When Elliott Samons showed up at the pro-Palestinian encampment on IU Indianapolis’ campus back in April, he never would have expected he’d still be there three months later.
“For the first few weeks, we thought, any day, they will come shut us down,” he said.
The Indianapolis camp popped up during a nationwide wave of campus protests against Israel’s invasion of Gaza. Most of those demonstrations have since shut down, either due to police or university action or because students went home for the summer. But students at the IU Indianapolis and IU Bloomington campuses have kept their camps going, even as they faced storms, heat waves and dwindling numbers.
“It really deepens my hope, seeing how many people are committed to this in this way to where they will stay out here months on end,” said Samons, who is 29 and an undergraduate student at IU Indianapolis.
[IUPUI’s pro-Palestinian protest feels different. Here’s why.]
But the encampment could be ousted as soon as this week. IU’s board of trustees is preparing to vote July 29 on a new policy that would limit “expressive activity” on all IU campuses, including Indianapolis. IU defines “expressive activity” as “any public display of individual or group speech or other expression occurring on property owned or controlled by Indiana University or at university-sponsored events.”
The proposed policy would ban overnight camping and “expressive activity” from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m. beginning Aug. 1. The policy also would bar demonstrations within 25 feet of building entrances, mandate that temporary structures like tents be approved 10 days in advance, require pre-approval for hanging signs on university-owned property, and limit where students can draw or write with chalk.
“I find it difficult — if you follow the rules — to see how we can continue it,” Samons said.
In a statement to Mirror Indy, IU spokesperson Mark Bode said the university gathered feedback about the policy from students, staff and faculty on all IU campuses and will share updates following the meeting.
“Indiana University remains committed to supporting and protecting freedom of speech for all,” Bode’s statement said.
Others, though, worry the proposal would unnecessarily limit free speech.
Laura Beltz, director of policy reform at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, said the policy presents concerns about free speech, especially in how “expressive activity” is defined in the policy.
Beltz said IU’s definition of “expressive activity” could refer to any form of dissent, from a student turning their back on someone speaking to a protest with hundreds of students. That vagueness, she said, could result in the policy being enforced unfairly and unevenly.
“I think it’d be better if schools adopted more narrowly tailored policies to limit the most disruptive types of protests without limiting nondisruptive protests,” she said.
How we got here
Indiana University is one of many U.S. colleges grappling with the aftermath of the pro-Palestinian protests that shook the nation this spring.
In April, IU changed a long-standing policy about “temporary structures” the night before a planned demonstration at its Bloomington campus. The next day, 34 students were arrested for disobeying the new policy. Two days later, IU made national news when Indiana State Police came to campus and arrested 23 more students and stationed officers with “sniper capabilities” on the rooftop, according to IndyStar reporting.
Nationwide, universities have been wrangling with how to reprimand student protestors, from withholding protestors’ diplomas to tightening restrictions on campus events and demonstrations. According to a New York Times tracker, more than 3,100 people have been arrested or detained in connection with campus protests, though many of those charges have been dropped.
Indianapolis students, though, set up camp just a few days after the Bloomington campus and have not had so much as a standoff with police. The camp is run by the Palestinian Solidarity Committee at IUPUI, which is not an officially recognized student group but is made up largely of students.
On July 25, Indiana University released the results of an independent report about the encampments from law firm Cooley LLP. The report said that Indianapolis’ encampment was smaller than Bloomington’s and cooperative with administration and policies, so IU Indianapolis didn’t attempt to remove it. But the report also cited an unnamed IU Indianapolis administrator who said the school wanted to avoid the police response seen in Bloomington.
“This administrator also believed they lacked the necessary policy to clear the encampment and understood that IU Indianapolis’s approach would be to wait for the IU board of trustees to enact a new university-wide policy that deals with encampment,” the report said.
‘I find that really limiting’
Members of the Indianapolis encampment feel the proposed policy is directly targeting their protest.
In addition to explicitly prohibiting overnight camping, Samons said, the Indianapolis encampment is covered in signs and chalk messages on the concrete posts that surround the camp.
Samons lamented that the policy puts limits on how and when signs can be displayed. Getting approval from the university in advance to place signs is difficult when news is happening fast.
“I find that really limiting in how people can share things with each other whenever some things demand more urgent responses,” he said, “like the situation in Gaza.”
Students in the Indianapolis encampment say these changes would affect other student groups on IU’s campuses, too, especially the provisions about signs. They are planning to band together with other student groups in Indianapolis to protest the restrictions.
“You have to have mass movements that are encompassing of as many people as possible from as much diversity as possible,” said Layth Abdulbari, a leader in the Indianapolis encampment and a student at IU Indianapolis. “If you don’t do that, then the issue is, we isolate ourselves into an echochamber, and then we forget that our mission is to divest.”
‘A great sense of grief’
Abdulbari, 21, has been camping out at IU Indianapolis since the very beginning. From the beginning, he said the group knew it would be extremely hard to achieve its goals of persuading IU to divest from Israel and the Crane naval base.
He sees the last three months as successful in building a pro-Palestinian movement at IU and in Indianapolis.
“I’ve learned a lot,” he said, “about love and brotherhood and sisterhood and family.”
As for Samons, he’ll be deeply disappointed if the camp closes. He said joining the encampment has changed his perspective, and when he leaves it, he dreams about returning.
“That’s part of why I think there will be a great sense of grief,” he said.
Claire Rafford covers higher education for Mirror Indy in partnership with Open Campus. Contact Claire at claire.rafford@mirrorindy.org or on social media @clairerafford.
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