The #UCLA5 are on trial NOW, facing up two years in jail, for speaking out from their seats while Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin was at UCLA in February 2018.

The UCLA administration – far from defending these people or even standing aside – initiated their arrest and has acted in concert, banning some activists from campus and using police to spy on others.

The defendants are members of the Revolution Club and Refuse Fascism who, a year and a half ago, sounded the alarm against the fascism being imposed by the Trump-Pence regime: "[Mnuchin] is part of a regime that is hellbent on consolidating fascism!"  

That these defendants are facing jail time for speaking loudly to a government official at a public university is a major attack on campus free speech, and has ominous implications for the space for dissent in the University.

Reflecting a further leap in repression, police reports released in the case reveal that university police stalked the Revolution Club, recording their activities – including the recording of someone’s license plate number when they were on campus carrying out what is supposed to be constitutionally protected speech and simply talking to people

This is taking place while University administrations nationally are spending millions protecting the free speech of fascists who have the bully pulpit of the president, and criminalizing ANTI-fascist protest and speech of people who have no Oval Office and own no airways to amplify their voices.

These cases are criminalizing constitutionally protected protest and speech while the Trump/Pence regime  is tearing up the rule of law, stacking the courts with fascists, rounding up immigrants and fanning mobs against the press, LGBT people and anyone not white and Christian.  Many more need to be acting in these bold ways to oppose fascist normalization – and that is exactly what this kind of criminalization is aimed at preventing.

We cannot allow UCLA to silence and criminalize meaningful protest that is aimed at stopping this regime from bolting fascism into place. We, the undersigned, recognize that silence is complicity.

The #UCLA5 stood up, in the name of humanity.  We stand with them! Drop the charges!

[NOTE: If you have trouble signing this form, email us at socal@refusefascism.org]