The NYPD’s ‘Outside Agitators’ Columbia Claim Is Thin So Far

Officials have not identified any non-students among the nearly 300 people arrested on Tuesday.

On Tuesday night, the NYPD arrested nearly 300 pro-Palestinian demonstrators at the campuses of Columbia University and City College of New York. Ahead of the police sweep, Mayor Eric Adams warned students to leave, claiming that protests had been hijacked by “outside agitators.” On Wednesday morning, Adams and law-enforcement officials extended this line of argument, defending the department’s tactics as a necessary response to chaos perpetuated by external actors.

“There is a movement to radicalize young people and I’m not going to wait until it’s done and all of a sudden acknowledge the existence of it,” Adams said at a press conference. “This is a global problem that young people are being influenced by those who are professionals at radicalizing our children and I’m not going to allow that to happen as the mayor of the city of New York.”

In news appearances, NYPD officials cited the use of heavy bike chains to secure the doors of Hamilton Hall as evidence of the professional nature of the protests. “This is not what students bring to school. This is what professionals bring to campuses and universities,” Deputy Commissioner of Communication Tarik Sheppard said during an appearance on MSNBC Wednesday. But social-media users unearthed old posts from Columbia University’s Public Safety department that recommended the Kryptonite bike locks in question to students who biked and even offered a discount for purchasing them. Reporters questioned Sheppard further about the claim following Wednesday’s press conference. He said the NYPD did arrest non-students Tuesday evening, but did not elaborate on the numbers or who they were associated with.

Here is @katie_honan confronting @NYPDDCPI with evidence that the chain he wielded to imply that “outside agitators” barricaded Hamilton Hall is a common bike lock that @Columbia itself sold to their students pic.twitter.com/j7lU9Nm1GO

— Christopher Robbins (@ChristRobbins) May 1, 2024

Student reporters with Columbia’s radio station WKCR also pushed back on apparent claims that there were no students at all in Hamilton Hall, the academic building occupied by protesters earlier this week.

The New York Times reports that Lisa Fithian, a longtime activist, was seen among protestors outside Hamilton Hall the night it was first occupied. Fithian, whom the NYPD describes as a “confirmed professional agitator,” told the Times that she wasn’t on campus Tuesday evening when arrests were made and that she played no role in organizing the protests.

The department confirmed Wednesday that 282 people were arrested during Tuesday’s raids with 173 arrests occurring at City College while the other 109 were taken into custody on Columbia’s campus. According to NYPD commissioner Edward Caban, those taken into custody face a variety of potential charges including trespass, criminal mischief, and burglary. Columbia University president Minouche Shafik requested that the NYPD maintain a presence on campus through May 17, two days after commencement, in her letter asking for police intervention.

When asked to identify how many were outsiders and not students, NYPD chief of patrol John Chell, echoing Sheppard, said the number hadn’t been determined yet. “We’ll have that answer sometime today. We haven’t broken it down yet, but we’ll have that answer,” he said.

Adams cited what he saw as a change in strategy, noting “destruction of property” and “disruptions of cameras” as proof of outside involvement. But the mayor said that any further information will be released on the department’s timeline due to the sensitive nature of the investigation.

“Let me be very clear. This is an ongoing, evolving investigation. The intelligence division must be extremely sensitive about information they release,” Adams said. “Our goal is not to ensure you get a good story. Our goal is to make sure that we tell the right story.”

The term “outside agitator” is notably fraught: It was frequently deployed by authorities to undermine civil-rights activist protests in the 1960s. And in 2020, New York’s then-police commissioner Dermot Shea used the term to justify harsh police crackdowns on social-justice demonstrators in the wake of George Floyd’s murder.