part of that. This is all only possible because readers pay. If you appreciate our independent journalism about higher education and the U.S.-Israel relationship, and the work helping to keep other media accountable, please help support this work and our continued growth by becoming a paying customer. Thanks to the many of you who already have.