In a rebuke of restrictions placed on student protesters by UTSA officials last week, dozens of students chanted “from the river to the sea” while marching through campus on a muggy Wednesday afternoon, calling for the divestment of university funds from Israel and a ceasefire in the Gaza war.
The phrase refers to the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea and has become a divisive chant that some say is a call for liberation and peace for Palestinian people while others say it is an antisemitic call for the elimination of Israel.
For UTSA protesters, it was a line in the sand, after a representative of campus administration told them not to use the phrase while protesting in an exchange captured on video — an allegation of free speech violations the university disputes.
Wednesday’s march was timed to coincide with similar demonstrations at colleges across the region while sending letters to their college administrators. A press release from organizers said letters were sent to administrators at San Antonio College, UTSA, Texas A&M San Antonio, Trinity University and UT Health San Antonio.
The letters also decried an executive order issued by Gov. Greg Abbott in March that requires universities to adopt stricter punishments for what the order defines as antisemitic speech. Students and First Amendment advocates have called into question the constitutionality of the order.
The relatively small local marches contrast with the large encampments and protests being met with increasing law enforcement responses in Dallas, Austin and elsewhere across the country.
President Joe Biden provided unscheduled remarks from the White House on Thursday, condemning violence and property destruction seen during some protests across the country.
On a call with reporters Thursday, U.S. Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) commended the crackdown on protesters seen in recent days at UT Austin, suggesting that other colleges across the country could “take a few notes from people like UT Austin President Jay Hartzell, who’s taking swift action to break up these demonstrations.”
Cornyn pointed out that time, place and manner restrictions are allowed under the First Amendment, and that protesters are violating those restrictions on campuses across the country.
Free speech allegations
During the long, winding march through campus, undeterred by rain, students at UTSA repeated claims first shared last week that university officials had limited their free speech rights by banning the phrase “from the river to the sea” as well as the mention of Israel or Zionism.
Unlike last week, students didn’t listen.
Matthew Pena, an organizer with the Party for Socialism and Liberation, which organized the march along with Students for Justice in Palestine, said the limits had defeated the point of the protests in the first place.
“We are here calling out Israeli genocide, Israeli apartheid,” he said. “It revoked the point of our protests because we are attacking the state of Israel.”
When asked for evidence of the speech restrictions, student organizers provided an April 24 video of Dean of Students LaTonya “LT” Robinson warning students before their march last week not to use the phrase “from the river to the sea.”
In the video, which was shared with the San Antonio Report, Robinson is shown standing before protesters and citing the March executive order by Abbott, which directed higher education institutions to update free speech policies “to address the sharp rise in antisemitic speech and acts on university campuses and establish appropriate punishments, including expulsion from the institution.”
If protesters did not comply after being warned two times, they would be referred to “the law enforcement agencies that are in our area,” Robinson says in the video.
The administrator is not shown telling the protesters not to use the words “Israel” or “Zionism,” though protesters did not back down this week from the claim that a university official told them those words were not allowed. They did not provide evidence or identify who told them that.
Instead, she said: “The executive order states that language such as ‘from the river to the sea’ is considered antisemitic speech. And so we’re asking for folks to refrain from that, because we are required to enforce that that is not language that is used. … I ask you all not to use that language and we ask that you all comply with that.”
Abbott’s order also called out specific organizations by name, directing universities to “ensure that … policies are being enforced on campuses and that groups such as the Palestine Solidarity Committee and Students for Justice in Palestine are disciplined for violating these policies.” UTSA Students for Justice in Palestine was one of the organizers of the march.
Joe Izbrand, a spokesperson for the university, disputed student claims last week and pointed to a statement made by UTSA President Taylor Eighmy, which referred to having no tolerance for anitsemitism.
“That is not correct on certain words [being banned],” he said at the time. “As President Eighmy indicated in his message earlier this week, the university will not tolerate antisemitic expression.”
Fallout from the clash
Regardless, students used the banned phrase repeatedly Wednesday in a march that was more brazen than last week, weaving through parking lots and looping around campus for more than an hour, making stops to chant in front of the UTSA Police Department Building and the Main Building of campus before dispersing.
In the video provided by students, Robinson also asks them not to use any sound amplification devices. Students last week waited until they were in the parking lot to use megaphones, but briefly used them in the Sombrilla, a center square on campus, this Wednesday.
Other than closing roads to traffic as protesters marched through this Wednesday, police kept their distance, as did administrators including Robinson, who watched the events unfold without interfering.
University officials didn’t respond to a request for comment about whether students or organizers would face any punishment for violating the university directives.
Amy Sanders, an associate professor of journalism and media at the University of Texas in Austin, said any potential punishment could run afoul of speech protections under the U.S. Constitution.
“Even if you consider the phrase ‘from the river to the sea’ to be hate speech, it would be protected speech by the First Amendment,” she said. “A number of Palestinians and pro-Palestinian supporters talk about that phrase as a phrase that indicates and supports Palestinian freedom.”
In addition to that, Sanders pointed out that Abbott’s executive order only aims to punish one type of viewpoint, namely antisemitic speech.
“The First Amendment is particularly implicated when government tries to discriminate based on the content of the speech,” Sanders said. “Those kinds of restrictions on speech are almost never constitutional.”
Meeting with administrators
While students were marching through campus, another group with similar aims was holding a meeting with JoAnn Browning, the Vice President for Research, to discuss how the university invests funds and what divestment from certain funders would entail.
University officials didn’t return a request for comment on the meeting.
Parker Davis, the treasurer for the UTSA chapter of Young Democratic Socialists of America (YDSA), said the conversation, which he and others from the group joined, laid the groundwork for future discussions about divestment.
“We did get a lot of information that seems to suggest that UTSA seems to contribute a very small percentage of investments to [University of Texas/Texas A&M Investment Management Company (UTIMCO)] and likewise, doesn’t have a lot of influence or power over UTIMCO’s functions or their their mutual funds,” he said.
With that, students are now trying to learn how they can find a way to pressure organizations with more direct influence over UTIMCO’s functions, Davis said.
Calls for divestment have long been associated with the pro-Palestinian movement, along with calls for boycotting Israeli companies. Texas has a law prohibiting state agencies and political subdivisions from contracting with businesses that boycott Israel.
While university officials reportedly made no concessions, the students viewed the conversation as a starting place and a sign the movement taking place in recent months is being taken seriously.
“I think it shows a commitment from the university to address at least for the time being the genuine concerns of students over this extremely serious issue,” Davis said. “I think that it shows the power, not just of our chapter at UTSA, but I think of many different students across the United States making their voices heard and showing that we have the power to question: ‘Where’s our money going?'”
Amanda Sellers, the co-chair of YDSA, said the overall conversation and treatment of protesters has been markedly different at UTSA than some other campuses.
“We’ve been organizing for the past 16 weeks, we’ve had no pushback really from admin, we get away with a lot,” she said. “If you look at what’s going on at UT Dallas, if you look at what’s going on at UT Austin, we get away with so much on this campus. And I think that’s partly because we have a rapport with the dean of students. She’s not the enemy.”
