Aggies Give UT Lesson in Crisis Defusing
as Hundreds March Against War at A&M

Capitol Inside
April 30, 2024

Justice System Strained
as Police Push UT Campus
Protest Arrest Count to 136

The University of Texas appeared to take the lead on Tuesday in the national tally of students and others arrested in protests against the Gaza war protests after 79 more were recorded on campus in Austin the day before.

The arrests that the Department of Public Safety made on Monday pushed the cumulative count for two days to 136. More than 100 protestors have been arrested at Columbia University in New York City in the past week.

Students have been arrested at demonstrations in support of Palestine at 18 colleges across the country since the first erupted at Columbia. But Monday's police net in Austin put Governor Greg Abbott in position to flaunt his alma mater's lead in protesters who've been jailed for expressing their opposition to the Israeli occupation of Gaza at organized and unauthorized events.

Abbott declared during the weekend that Texas ranked first in almost every category. The nation-leading arrest count at UT could soar in the coming days and weeks.

Travis County Attorney Delia Garza revealed late today that 65 of the protesters were taken to jail for the minor offense of trespassing. Garza's office fielded 57 cases of protestors who were jailed at a UT protest last week. She dismissed all of those due to the way they were handled.

Garza said the school and police were straining local resources and the criminal justice system in the Capitol City.and that she hoped to help the parties negotiate some sort of agreement that keeps the system from breaking.

 

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GOP State Rep. Cody Harris of Palestine branded student demonstrators at the University of Texas on Monday as "snot-nosed, entitled, mindless brats" in a full-throated endorsement of the violent tactics that the state police have used against unarmed protestors at the school's request twice in the past week.

But the East Texas lawmaker remained silent on a simultaneous protest at Texas A&M University on the same day when more than 200 students and comrades demonstrated peacefully throughout the afternoon without arrests or police harassment like their counterparts faced at Forty Acres in Austin.

As a proud Texas Aggie, Harris can take pride in the way officials at his own alma matter put on a clinic in how to handle a major protest with intelligence, finesse and respect in a direct contrast to the methods that UT officials have demonstrated in the art of crisis management over a span of five days.

Harris hasn't stepped up to clarify whether he views the student protestors at the college he attended in College Station in the same contemptuous light in which he holds their counterparts in Austin. Students demonstrated for eight hours as planned on Monday in Academic Plaza at Texas A&M with calls for an end to the university's investments in firms that are making weapons for the Israelis in their occupation of the Gaza Strip.

The Aggies Against Apartheid - the group that organized at the protest and march through the campus - issued a statement to show solidarity with their comrades at UT.

“We affirm our solidarity and steadfast support to the people of Gaza and to our brothers and sisters at the University of Texas at Austin, as well as to each and every student being silenced by institutional power across the nation,” the organizers of the event said.

But Harris and other A&M alumni in the Texas Legislature may not have heard about the protest in College Station as a consequence of the professional manner in which it was handled compared to the University of Texas strategy that relied on brawn over brains in the school's response.

The Texas A&M administration chose to honor the First Amendment and state law that guarantees the right of peaceful expression while UT trampled both in a blatant attempt to appease a governor who's trying to show that he's a tough guy in a league with Donald Trump.

UT officials said last week that their goal was to prevent disruptions to the learning environment before going along with Governor Greg Abbott's plan that maximized the disruptive effect of student demonstrations against the killing of innocent people in the Middle East.

The administration in Austin has made excuses for its butchering of free speech on campus while kowtowing to the governor who's trying to build his stock in hopes for a spot on the 2024 Republican national ticket as the nominee for vice-president. Abbott odds on paper for the VP role have appeared to rise in the past week as a result of all but fatal publicity that South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem has garnered after admitting that she shot a puppy to death because it was harder to train.

Harris the representative who berated students at UT also sought to blame the chaos and mayhem on campus in Austin on some 500 faculty members who've signed a petition calling for a vote of no-confidence for school president Jay Hartzell.

"I’ll see your 500 woke faculty and raise you the Texas Legislature,: Harris wrote on X. "The vast majority of us think @JCHartzell is doing a fantastic job cleaning up after the snot-nosed, entitled, mindless brats created by those 500 faculty."

more to come ...

 

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

 

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