Protestors allegedly assaulted an employee Wednesday evening when they took over a building on the campus of Barnard College, a private women’s liberal arts college which is part of Columbia University.
The students were protesting Columbia’s expelling of two students who reportedly barged into a class in January and threw around flyers with hateful terminology.
Columbia was a flashpoint for unrest in 2024.
Elisha Baker, a junior at Columbia, was at Barnard confronting protestors and is seen on video being blocked access into the building.
He went on Fox to share what happened.
“This is nothing new. These are students who cosplay as the terrorists that they support. They have no regard for the rules. They have no regard for the basic function of the university, which is to teach and to learn."
He explained his friend, also seen in the videos, tried to get in the building because he had an accounting class inside.
“That door was locked, and he was prevented because these protesters were essentially given exclusive access. Especially on the day where the Bibas family was buried in Israel, one of the saddest days in Jewish history, it's so upsetting to see a mob overrun a building, run around our campus, supporting the terrorists that commit these acts,” Baker said.
More video shows more masked people outside the building handing bags of food and water through a window to the barricaded protestors.
"What I said to them is, ‘you're not in that building, but you are absolutely supporting and aiding and abetting this protest by providing them food and by providing cover for the people who are breaking the rules.’"
The protest ended the same night it started. The group voluntarily vacated after Barnard officials promised no disciplinary action if it somewhat met a deadline.
“Barnard gave them a document that said if you leave by 10:30 PM, which is more than six hours after they arrived, more than five hours after they blocked people from going to class, we will not issue any disciplinary rulings against you for being inside the building,” Baker said.
Coming out on their own time
The terrorist supports set their own deadline for 15 minutes later.
“Essentially, at 10:45, they did a victory March because they successfully held a standoff, and they're getting away with no I.D.'s checked and no discipline,” Baker said.
The school erred by failing to discipline the students, she said.
Baker hopes her video discourages similar classroom takeovers.
“By videoing that and by confronting them, it's important for me to just make a point to try to disincentivize this kind of behavior."
