Americans love to protest. We love it so much that we included the right to assembly and peaceful protests in the First Amendment in the Bill of Rights.
Every time the news is on, there is a new protest or boycott that is occurring — the Israel-Palestine conflict, ICE raids on undocumented families and bannings of drag show performances on college campuses.
All of these issues seem so different, but they have a thread that connects them: Each has occurred on or had a looming presence on college campuses.
But our right to protest — especially on college campuses — is under attack.
On March 4, President Donald Trump posted a concerning statement on Truth Social:
“All Federal Funding will STOP for any College, School, or University that allows illegal protests. Agitators will be imprisoned [sic] or permanently sent back to the country from which they came. American students will be permanently expelled or, depending on [sic] the crime, arrested.”
This post comes less than a year after massive student protests against the Israeli-Palestinian conflict swept across college campuses, including Columbia, UCLA and smaller protests at Texas A&M.
The post does not specify what it means to have an “illegal” protest. The worry many Americans have is that the statement is so vague that any protest the current administration disagrees with could be considered illegal.
Blocking all federal funding would have a major impact on the entire business structure of universities including A&M which gets a significant amount of its funding from federal grants. Universities would be forced to choose between protecting their students’ right to assembly and losing out on billions of dollars in funding or complying with an administration that is more worried about students protesting than solving issues the citizens of the United States care about.
What is not always talked about is how many of these campus protests were peaceful. During the height, 97% of the protests were found to be entirely peaceful, with the remaining 3% resulting in mostly property damage and building occupations.
Many of the students involved in the largest and most publicized protests — such as those at Columbia and UCLA — have been targeted by their school administrations. They serve as an example of what could happen if you protest and why you should not speak out against problems that are important to you.
The right to protest has always been contested. The government has passed laws during times of conflict, such as the Sedition Act of 1917, which expanded the Espionage Act of 1917 to criminalize speech or writing that criticized the government, military or war efforts, leading to significant restrictions on free speech during World War I.
The government has also targeted colleges in the past for being the site of political protests. On May 4, 1970, 4 students at Kent State were shot and killed after members of the National Guard were sent to disperse a large crowd of protestors.
Could you imagine that happening in our world today? If protests were restricted on college campuses, would we be seeing more 20-year-olds being killed for simply expressing their beliefs?
Freedom of assembly gives everyone protection. When governmental leaders can properly handle protesters, counterprotesters and law enforcement, all of these parties can peacefully coexist and be allowed to express their beliefs in a public forum.
Unfortunately, that is not the case for the United States. Students are being targeted for their beliefs and systematically prevented from having the right to express them.
In his inauguration speech, Trump mentioned how this administration is never going to abuse the immense power of the state to restrict freedom of speech in this country. Government censorship was going to be a thing of the past and would not be a part of his new version of America.
Now, we’re faced with the exact opposite. Freedom of speech and assembly are under attack, and it will set precedents that will harm everyone.
But what can we do about it? We all have a part to play in protecting our rights as Americans. There are many simple steps that we can take, such as staying informed about our rights, contacting local officials and representatives to ensure they are working to protect our rights and participating in protests to make sure our voices are being heard.
Every American — regardless of political party, socioeconomic background or religion — should protect our fragile right to assembly and make the United States a place where everyone can speak, think and act freely.
Wyatt Pickering is a business honors and finance sophomore and opinion writer for The Battalion.
