Above photo: Jace Boland speaking at Swarthmore 9 press conference in Media, Pennsylvania, June 9, 2026.
Philadelphia — Students at Swarthmore College, outside of Philadelphia, held a nonviolent, pro-Palestine encampment on campus in May 2025. They protested the college administration’s support, through a $2.7 billion endowment, of companies supporting Israeli genocide in Gaza, specifically Cisco Systems. The encampment was named after Palestinian journalist Hossam Shabat, who was killed by the Israel Occupation Forces.
Despite the college’s liberal legacy of supporting peaceful protests, campus President Valerie Smith and Vice President Stephanie Ives refused to negotiate. Instead, on May 3, 2025, they called in 40 police officers from eight different municipal police departments to clear the encampment. The police brutalized and arrested nine protesters.
All nine were charged with third-degree misdemeanor defiant trespassing and face up to a year in prison for exercising their First Amendment-protected free speech.
Speaking at a press conference outside the courthouse in Media, Pennsylvania, on June 9, Swarthmore student Jace Boland, one of the defendants, stated: “Swarthmore’s $2.7 billion endowment invests in war and destruction. Our central demand was that Swarthmore sever all ties with Cisco Systems, a leading tech company assisting Israel’s military.
“Swarthmore’s administration called us a ‘threat to the community,’ but what community are they protecting? Their investment was their main concern. If we lose, Swarthmore becomes a college where police are the norm.”
The Swarthmore 9 have all pleaded not guilty. Winona Malcarney, another defendant, stated: “This trial is a massive escalation in the repression of pro-Palestine activists in the Philadelphia area. This political trial is an effort to silence pro-Palestine activism and distract the public from the war crimes that educational institutions and the federal government are complicit in.”
Students attending the press conferences noted that this is not the first time that Swarthmore College administrators have cooperated with the state against student demands. In the 1960s, they collaborated with the FBI against Black students demonstrating on campus.
Boland noted: “The arrests have had a chilling effect. Many students are hesitant to engage in free speech on campus. The administration’s repression is because they are afraid of us. We have come to understand our own institution’s complicity in the maintenance of genocide and how they profit from it.”
A request by lawyers for the nine defendants to dismiss their charges was denied by Judge Dominic Pileggi on June 22. The case will now go to a jury trial on July 1.
Visit Swarthmore9.com for more information.
