USAC passes resolution calling for UCLA Chancellor Gene Block’s resignation
Chancellor Gene Block is pictured. On Tuesday, the Undergraduate Students Association Council passed a resolution calling for the resignation of Block if he does not meet the five demands of the Palestine solidarity encampment. (Jeremy Chen/Photo editor)
By Catherine Hamilton
May 7, 2024 11:29 p.m.
The Undergraduate Students Association Council passed a resolution Tuesday night calling for the resignation of Chancellor Gene Block if he does not meet the demands of the Palestine solidarity encampment.
By a 10-3 vote, the council voted to pass the “Resolution Calling for the Immediate Resignation of Chancellor Gene Block if He Does Not Meet PSE Divestment Demands, Grant Amnesty to Affected Students, and Waive Medical Bills of Those Hospitalized.” Cultural Affairs commissioner Alicia Verdugo sponsored the resolution – which passed following a tense debate – with international student representative Adam Tfayli and general representative Jonathan Valenzuela Mejia as co-sponsors.
[Related: Candidates in upcoming USAC elections participate in solidarity encampment]
General representatives Katie Pool and Gabby Lasry and Financial Supports commissioner Sara Broukhim were the three votes against.
The resolution follows the violent attack on the Palestine solidarity encampment by outside aggressors April 30 and May 1 and the forceful police-led sweep of the encampment the following day.
“These events did not occur in a vacuum,” the resolution stated. “Rather, they are the culmination of UCLA administration’s refusal to address the ongoing genocide in Palestine and the repression of pro-Palestine voices on campus for the past seven months.”
The resolution outlines the five demands of the encampment and calls on Block to meet all of them. The demands include divestment from companies and institutions the encampment says are complicit in Israel’s occupation of and genocide in Palestine; the disclosure of university financial assets; abolishing policing on campus and severing ties with LAPD; the university calling for an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip; and a boycott of Israeli universities.
The resolution also calls for the abolishment of the UCLA Younes and Soraya Nazarian Center for Israel Studies.
“Gene Block’s administration is directly responsible for enabling Tuesday night’s tragedy,” the resolution stated. “How dare he and his administration blame the encampment for the violence they endured as a result of his negligence.”
Contributing reports by Shiv Patel, Daily Bruin contributor.
