The academic workers' union at the University of California Los Angeles will hold a vote on whether they will side with pro-Palestinian protestors, potentially bringing grading and research for all students on campus to a screeching halt.
The union's executive board held an emergency meeting on Wednesday morning, during which they voted to hold a strike authorization vote as early as Monday - which would give the union the authority to call an official strike.
A UCLA PhD student, speaking to HNGN on the condition of anonymity, said that she "strongly supported" the union taking a strike authorization vote.
"As a student worker I believe it is past time that UCLA entered negotiations with the pro-Palestinian demonstrators," she said. "Their failure to protect students from violent counter-protestors last night shows that further direct action is necessary."
In an email to union members obtained by HNGN, the UCLA academic researchers and post-doctoral students said that the university's "failure" to protect pro-Palestinian students and employees from the counter-protestors, who stormed their encampment early Wednesday morning, was an abdication of responsibility.
"Management has employed police violence or allowed violence to be used against students, faculty and academic workers exercising their right to free speech, the executive board of UAW 4811 wrote. "The use and sanction of violent force to curtail peaceful protest is an attack on free speech and the right to demand change, and the university must sit down with students, unions and campus organizations to negotiate, rather than escalate."
UAW 4811 represents nearly 50,000 academic researchers and post-docs across 10 public universities and one laboratory in California. In the fall of 2022, it was part of the largest strike in the history of American higher education, when academic workers walked off the job for more than a month.
While it's not clear what the immediate impact of this strike could be, the 2022 strike delayed grading during final exams and brought the majority of university research to a halt.
UCLA classes were canceled Wednesday and police helicopters lingered above the university, after 200 counter-protestors stormed the encampment overnight, ripping away wooden pallets and metal barricades. Individuals could also be seen throwing fireworks towards the encampment, in footage shared to social media by the UCLA student newspaper. Members of UAW 4811 were inside the encampment as the violence unfolded, according to the union's executive board.
https://t.co/yt2BzgkCLg pic.twitter.com/lmFVt25NWf
— Daily Bruin (@dailybruin) May 1, 2024
The incidents went on for several hours before police wearing riot gear formed lines and slowly separated the groups. Academic workers criticized the university - claiming that it failed to ensure the security of students and university employees. Undergrad and graduate students, including some union members, rebuilt the encampment barricade in the light of day, while volunteers distributed food to the activists.
In their communications with union members, the executive board wrote that a strike would be justified "should the university decide to curtail the right to participate in protected, concerted activity; discriminate against union members or political viewpoints; and create or allow threats to members' health and safety."
"UAW 4811 members will take any and all actions necessary to enforce our rights," executive board wrote.
