At least 12 pro-Palestinian protesters were arrested at Wayne State University on Thursday after police raided and shut down their encampment which began May 23, The Detroit Free Press reported.
The arrests came after university officials announced Tuesday that the campus would transition to remote learning “until further notice,” saying the encampment presented “legal, health and safety, and operational challenges.” The arrests add to the growing list of more than 2,900 individuals detained by law enforcement officials since police first stormed the Columbia University encampment on April 18.
Matt Lockwood, a university spokesperson, said the dismantling was necessary to ensure the safety and accessibility of campus for all, adding that demonstrators were given multiple warnings before officers moved in.
“University leadership repeatedly engaged with occupants of the encampment … In each conversation, we reiterated that the occupants were trespassing on university property,” Wayne State president Kimberly Andrews Espy said in a statement. “The encampment also created an environment of exclusion—one in which some members of our campus community felt unwelcome and unable to fully participate in campus life.”
U.S. House representative Rashida Tlaib, a Democrat who represents Detroit and the only Palestinian American lawmaker on Capitol Hill, was seen in lockstep with protesters who began to march around campus once their tent city was torn down. She, along with family members of Nazimia Abdrabah, a 19-year old female student, allege that police had pulled off Abdrabah’s hijab during the sweep earlier that morning.
“You took her Islamic headscarf off,” Tlaib said according to The Free Press. “Do you care anything about them?”
The university declined to make an immediate comment in response.
