A speech by conservative firebrand and British writer Milo Yiannopoulos was canceled at UC Berkeley on Wednesday amid a violent protest that sparked at least one fire.
Police clashed with protesters, and much of the university was placed on lockdown. Campus police were ordering protesters to leave the area, but many refused.
At 6:50 p.m., police used a loudspeaker to tell the crowd that Yiannopoulous had left the campus and that they would be arrested if they didn’t disperse.
Witnesses said some windows were broken at the Martin Luther King Jr. Student Union, where Yiannopoulos was scheduled to speak at an event hosted by the Berkeley College Republicans.
This marks the second time in two weeks that rowdy protests have forced the cancellation of a Yiannopoulos speech. The same thing happened last month at UC Davis, prompting a debate about free speech protections and how universities should respond to so-called hate speech.
Yiannopoulos, 32, writes for Breitbart News and is an avowed supporter of President Trump. A self-proclaimed Internet troll, his comments have been criticized as racist, misogynist, anti-Muslim and white supremacist. He was banned from Twitter after leading a harassment campaign against “Ghostbusters” actress Leslie Jones.
On his Facebook page, Yiannopoulos said that “violent left-wing protesters” had broken into a building’s ground floor, ripped down barricades and thrown rocks.
“My team and I are safe. But the event has been cancelled,” Yiannopoulous said.
In characteristic fashion, he pointed to the mayhem on campus to highlight his agenda: “One thing we do know for sure: the Left is absolutely terrified of free speech and will do literally anything to shut it down.”
Yiannopoulos spoke Tuesday night at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, where the university braced for large protests and stationed more than 100 police officers. About 150 protesters arrived and remained peaceful, and there were no reports of arrests, according to the San Luis Obispo Tribune.
In his remarks Tuesday night, he extolled Cal Poly for having a student population that was mostly male, railed against abortion and provided instructions on how to apply to his male-only scholarship fund, the “privilege grant,” according to text of his remarks published by Breitbart.
The cancellation of his talk at UC Davis sparked debate about the limits of free speech and hate speech. Davis College Republicans decided it was unsafe to continue the event after a large number of protesters blocked access to the venue, according to a release from the school.
UC Davis interim Chancellor Ralph Hexter said he was “deeply disappointed” by the protests and the cancellation.
“Our community is founded on principles of respect for all views, even those that we personally find repellent,” Hexter said in a statement after the cancellation. “As I have stated repeatedly, a university is at its best when it listens to and critically engages opposing views, especially ones that many of us find upsetting or even offensive.”
Hexter said he worries that outside groups are using college campuses to trigger conflicts intended for the national stage. He acknowledged the difficulty of protecting open speech in a field rife with landmines.
“I get very, very alarmed with folks who don’t treat [freedom of speech] for the treasure that it is,” he said two weeks ago.
Milo Yiannopoulos, a conservative commentator who writes for Breitbart News, in a photo from 2015. David Ng / Los Angeles Times Milo Yiannopoulos, a conservative commentator who writes for Breitbart News, in a photo from 2015. Milo Yiannopoulos, a conservative commentator who writes for Breitbart News, in a photo from 2015. (David Ng / Los Angeles Times)
So far, the UC system has resisted calls to cancel Yiannopoulos’ talks.
UC President Janet Napolitano and the Board of Regents’ advocacy for fighting offensive speech with “more speech” rather than censorship was included in “Principles Against Intolerance,” approved by UC regents last year as guidelines for the 10-campus system. Campus administrators are counseling a similar approach to those urging a ban on Yiannopoulos.
In the weeks before Yiannopoulos’ planned Berkeley appearance, administrators received hundreds of letters from faculty, students and others demanding they bar him from speaking.
One letter from a dozen faculty members argued that his talk could be canceled on the grounds that his actions — which they called “harassment, slander, defamation and hate speech” — violated UC Berkeley’s code of conduct.
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King reported from Berkeley, Hamilton and Watanabe reported from Los Angeles. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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peter.king@latimes.com
UPDATES:
7:50 p.m.: This article was updated with details on Yiannopoulos’ speech Tuesday at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo.
7:30 p.m.: This article was updated with additional background on the event and new details about the protests.
7:00 p.m.: This article was updated with additional background on Yiannopoulos.
6:45 p.m.: This article was updated with information about the cancellation of the event and background on previous speeches by Yiannopoulos at California college campuses.
This article was originally published at 4:45 p.m.
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