Baltimore Beat has learned that officials at Johns Hopkins University are asking students who have been protesting there to leave the area by 6 p.m. today — and not to return.
People have been gathered at the school’s Homewood campus since last week, part of a wave of protests calling for an end to genocide against Palestinians that has swept college campuses in the United States and elsewhere.
Student organizers of the encampment received the letter shortly after 3 p.m. The letter, written by Jennifer Calhoun, associate vice provost for Student Affairs, Student Living and Community Standards, says that students there are violating the school’s code of conduct. It says that if they leave now, JHU will “defer taking conduct action” against participants in the protest.
“Going forward, you will not participate in any protest or demonstration activities that violate the Student Conduct Code or university policy. Should you violate the Student Conduct Code or university policy in a future protest or demonstration, conduct charges that would have been brought regarding the encampment related activities since April 29 will be initiated,” the letter reads. “This conduct deferral will not be part of your student record and will not affect your academic career at Johns Hopkins University.”
The letter also asks the signee to pledge to “not in any way interfere with or disrupt any end-of-academic-year or commencement-related activities.”
Organizers of the JHU protest said they met with school officials Wednesday to discuss their requests — including that the school divest from companies that organizers said assist in the Israeli occupation of Palestine — but that the discussion was not successful.
In addition to that request, protesters have asked Johns Hopkins University to disclose its “investments and academic complicity” in Israel’s treatment of Palestinians, including “weapons and military technology developed at Hopkins,” and end its partnership with Tel Aviv University.
“The Administration did not approach the table with an offer that engaged our demands. The University offered a timeline that would merely ‘consider’ our PIIAC [Public Interest Investment Advisory Committee] proposal for divestment in October of 2025,” the Johns Hopkins Collective said in a press release. “With every passing day, the violence of one of the most well-documented genocides in world history accelerates.”
“Today, at 3:12 p.m., the encampment received papers threatening individual students to reveal their personal identification and affiliation with the Palestine Solidarity Encampment. This was paired with an additional threat that the encampment would be swept at 6 p.m. today,” the Johns Hopkins Collective said in a press release sent out a little before 5 p.m. Wednesday.
They said they have not heard any information from university officials about resuming negotiations. They asked that people who stand in solidarity with the demonstration report to the campus at 5 p.m.
This story will be updated.
From Issue 39 of Baltimore Beat:
As this issue went to print, the people gathered on the area of Johns Hopkins University known as “the beach” said they were going into day 7 of their occupation of the area. Despite the cold and drizzly weather, on May 5, a cluster of about 35 small, enclosed tents remained. Larger tents — the kind you might find at a cookout or summer festival — created a semicircle around the enclosed tents. Signs hung in the area listing the occupier’s demands and calling for a ceasefire in Gaza.
They began the occupation to highlight the plight of Palestinians in Gaza. People in the area have been under constant assault by the Israeli government since last October, when Hamas carried out an attack that left 1,200 Israelis dead. Over 200 were kidnapped.
“People who sympathize with Israel say the attacks are warranted to eliminate the threat that Hamas poses to the Israeli people,” this outlet wrote this past January, as we reported on a pro-Palestine protest in Annapolis. “However, many people have rallied around Palestinians, saying that the incessant bombing, which has killed over 25,000 Palestinians — including a large number of children and infants — constitutes genocide and is only the latest act in a long history of settler colonial violence.”
On Thursday, May 2, Johns Hopkins University president Ron Daniels issued a letter to the group Hopkins Justice Collective and student protesters asking them to end the encampment. He said the school had health and safety concerns, and that the protest was not helpful.
“An encampment of this nature cannot help but reduce the capacity of those within it to see the common humanity of those who are outside its perimeter,” he wrote.
The Hopkins Justice Collective, the student group organizing the action, released a statement the next day saying they felt that Daniels’ statement mischaracterized them and their mission.
Daniels invokes the vague language of ‘risk’ as a rhetorical tool against the nonviolent encampment as a threat, perpetuating fear of the Baltimore community.
Hopkins Justice collaborative
“Daniels invokes the vague language of ‘risk’ as a rhetorical tool against the nonviolent encampment as a threat, perpetuating fear of the Baltimore community. His language enforces a false binary between ‘non-affiliates’ and ‘affiliates.’ Johns Hopkins University is not a self-contained institution,” they wrote.
They said the framing was a distraction from their demand of the school: that the school divest from companies like Elbit, Blackrock, Lockheed Martin, and Google,” who they said help support the current genocide in Palestine.
The same day, members of Johns Hopkins University’s Krieger School of Arts and Sciences Faculty Senate also responded to Daniels’ words.
“A number of faculty, including KSAS Senators, have visited the protest as observers; we have seen that the encampment has largely been civil and emphasizes the types of engagement that many faculty seek to develop in our students,” they wrote.
They said they have witnessed organizers’ adherence to the principles of non-violence and have used the space to highlight learning.
“We commend President Daniels for his commitment to take seriously some of the protesters’ demands, and his broader commitment to the principles of freedom of expression. Particularly given the non-violent nature of the protest, and the willingness of students to use this opportunity for education and training, we urge President Daniels to continue to follow principles of dialogue, engagement and de-escalation.”
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