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Pro-Palestinian campus protesters face looming deadlines and risk of arrest
Activists and students participate in an encampment protest at the University Yard at George Washington University on Thursday.
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Activists and students participate in an encampment protest at the University Yard at George Washington University on Thursday.
Alex Wong/Getty Images
Pro-Palestinian encampments and demonstrations have cropped up at dozens of college campuses across the U.S., many turning chaotic as police arrived to disperse crowds and take protesters into custody.
Still, student activists nationwide appear determined to show their support for people in Gaza and push their universities to divest from companies with ties to Israel or who otherwise profit from its war with Hamas.
Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack killed 1,200 Israelis and resulted in another roughly 240 being taken hostage, according to Israeli authorities, while Gaza’s health ministry says Israel’s military response has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians, a majority of them women and children.
This latest wave of campus protests was sparked last week at Columbia University, where over 100 people were arrested after the administration called in New York City police to clear out a pro-Palestinian encampment. Undeterred protesters then built a larger encampment on an adjacent quad, prompting the school to switch to hybrid learning for the remainder of the semester.
Columbia officials and students have been in negotiations over clearing the encampment, with talks set to continue past their Friday morning deadline.
The administration originally set a deadline of midnight Tuesday for protesters to dismantle the setup, but repeatedly extended it due to what it described as constructive dialogue.
Columbia officials said Thursday that protesters had agreed to take certain steps, including removing a significant number of tents, limiting the protests to Columbia students only, complying with fire department requirements and prohibiting discriminatory or harassing language.
Officials announced just before midnight that “the talks have shown progress and are continuing as planned.”
“For several days, a small group of faculty, administrators, and University Senators have been in dialogue with student organizers to discuss the basis for dismantling the encampment, dispersing, and following University policies going forward,” the statement read. “We have our demands; they have theirs. A formal process is underway and continues.”
University President Minouche Shafik — who is facing criticism from faculty, donors and lawmakers for her handling of the protests — has said that if discussions are not successful, the school will have to consider “alternative options for clearing the West Lawn and restoring calm to campus so that students can complete the term and graduate.”
“I am deeply sensitive to the fact that graduating seniors spent their first year attending Columbia remotely,” she said. “We all very much want these students to celebrate their well-deserved graduation with family and friends.”
Also on Thursday, the University of Southern California in Los Angeles announced it would cancel its main commencement ceremony, citing the need for additional security measures. It had already canceled its valedictorian’s speech because of safety concerns stemming from the backlash she received over her social media posts about the Israel-Hamas war.
At Columbia, student protesters still have their tents set up and are in negotiations with university officials.
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Nikita Payusov/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty
At Columbia, student protesters still have their tents set up and are in negotiations with university officials.
Nikita Payusov/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty
Meanwhile, at George Washington University in D.C., a second day of protests is underway Friday despite the university’s 7 p.m. deadline for clearing the encampments.
The GW Hatchet reports that police were in the area as about 40 protesters remained in their tents overnight, but no arrests were made. Protests resumed shortly after 7 a.m., prompting the university to close and restrict access to University Yard.
More than a dozen demonstrators left the encampment, with some rejoining the chants from the opposite side of the barricades.
GW Law School Dean Dayna Bowen said in a video message on Thursday that the school is working to move law students’ final exams, which are currently underway, to more quiet and secure locations because of the protests.
“Now let me emphasize, there is nothing threatening your safety that’s going on at this moment,” she said. “But yet you are our primary concern. To protect your safety and the integrity of our academic program we are relocating student final exams.”
Thousands of people sit silently while fellow demonstrators pray during a rally at George Washington University on Thursday night.
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Thousands of people sit silently while fellow demonstrators pray during a rally at George Washington University on Thursday night.
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More than 500 protesters have been arrested
Protesters were arrested at schools including The Ohio State University, the University of Minnesota and Indiana University on Thursday, joining the fast-growing list of demonstrators who have been detained by police nationwide.
That same day, two graduate students were arrested at Princeton University for setting up encampments in violation of school policy, while more than two dozen people were arrested at Emory University in Atlanta, where participants were also protesting a police training facility nicknamed “Cop City.”
Police officers arrest a protester as pro-Palestinian students demonstrate at Emory University on Thursday.
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Police officers arrest a protester as pro-Palestinian students demonstrate at Emory University on Thursday.
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At Emory University in Atlanta, protesters — including students from other Atlanta universities and area activists — clashed with state, city and university law enforcement on campus. Videos on social media show officers using tear gas, tasers and handcuffs to detain protesters, including faculty members.
Cheryl Elliott, Emory’s vice president for public safety, said in a statement Thursday that the university called in Atlanta police and George State Patrol officers to disperse the crowd after protesters ignored multiple warnings for trespassing. During subsequent confrontations, she said, law enforcement “released chemical irritants into the ground” after protesters threw objects at them.
She said 28 people had been arrested, including 20 members of the Emory community, “some of whom have been released.”
“We are working with responding agencies to expedite the release of any Emory community members who remain in custody,” Elliott added.
More than 100 people were arrested at Emerson College in Boston early Thursday morning after police tore down an encampment there. The school subsequently added Boylston Place Alley, where the encampment was located, to its list of campus locations where demonstrations are not allowed.
At the University of Southern California, 93 people were arrested Wednesday for trespassing, a misdemeanor offense. One arrest was made for assault with a deadly weapon, though the department did not say what the weapon was. No injuries were reported, the Los Angeles Police Department said.
At The University of Texas at Austin, almost 60 people were arrested Wednesday for loitering, but charges have been dropped for most of them.
Still, the following day, faculty members gathered at a rally and called for the school’s president, Jay Hartzell, to resign after he praised the school and law enforcement for exercising restraint against the protestors, according to NPR member station KUT.
