Crackdown at 4 US college protests lead to nearly 200 arrests

Nearly 200 protesters were arrested Saturday at Northeastern University, Arizona State University, Indiana University, and Washington University in St. Louis, according to officials, as colleges across the country struggle to quell growing pro-Palestinian demonstrations and encampments on campus, Seattle Times reported.

More than 700 protesters have been arrested on U.S. campuses since April 18, when Columbia University had the New York Police Department clear a protest encampment there. In several cases, most of those who were arrested have been released.

At Washington University in St. Louis, the campus was locked down amid protests, and several arrests were made Saturday evening, according to campus police and updates on the university website. Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate for the 2024 presidential election, was among those arrested, along with her campaign manager and another staff member, a spokesperson for the campaign said. It was not immediately clear how many people were arrested.

Earlier in the day, at Northeastern in Boston, protesters had set up an encampment on the campus’s Centennial Common this past week that drew more than 100 supporters. The administration had asked the protesters to leave, but many students did not.

Around dawn Saturday, Massachusetts State Police officers arrived at the encampment and began to arrest protesters, putting them in zip-tie handcuffs and taking several tents down. They said they had arrested 102 protesters. It was unclear how many of those arrested were students, but the university said students who showed their university IDs were being released.

On Saturday, there appeared to be increased police presence on several campuses, though not all of them have made arrests. At the University of Pennsylvania, more than a dozen campus police officers were stationed along barricades, with more than 100 protesters in an encampment and about a dozen pro-Israel counterprotesters across the campus walk.

Across the country at the California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt, officers were stationed all over the now-closed campus after protesters occupied two buildings this past week. About three dozen protesters were inside an encampment.

SD/PR