Faculty file charge accusing UC campuses of suppressing pro-Palestinian speech

Faculty across the state have accused the University of California system of waging a massive crackdown on pro-Palestinian speech and protests that violate civil service law.

The Council of University of California Faculty Associations said UC administrators threatened faculty to teach about the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and initiated disciplinary actions for supporting campus student camps and sponsoring a strike by academic staff this spring. .

The intellectual group made the allegations in a 581-page complaint filed Thursday with the Public Employment Relations Board of California, which oversees labor relations for public employees in the state. The inappropriate practice charges were jointly signed by faculty members at seven UC campuses, including Los Angeles, Irvine, San Diego, Santa Cruz, Berkeley, Davis and San Francisco.

Faculty members gathered at UCLA at noon Thursday to announce the lawsuit. At a news conference, Constance Penley, president of the Council of UC Faculty Associations, described the university’s actions as “a relentless campaign to silence faculty from exercising their academic freedom and prevent them from teaching about war in an inconsistent manner.” for the position of the university.”

The Faculty was also investigated for pro-Palestinian social media posts, who were arrested for exercising their free speech rights and were monitored and threatened by university representatives, it is alleged that the application was filed.

The teachers’ pressure highlights that, months after police removed pro-Palestinian camps from universities, outbreaks have continued on various campuses, with university officials implementing new protest laws and students facing ongoing suspensions and having their records seized.

The faculty claims build on a previous charge filed by the UCLA Faculty Assn. after the attacks and mass arrests of students and teachers who participated in the campus camp in April and May. And they match similar allegations made by unions representing UC workers, including the United Auto Workers Local 481, which represents student academic workers and the University Council-American Federation of Teachers, which represents 6,500 professors and teaching assistants across the university system.

Separate lawsuits, filed earlier this year with the state labor board, basically allege that the university failed to maintain safe working conditions, violated its employees’ free speech rights, and illegally made changes to working conditions due to the university’s protests.

The university defends its course of action. In response to a request for comment, UC spokeswoman Heather Hansen pointed to a statement the university previously filed with the state labor board in response to a lawsuit by the UCLA Faculty Assn.

The university said that while it “supports free speech and legal protests,” it must also “ensure that all members of its community can continue to study, work, and exercise their rights, which is why it has policies in place to control crime.” the time, place, and manner of protest activities on its campuses.”

“The University has allowed – and continues to allow – legal protests surrounding the Middle East conflict. But if the protests violate University policy or threaten the safety and security of others, the University has taken legal action to end the illegal and illegal behavior,” the university said.

Entering information about incidents the university is allegedly investigating and disciplinary.

Immediately after the attack on Oct. 7 of Hamas in Israel, and the start of Israel’s bombardment of Gaza, the university began sending emails to faculty threatening that they would be investigated and disciplined for teaching content outside the scope of their courses. In November, UC San Diego investigated two teachers for teaching about the history of the Palestinian territories, the filing said. A UC Irvine faculty member has been sent a “warning letter” by administrators for holding a vote on whether to hold a class at an on-campus camp, and attendance is voluntary.

In one example cited, a UC San Francisco medical school professor who gave a talk in April about trauma-informed care at a health equity conference was barred from participating in future academic activities after spending six minutes of a 50-minute lecture discussing the topic as it relates to Palestinian health challenges. The head of the center informed the pastor that they had received complaints that his speech was “biased and anti-Semitic,” and released a video of the speech online. The ban was eventually lifted, but the video remains offline.

The complaint says “the university’s harassment of professors for expressing pro-Palestinian views stands in stark contrast to its treatment of pro-Israel faculty.”

The university has declined to launch a formal disciplinary investigation into a pro-Israel faculty member at UC Irvine accused of harassing and threatening an undergraduate student, despite being provided with video of the faculty member “cornering, physically threatening, and interrogating an apparently terrified student,” the filing said. .

After an improper performance charge is filed, the Public Employee Relations Board will review and evaluate the case, and decide whether to dismiss the case or continue with the parties to negotiate a settlement. If no resolution is reached, the case will be scheduled for a formal hearing before an administrative law judge.