Morehouse College President David A. Thomas said that he is prepared to shut down Sunday’s commencement exercises rather than have it disrupted before a national audience and with President Joe Biden on the stage.
In an interview with NPR’s Ayesha Rascoe, Thomas was asked if the school was “open to scenarios where you would have student protesters arrested?”
Some Morehouse students and alumni have voiced concerns about Biden, who has supported Israel in that country’s ongoing conflict with Hamas, speaking at the graduation. Throughout this graduation season, students at several schools across the country have held pro-Palestinian protests during their ceremonies.
“The last thing that we want to do is create a moment where someone is taken out of commencement by law enforcement because they are being disruptive,” Thomas said. “Faced with the choice of having police take people out of the Morehouse commencement in zip ties, we would essentially cancel or discontinue the commencement services on the spot.”
Thomas added: “If my choice is 20 people being arrested on national TV on the Morehouse campus, taken away in zip ties during our commencement before we would reach that point, I would conclude the ceremony.”
In an interview with V-103′s Big Tigger, Biden said he was excited to come to Morehouse.
Biden spoke at Morehouse in 2015 when he was vice president. In 2022, Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris spoke jointly at the Atlanta University Center, which includes Morehouse.
Credit: ccompton@ajc.com
Credit: ccompton@ajc.com
“I’m honored to be able to speak to the future leaders of America this weekend at Morehouse, and celebrate the accomplishments of the graduates,” Biden said. “But I’ve been very clear. Every American has the right to peacefully protest. Once that protest crosses the line into hate speech and violence, that’s unacceptable.”
Thomas said the college is working closely with the Atlanta Police Department, the local sheriff’s office and the Secret Service to ensure that things go smoothly. He said the school has also sent out and reinforced the school’s policies on free speech.
“If during the ceremony, people engage in silent, nondisruptive protests, if, you know, my students when they cross the stage — they want to wear insignia or scars that identify their relationship to this issue, that will be allowed,” Thomas said.
At Emory University’s undergraduate commencement Monday, some students walked across the stage at ceremonies later in the day and handed over small Palestinian flags rather than shaking hands with Emory officials. Others wore kaffiyehs over their robes or shouted “Free Palestine!” as they walked across the stage. These demonstrations were among the few allowable forms of protest per Emory’s open expression policy.
Credit: Chauncey Alcorn/Capital B
Credit: Chauncey Alcorn/Capital B
Thomas, who has led Morehouse since 2018, also talked about the pressure that he has been under since the Biden announcement. He noted that a flier was put up on campus attacking him as “a hand of the white man’s violence, supporting genocide and terrorism.”
“It hurts when you’re demonized,” Thomas said. “It also hurts when I have to worry about not whether my students disagree with the decision to bring Biden, but that they may also be susceptible to weaponization by those who want to demonize anybody who’s on the other side of the issue as compared to them.”
Thomas noted that there have been at least two protests on campus and neither of them drew more than 100 people. Last week, an official from the White House traveled to Morehouse to talk to students and staff about their concerns.