A man is tackled after spraying an unknown substance at US Representative Ilhan Omar (D-MN) (L) during a town hall she was hosting in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on January 27, 2026. (Photo by Octavio JONES / AFP via Getty Images)
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Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., was rushed by a man during a town hall event Tuesday night and sprayed with a liquid via a syringe.
Footage from the event shows a man approaching Omar at her lectern as she is delivering remarks and spraying an unknown substance in her direction, before swiftly being tackled by security. Omar called on Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to resign or face impeachment immediately before the assault.
Noem has faced criticism from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle in the aftermath of the fatal shooting of 37-year-old intensive care nurse Alex Pretti by federal officers in Minneapolis Saturday.
Omar’s staff can be heard urging her to step away and get “checked out,” with others nearby saying the substance smelled bad.
“We will continue,” Omar responded. “These f******* a**holes are not going to get away with it.”
A statement from Omar’s office released after the event said the individual who approached and sprayed the congresswoman is now in custody.
“The Congresswoman is okay,” the statement read. “She continued with her town hall because she doesn’t let bullies win.”
A syringe lays on the ground after a man, left, approached Representative Ilhan Omar, a Democrat from Minnesota, during a town hall event in Minneapolis, Minnesota, US, on Tuesday, Jan. 27, 2026. The man was apprehended after spraying an unknown substance according to the Associated Press. Photographer: Angelina Katsanis/Bloomberg via Getty Images
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Omar followed up with a statement on social media saying she will not be intimidated.
I’m ok. I’m a survivor so this small agitator isn’t going to intimidate me from doing my work.
I don’t let bullies win.
Grateful to my incredible constituents who rallied behind me. Minnesota strong.
— Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) January 28, 2026
As Omar continued her remarks at the town hall, she said: “We are Minnesota strong and we will stay resilient in the face of whatever they might throw at us.”
Just three days ago, fellow Democrat Rep. Maxwell Frost of Florida said he was assaulted at the Sundance Festival by a man “who told me that Trump was going to deport me before he punched me in the face.”
Threats against Congressional lawmakers have been rising. Last year, there was an increase in security funding in the wake of growing concerns about political violence in the country.
According to the U.S. Capitol Police, the number of threat assessment cases has increased for the third year in a row. In 2025, the USCP investigated 14,938 “concerning statements, behaviors, and communications” directed towards congressional lawmakers, their families and staff. That figure represents a nearly 58% increase from 2024.
new video loaded: F.A.A. Ignored Safety Concerns Prior to Collision Over Potomac, N.T.S.B. Says
transcript
transcript
F.A.A. Ignored Safety Concerns Prior to Collision Over Potomac, N.T.S.B. Says
The National Transportation Safety Board said that a “multitude of errors” led to the collision between a military helicopter and a commercial jet, killing 67 people last January.
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“I imagine there will be some difficult moments today for all of us as we try to provide answers to how a multitude of errors led to this tragedy.” “We have an entire tower who took it upon themselves to try to raise concerns over and over and over and over again, only to get squashed by management and everybody above them within F.A.A. Were they set up for failure?” “They were not adequately prepared to do the jobs they were assigned to do.”
By Meg Felling
January 27, 2026
President Trump speaks as U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth looks on during a meeting of his Cabinet at the White House in December 2025.
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Relatives of two Trinidadian men killed in an airstrike last October are suing the U.S. government for wrongful death and for carrying out extrajudicial killings.
The case, filed in Massachusetts, is the first lawsuit over the strikes to land in a U.S. federal court since the Trump administration launched a campaign to target vessels off the coast of Venezuela. The American government has carried out three dozen such strikes since September, killing more than 100 people.
Among them are Chad Joseph, 26, and Rishi Samaroo, 41, who relatives say died in what President Trump described as “a lethal kinetic strike” on Oct. 14, 2025. The president posted a short video that day on social media that shows a missile targeting a ship, which erupts in flame.
“This is killing for sport, it’s killing for theater and it’s utterly lawless,” said Baher Azmy, legal director of the Center for Constitutional Rights. “We need a court of law to rein in this administration and provide some accountability to the families.”
The White House and Pentagon justify the strikes as part of a broader push to stop the flow of illegal drugs into the U.S. The Pentagon declined to comment on the lawsuit, saying it doesn’t comment on ongoing litigation.
But the new lawsuit described Joseph and Samaroo as fishermen doing farm work in Venezuela, with no ties to the drug trade. Court papers said they were headed home to family members when the strike occurred and now are presumed dead.
Neither man “presented a concrete, specific, and imminent threat of death or serious physical injury to the United States or anyone at all, and means other than lethal force could have reasonably been employed to neutralize any lesser threat,” according to the lawsuit.
Lenore Burnley, the mother of Chad Joseph, and Sallycar Korasingh, the sister of Rishi Samaroo, are the plaintiffs in the case.
Their court papers allege violations of the Death on the High Seas Act, a 1920 law that makes the U.S. government liable if its agents engage in negligence that results in wrongful death more than 3 miles off American shores. A second claim alleges violations of the Alien Tort Statute, which allows foreign citizens to sue over human rights violations such as deaths that occurred outside an armed conflict, with no judicial process.
The American Civil Liberties Union, the Center for Constitutional Rights, and Jonathan Hafetz at Seton Hall University School of Law are representing the plaintiffs.
“In seeking justice for the senseless killing of their loved ones, our clients are bravely demanding accountability for their devastating losses and standing up against the administration’s assault on the rule of law,” said Brett Max Kaufman, senior counsel at the ACLU.
U.S. lawmakers have raised questions about the legal basis for the strikes for months but the administration has persisted.
—NPR’s Quil Lawrence contributed to this report.
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