Ming DeMers/Sun Photography Editor

Approximately 30 demonstrators march from Day Hall across Feeney Way in the CML protest.

January 25, 2025

At First Protest of Semester, CML Urges University to Divest, Discusses Undocumented Immigrant Concerns

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Amassed before the recently vandalized Andrew Dickson White statue, the Coalition For Mutual Liberation staged its first protest of the spring semester on Friday in support of Palestine and against the Trump administration’s immigration policies.

CML is an umbrella group of over 40 campus and local organizations. While prior CML-led demonstrations garnered hundreds of demonstrators, only about 30 students, faculty and community members met in front of Day Hall on Friday. From there, they marched to the Arts Quad and gathered in front of the defaced A.D. White statue, now covered with a tarp. 

On Monday, students awoke on the first day of classes to “Divest from death” and “occupation=death” spray painted in dark red on the statue of A.D White. CML expressed support for the vandalism in a Tuesday Instagram post, writing, “You can cover a statue with a tarp but you can’t cover up your complicity.”

Demonstrators in the CML rally protest in front of the covered A.D. White statue on the Arts Quad. (Stephan Menasche/Sun Staff Photographer)

As the protesters rallied on Friday, they continued to push the University to divest from defense manufacturers involved in the Israel-Hamas war.

Protesters chanted “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” “More repression, more resistance” and “F*** you Kotlikoff.”

The protesters also focused on concerns for undocumented immigrants under the Trump administration. Since President Donald Trump took office, deportations have expanded across the United States. Trump will allow officers enforcing immigration law to carry out arrests in schools, according to reporting by The Associated Press.

Assembled in front of Day Hall, pamphlets were distributed with the title, “What’s wrong with ICE?” and a speech by a masked speaker warned that “We need each other now more than ever with ICE raids possibly imminent.” 

Protesters listened to speeches from students, an alumna and Prof. Russell Rickford, history. Multiple members of the Cornell University Police Department and University officials were present throughout the demonstration but did not appear to intervene. 

Rickford took a voluntary leave of absence during the 2024 Spring semester after receiving backlash for stating he was “exhilarated” by the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack on Israel. Since returning to campus, he has remained involved in pro-Palestinian demonstrations. On Friday, Rickford pushed for guarantees from the University “that our records [and] our information will remain private.”

“We demand that our institutions reject the depredations of ICE and the despotic federal government,” Rickford said.

When asked by The Sun if the University would allow ICE or other governmental officers enforcing immigration law onto campus, a Cornell Media Relations representative did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

Barbara Taam ’74, a member of Alumni For A Fair And Just Cornell, also spoke. She explained that the organization of alumni works to support student protesters in “their interest in trying to do their part to stop the genocide.” 

Taam handed out flyers to the protesters calling for Interim President Michael Kotlikoff to reverse punishments against student protestors, Chair of the Board of Trustees Kraig Kayser MBA ’84 to resign and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to be arrested.

“[The members of Alumni For A Fair And Just Cornell are] very concerned,” Taam said in an interview with The Sun. “We don’t think that suspending students and just telling them to go away is the way to run a University.”