To President Benson, Dean Smith, OCSC, and all UTD administrators:

I am writing in support of the 21 students, faculty, and community members who were violently arrested for expressing their opposition to this university’s complicity in genocide, and I stand firmly with my fellow Comets in demanding divestment from war profiteers. At this moment, the students who were arrested at the Gaza liberation encampment are facing threats from the university for alleged violations of the Student Code of Conduct. Furthermore, the University is not extending any efforts whatsoever to ask Collin County to drop the pending criminal charges against any of the arrestees. I request that UT Dallas urges Collin County to drop the charges and not proceed with the planned disciplinary proceedings against the nine students arrested.

In these very moments, Israel is heavily bombing Rafah, a city housing over 1.4 million Palestinians displaced in tents, and continuing to attack parts of Northern Gaza while preventing food, water, and medical supplies from reaching the strip. This genocide has already amounted to the slaughter of over 45,000 men, women, and children, and only more lives are being taken. In the midst of this brutal genocidal campaign, you have chosen to turn a blind eye and instead attack and silence those who stand for justice on campus.

The university’s response, your response, to our protest against literal atrocities is a clear infringement on the students and faculty’s academic freedom and right to free speech and assembly on campus. The deployment of militarized police—literal state troopers—and their excessive use of force was a shameful attempt to intimidate students and created a hostile environment, threatening the safety of everyone on campus.

This violence and targeting did not end on May 1, as you all are continuing to disgracefully target the arrestees by banning them from campus, cheering on the pending baseless criminal charges against them, putting students through academic disciplinary hearings, and withholding their degrees. These actions reflect an alarming pattern of behavior taken by UT Dallas administrators, which sets a precedent for government interference in student organizing and repression of political activities on campus.

As per the reasons mentioned above, I request that the administration of UT Dallas urge Collin County to drop the charges immediately and halt the proceeding with disciplinary charges against my fellow Comets, both students and faculty. These basic requests would be the first step towards rectifying the damage you inflicted on your students and community. However, we emphasize that these are the floor of our demands, and there will be no real change until UT Dallas divests from death.

Signed,