Colleges Side With Radicals, Their Students Be Damned
The Left and their media allies want you to believe the protests roiling college campuses are spontaneous uprisings of morally fervent students worried about Gaza war victims. Don't fall for that claim. It's a scam. These protesters don't represent most students or the American public.
Yet Monday, Columbia University canceled graduation ceremonies, kowtowing to the radical fringe, with whom they largely agree. Students and their families be damned.
Here are the facts: A miniscule 2% of people ages 18 to 29 polled by Harvard's Kennedy School named the Israel-Hamas conflict as their top political concern, compared with double digits who were concerned about the economy. Students couldn't care less about this issue.
Claims that today's campus riots are reminiscent of 1968, when students closed down campuses to protest the Vietnam War, are nonsense. Back then, Gallup found 46% of respondents in that age group considered the Vietnam War the nation's biggest problem. Not 2%.
Ray Kelly, former New York Police commissioner, nailed it Sunday when he said the nationwide turmoil "looks like a conspiracy. ... We need the federal government's investigative capacity to look at this whole situation."
Organized outside groups are behind much of the campus violence. Hours before the storming of Columbia's Hamilton Hall, an outside organization called The People's Forum -- known for its anti-Israel activities and links to the Chinese Communist Party -- started gearing up for its Hamilton Hall invasion. In a meeting, TPF's leader spewed invectives against Columbia.
Hours later, protesters smashed the glass doors of Hamilton Hall, vandalizing and seizing the building. When Minouche Shafik, university president, finally called in police, 13 of the 44 arrested in the building had no affiliation with the university.
Reflecting on the incidents at Columbia and other New York campuses, New York City Mayor Eric Adams said after the arrests, "Individuals unaffiliated with these schools had entered these different campuses and, in some cases, were even training students in unlawful protest tactics."
New York University Board Vice Chairman Bill Berkley says these occupations appear to have been orchestrated by external groups. He wants the FBI to investigate.
As these groups seize control of our universities, where is the FBI? Director Christopher Wray says the bureau does not directly track college protests but will provide information to campuses if the agency becomes aware of a specific threat.
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