On Friday, the inauguration of the University of Massachusetts Amherst’s 31st chancellor, Javier Reyes, faced numerous disruptions and walkouts by pro-Palestinian students and faculty calling for the university to cut ties with weapons contractors and drop academic discipline charges against 56 students and a faculty member arrested for a sit-in in October.
The interruptions and simultaneous demonstration outside the Mullins Center, the UMass arena where the event was held, comes just days after it was revealed that the university is under federal investigation by the Department of Education for allegedly discriminating against Palestinian students.
Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey and U.S. Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Northampton, were among those who joined UMass administrators, faculty, and students, as Reyes was formally recognized as chancellor, a position he has held since August 2023.
At the beginning of the inauguration, a promotional video was shown, claiming a “revolutionary spirit flows through (UMass’s) veins.”
UMass President Marty Meehan, who co-founded a coalition of over 100 universities to “Stand with Israel Against Hamas” in October, was the first to speak at the ceremony. Dozens of pro-Palestinian demonstrators quickly interrupted him, calling on the president to drop the charges against students and meet their demands. Meehan awkwardly paused, and waited as the demonstrators exited, with some leaving willingly and event security escorting others out of the Mullins Center. A few attendees laughed and mocked the students as they left.
Many protestors, especially those who did not stand up and weren’t as loud as others, weren’t asked to leave.
Healey followed Meehan, with her address meeting similar disruptions and walkouts.
As demonstrators left the Mullins Center, a pro-Palestinian protest outside the facility grew in size.
McGovern gave a speech after Healey, speaking to the importance of combating anti-Semitism and Islamophobia on campus and protecting students’ right to protest. He asked the UMass community to “not call people out, but call people in.”
Sigrid Schmalzer, a professor in the UMass history department who walked out on behalf of arrested students and in support of their demands, saw McGovern’s speech as more sympathetic to the demonstrators. She recalled McGovern’s speech at the memorial service for the renowned Northampton peace activist Frances Crowe in 2019, and said that during his speech, she thought: “Am I going to need to shout, ‘What would Frances do?’”
However, Schmalzer said she was “pleased” by McGovern’s words.
“He’s a politician, he had to walk a line there, but I was really moved,” she told The Shoestring.
McGovern, who himself has an anti-war track record in Congress, recently voted against a bill that included $26 billion in aid to Israel. His speech was met with no disruptions.
Six UMass students, professors, staff, and administrators spoke in a joint speech after McGovern and faced no protest.
Imani Wallace, a PhD student in the College of Education and spoken word artist, performed an original poem in which she invited the audience and greater UMass community to let Reyes be a “spaceship” to propel them “to be bold, be true, [and] be revolutionary.”
As Meehan reappeared, speaking briefly before carrying out the formal inauguration that included a ceremonial scepter and ornate necklace to be draped over Reyes’s neck, about 20 staff members, adorned with stickers supporting the arrested students and kefiyehs, a traditional Palestinian headdress, left the Mullins Center.
As they left, they loudly echoed the demands of student demonstrators earlier in the event, with many holding fliers reading “Divest and Drop the Charges.”
Meehan stumbled through the climax of the event, trying to drown out the protesting faculty by speaking noticeably louder.
Following Reyes’s formal inauguration, Stephen Karam, the chairman of the UMass Board of Trustees, could be heard saying in a hot-mic, “I’m from Fall River, that was nothing.”
As Reyes took the podium for his inaugural address, a lone protester holding a banner calling attention to UMass’s experimentation with marmoset monkeys, imploring the chancellor to end the project before being removed from the event.
Reyes waited for the protester to be escorted out before addressing the audience saying “Someone told me today, to take a moment to just take it in, and I want to take that moment now,” before another interruption.
Chants of “Free, free Palestine,” rang throughout the arena from the remaining student demonstrators.
Eventually, security escorted the students out of the building, with some making peace signs to the crowd and others pointing middle fingers at the stage. Reyes was able to continue his address with no interruptions.
At one point, he struggled through tears to express gratitude to his family.
Reyes said UMass has “a deep and profound commitment to social justice and a long tradition of activism — activism that has been front and center during my first year here,” a statement that was met with laughter by the audience.
“I stand before you today to reaffirm our campus commitment to academic freedom and freedom of expression in all its forms,” he continued, “We must also instill in our community — faculty, students, and staff — that while we may not always agree, the power of persuasion lies not in being the loudest and most disruptive, but in making the strongest case through civil dialogue grounded in facts, logic and reason.”
Protesting outside the arena, undergraduate student Aidan O’Neill said he felt that Reyes’ remark about student activism rang hollow.
“I think that’s very hypocritical,” he said.
O’Neill was arrested at the sit-in inside the administrative building in October and denied an opportunity to study abroad just two weeks before he was set to go to Spain. He was one of the first demonstrators to be removed from the ceremony at the Mullins Center.
“[Reyes] already has drowned 57 people out, who were sitting outside his office on Oct. 25 from 5:00 p.m. to 2:00 a.m., and had them all arrested,” O’Neill said.
Towards the end of the event, a series of video messages played including congratulations from the state’s two U.S. senators, Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey MA, as well as local lawmakers.
As attendees left the Mullins Center, protestors greeted them with a myriad of anti-war and pro-Palestinian slogans.
They were joined by the faculty members and student activists who disrupted the event.
Hundreds of protestors marched from the Mullins Center to a farmers market on the lawn outside of the Old Chapel on the UMass campus, promoting further protests to be held on May 1.
Dan McGlynn is an independent reporter studying journalism at UMass Amherst. He can be reached at dmcglynn@umass.edu.
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