AUSTIN, Texas — A student-led pro-Palestine rally was met with some opposition from the University of Texas at Austin Event Readiness and Response team on Wednesday.
It’s a group that was reorganized at the beginning of the year, focusing on educating protesters about the university’s free speech rules.
The protest led by the Austin Students of a Democratic Society met at the steps of Gregory Plaza and marched to the UT tower where they intended to hand a letter of demands to administrators, asking the university to divest from Israel.
“I think right now is a good time to show that we’re still taking action on these issues because these issues still matter,” student Arshia Papari said.
According to Papari, the Event Readiness and Response unit reached out to their group before the event. KVUE obtained the email exchanges between the two groups where response team director Joe Lobrutto specified where the protesters would be allowed to go.
Lobrutto explained in the emails that protesters would be limited to two or three representatives to make an exchange of the demands with the president’s and provost’s representatives, as to “not overwhelm them.”
The student group says they spoke about their plans with Lobrutto over the phone but did not fully disclose their plan to enter the building to deliver the letter themselves. As protesters were heading into the UT tower to deliver their letter of demands to administrators themselves, the unit attempted to stop students, saying that was not part of the plan that was discussed prior to the event.
The protesters entered the building anyway, where they were stopped for 40 minutes. Papari said that Lobrutto threatened disciplinary action for disrupting operations.
“This is the first time that any group has not been allowed to deliver something to the president’s office,” Papari said. “This administrative position that Mr. Lobrutto holds is perceived to build trust and to build collaboration with the community. However, the perception with that administrative member is that this is an intimidator force.”
Papari said he believes the unit is there to serve the purposes of the university and administrators and that they hindered their ability to carry out their rally.
“This is a reactionary force from protests last spring, and this is something that is there to stifle student speech, to stifle student activism, and to create a sense of fear in activism for students,” Papari said.
The unit previously told KVUE that their team has been around for 15 years attending protests and collaborating with organizers. In January, they decided to make the team a full-time unit in order to focus on creating an environment where student voices can be heard, while also following university guidelines.
A statement from a university spokesperson said they support the First Amendment right on campus, as long as demonstrators comply with UT’s institutional rules. They told us this is guided by time, place and manner restrictions, which allow the university to conduct its academic, research and administrative functions that support nearly 54,000 students without disruption.
They also said assembly is banned in some buildings if the assembly is unrelated to the purpose of the building.
Papari said Lobrutto took their letter of demands for them, but could not guarantee it would get to university president Jay Hartzell. He also said they will not stop speaking up, and the actions of the unit do a poor job of building the trust that was lost during the protests in April.
“Until the administration puts students before donors and before their administrative rule, until they look at students for who they are, and asks them for their demands … I don’t think trust will be restored,” Papari said.
A university representative says that the UT system has previously stated that they will not divest.