Johns Hopkins administrators, protesters fail to reach solution over pro-Palestinian encampment

BALTIMORE — The Johns Hopkins University student activists leading a campus encampment negotiated with university administrators for six hours Tuesday without reaching a resolution, the Hopkins Justice Collective said Wednesday.

The group of students, alumni and community members said President Ron Daniels presented a “weak” offer to consider their demand for the university to divest its endowment from companies that support Israel. University administrators want protesters to remove the encampment that has grown to include 70 tents since April 29.

The group said university officials gave protesters two hours to accept an offer or face “immediate discipline in the morning,” including suspension.

A Hopkins spokesperson did not immediately return a request for comment Wednesday.

“Consideration is not divestment, it is a tactic to delay and pacify us — especially when those voting on the board of trustees are affiliated with the defense contractors themselves,” the Hopkins Justice Collective wrote on social media.

University board of trustees member Gary Roughead, a retired U.S. Navy admiral, is also on the board of Northrop Grumman, one of the companies the group wants the university to cut ties with.

Other companies include Elbit Systems, BlackRock, Palantir, General Dynamics, Lockheed Martin and Google. Protesters also want the university to publicly disclose all its financial ties to Israel, along with its lobbying efforts to increase militarized spending and an account of the use of weapons and military technology developed at Hopkins.

“Hopkins continues to invest in and develop knowledge for weapons companies which produce bombs that kill Palestinians,” the group of demonstrators wrote on social media.

The university’s Public Interest Investment Advisory Committee received a request to divest from companies that support Israel. The request is the first part of a process that’s ultimately decided by the Board of Trustees, which has a fiduciary responsibility for the institution, a Hopkins spokesperson said Tuesday.

About 30,000 undergraduate and graduate students attend Hopkins, which has multiple campuses. The university’s May 23 commencement is moving forward as planned, a spokesperson said.

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