Howard Gillman, Chancellor, UC Irvine 

Gillian Hayes, Vice Provost for Academic Personnel, UC Irvine

Dyonne Bergeron, Vice Chancellor for Equity, Diversity & Inclusion, UC Irvine

Dear Chancellor Gillman, Vice Provost Hayes, and Vice Chancellor Bergeron:

We write as a group of scholars, students, and concerned community members from across the world to express our alarm and opposition to the three misdemeanor charges filed against Dr. Tiffany Willoughby-Herard, including “failure to disperse at the scene of a riot,” “resisting a peace officer with the threat of violence,” and “resisting arrest” at UC-Irvine’s (UCI) Palestine solidarity encampment on May 15, 2024. Dr. Willoughby-Herard's arrest was a direct result of her attempt to protect students from harm at the hands of armed riot police representing twenty-one different police and sheriffs' departments. The threat of violence came entirely from the police, not from the students, who were gathered to draw public attention to the horrors of ongoing human rights violations and genocide in Palestine. In other words, the students and Dr. Willoughby-Herard were gathered to insist on the sanctity of all human life. In response, the same UCI administration that proclaimed 2023-2024 as “The Year of Free Speech” called for the campus to be invaded by armed police. 

We therefore urge the leadership of UCI, in view of their role in triggering these unjust arrests, to actively and openly oppose these charges and to call for Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer to drop all charges. Not doing so poses significant hazards not only to academic freedom on campus, but also to the safety and well being of scholars like Dr. Willoughby-Herard, who have been targeted by far-right political groups with rape and death threats and public doxxing. 

We strongly oppose charges against all of those arrested on May 15 at UCI, but as scholars of race, law, gender, and sexuality, we want to highlight the abominable fact that the charges against Dr. Willoughby-Herard are the most extensive and punitive. This is just one example of the disproportionate criminalization of Black people in California and across the U.S.  

Dr. Willoughby-Herard is an Associate Professor of Global and International Studies at UCI. She is the author of Waste of a White Skin: The Carnegie Corporation and the Racial Logic of White Vulnerability, a groundbreaking book that examines how powerful philanthropic foundations augmented racial apartheid in South Africa. She also co-edited (with Dee Marco and Abebe Zegeye) Sasinda Futhi Siselapha (Still Here): Black Feminist Approaches to Cultural Studies in South Africa’s Twenty-Five Years Since 1994. She is one of the nation’s leading experts on transnational racial regimes, feminism, and decolonial theory, especially pertaining to the Global South. Her research areas are vital to the current public discourse about the international politics shaping the formation of the Israeli state.

In addition, Dr.Willoughby-Herard has taught and mentored multiple generations of students and twice received the Chancellor’s Award for Fostering Excellence in Undergraduate Research in 2011 and 2015 at UCI. In the academic year 2021-2022, she was awarded the Academic Senate Distinguished Faculty Award for Mentorship. In the subsequent year, she was a National Humanities Center Fellow. In other words, Dr. Willoughby-Herard embodies everything the contemporary university system says it wants from a faculty member: an internationally cited and celebrated researcher, a creative pedagogue who always puts students first, and a generous colleague committed to service to the university and her broader intellectual community. 

All of these achievements have earned Dr. Willoughby-Herard international acclaim. She was president of the National Conference of Black Political Scientists, and was appointed Professor Extraordinarius in the Chief Albert Luthuli Research Chair at the University of South Africa.

A video recording of Dr. Willoughby-Herard’s violent arrest was aired on ABC 7 on May 15, 2024, and shared through social media by countless members of the public. The video clearly shows her standing at the encampment, posing no threat to police, and subsequently being tackled by several police in riot gear and pinned face down on the concrete. 

Since her arrest, during which she sustained multiple injuries and now endures severe ongoing trauma, Dr. Willoughby-Herard has been targeted by far-right groups demanding that she be fired from her faculty position at UC-Irvine. On September 26, 2024, one of these groups entered UC-Irvine’s campus displaying Dr. Willoughby-Herard’s face and name on the side of a digital billboard truck under the words, “UC-Irvine’s Leading Antisemites.” There were no attempts by the university to shield its employees from this blatant harassment.  

In the civil rights movement, it was common for prominent figures such as Martin Luther King, Jr. and John Lewis to ‘accompany’ students and community members who were engaged in nonviolent actions. Dr. Willoughy-Herard is being unfairly prosecuted for the exact same actions— ‘accompanying’ students in order to protect them from harm and from the violation of their rights. Now, she has been unfairly prosecuted by the Orange County DA and attacked by extremist groups that are also opposed to the rights of women, religious minorities, and LGBTQ+ people. UC Irvine’s refusal to defend Dr. Willoughby-Herard would provide cover to these extremist groups. 

We again urge you to contact Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer to drop all charges against Dr. Willoughby-Herard and others arrested on May 15th, and to publicly recommit to protecting academic freedom and constitutionally protected speech at UC-Irvine for all.

*Institutional affiliations offered for identification purposes only

Initial signatories below (Click here for the full list of signatories)

Sharon Patricia Holland, Townsend Ludington Distinguished Professor of American Studies, UNC-Chapel Hill 

Cecelia Lynch, Professor, Political Science, UC Irvine

Danielle Purifoy, Assistant Professor of Geography and Environment, UNC Chapel Hill 

Sekou Franklin, Professor of Political Science, Middle Tennessee State University, President of the National Conference of Black Political Scientists

Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, Distinguished Professor of Comparative Literature, University of California, Irvine

Fred Moten, Professor and Associate Chair of Performance Studies, Professor of Comparative Literature, New York University

Nikhil Pal Singh, Professor and Chair of Social & Cultural Analysis, Professor of History, New York University

Ruth Wilson Gilmore, Professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences, CUNY Graduate Center

Eileen Boris, Hull Professor and Distinguished Professor of Feminist Studies, Professor of History, Black Studies, and Global Studies, University of California, Santa Barbara

Elizabeth Peters Robinson, Donor of Cedric J. Robinson and Elizabeth P. Robinson Archive, University of California, Santa Barbara Special Collections & New York University Tamiment Special Collections

Inderpal Grewal, Professor Emeritus, Yale University

Akosua Adomako Ampofo, Professor, University of Ghana, Founding Vice-President and former President, African Studies Association of Africa

Damien M. Sojoyner, Professor of Anthropology, UC Irvine

Rei Terada, Professor of Comparative Literature, UC Irvine

Radha Radhakrishnan, Distinguished Professor of English, African American Studies, and Comparative Literature, UC Irvine

Ananya Roy, Professor of Urban Planning, Social Welfare, and Geography, and Renee Luskin Chair in Inequality and Democracy at the University of California, Los Angeles

H. L. T. Quan, Associate Professor, Justice & Social Inquiry, School of Social Transformation, Arizona State University

Sharad Chari, Associate Professor of Geography, University of California, Berkeley