Joe Biden calls for order after police clear UCLA camp
Joe Biden has called on pro-Palestinian protesters on university campuses to uphold the rule of law.
“We are a civil society, and order must prevail,” Biden said in his first direct remarks about a wave of student unrest.
More than 2,000 people nationwide have been detained by police over the past fortnight at college rallies and protest camps.
That includes 209 arrests early on Thursday at the UCLA.
Hundreds of officers dressed in riot gear moved onto the main campus before dawn and cleared the pro-Palestine camp.
They set off flash bangs and flares, loaded demonstrators on to police buses, and tore down the makeshift barriers and tents that had been erected on campus a week ago.
US encampment cleared Twitter video
Tear gas and baton charge happened at UCLA to evict student protestors. Video from Twitter pic.twitter.com/bsvsPoj3ij
— Smita Prakash (@smitaprakash) May 3, 2024
In a statement, UCLA called the camp “both unlawful and a breach of policy. It led to unsafe conditions on our campus and it damaged our ability to carry out our mission.”
“Demonstrators directly interfered with instruction by blocking students’ pathways to classrooms,” it added, while their clashes with pro-Israeli counter-demonstrators “put too many [students] in harm’s way”.
Addressing the nationwide protests hours later, Mr Biden said: “We are not an authoritarian nation where we silence people or squash dissent. But neither are we a lawless country.
“There’s the right to protest but not the right to cause chaos. People have the right to get an education, the right to get a degree, the right to walk across the campus safely without fear of being attacked.”