After more than a year of political conflict on Pitt’s campus — including a days-long encampment, two targeted attacks against Jewish students and a close proximity to an assassination attempt on a presidential candidate — students on all sides of the aisle are feeling pressure to stay silent on campus.
After the Foundation for Individual Rights and Free Speech released its 2026 national free speech ranking of college campuses, Pitt students and organizations are grappling with the University’s failing grade.
Based on a survey of 358 Pitt students and evaluations of campus policies alongside recent speech controversies, FIRE described Pitt’s campus as an environment where students are feeling “widespread unease about speaking up.”
The survey found that 82% of surveyed students said they felt that, at least in rare cases, “they could not not express their opinion on a subject because of how students, a professor or the administration would respond.”
Forty-five percent of Pitt students have self-censored on campus at least once or twice per month. The report also said that 54% of students found it difficult to have open and honest conversations about the Israeli/Palestine conflict.
A board member from Students for Justice in Palestine at Pitt, who requested anonymity due to fear of retaliation, said the University has “doubled down on surveillance” of pro-Palestinian advocacy since October 2023. In March 2025, the organization was temporarily suspended. A federal judge granted a preliminary injunction reinstating them as a campus club in August.
“It really just is so insane to me that a student organization has to go to the lengths of seeking legal action to basically be able to have their constitutional rights to political advocacy on a public university’s campus,” the SJP representative said.
Free speech within the student body
Jesse Milston, vice president of College Republicans at Pitt and a junior political science major, said the pressure to self-censor comes from fellow students rather than the administration.
“There is a chunk of the student body — I’ve seen it at our club tablings, [and] I’ve seen it at our club events — who fundamentally view the very existence of my people, my club and what we do as a threat to their existence on campus,” Milston said.
On a campus where the FIRE report found roughly 4.46 liberal students to one conservative student, Milston said College Republican members were “mass unfollowed” on social media after the election, had messages of support for Charlie Kirk’s family erased from dorm room whiteboards and felt that they would receive a “worse grade” in class if their professors “learn[ed] they are conservative.”
“We have had members who have been afraid to come to our meetings because they are being watched by their peers,” Milston said. “They don’t want to be associated with us because they get ostracized.”
For other students, that sense of social pressure extends beyond political organizations.
Justin Winslow, a senior civil engineering major, said although he doesn’t take classes that “interact” with political discussion, he finds it difficult to have healthy disagreements on campus.
“A lot of times, whether it’s political issues or just societal topics, you might have an opinion that others disagree with — which is totally fine,” Winslow said. “But with the environment here, maybe even at colleges in general, you kind of feel put down or shunned for speaking up.”
For some Jewish students, physical safety has become a central concern. Macy Margulis, student president of Chabad at Pitt and a junior psychology and sociology major, pointed to incidents in August and September 2024 where three Jewish students were targeted in antisemtic attacks.
“There’s absolutely more fear [within the Jewish community],” Margulis said.
Margulis also described classroom environments where Jewish students have reportedly felt pressure to conceal aspects of their identity.
During an icebreaker in one of her classes, she sat next to a Jewish student she knew had spent the summer in Israel. When his turn came, he mentioned traveling to multiple countries but omitted Israel, she said.
When Margulis mentioned her own Israel trip moments later, she reported feeling “judged and uncomfortable.”
Relationships with the University administration
While students across different communities report concerns for free speech on campus, their relationship with administration differs.
Milston said he has “great respect” for current Pitt administrators, crediting their work with College Republicans to help facilitate their events and provide security.
“I think Pitt does great work — at least with the College Republicans — to allow us to put on these events, to support us in the venture of doing it and to make sure when it happens there is safety and security,” Milston said.
He said the only administrative “barrier” that College Republicans have faced was in 2023 after smoke bombs were thrown in protest of their political speaker event with Michael Knowles.
“The school was throwing up a lot of roadblocks, but that was a different administration,” Milston said. “Basically, all of those people have moved out of the Pitt system. Because of that, we’re much happier with who we’re working with right now. They’ve been great.”
Breanne Francis, junior political science major and political director for Pitt College Democrats, said campus support for student political organizations is “non-existent” because the administration doesn’t “show up” for them.
“I just want them to do more than denounce things and send out emails,” Francis said. “I want their deans to go out of their way to support their students. I want them to show up to events. We host speakers every other week, and there’s no coverage from anyone.”
Margulis said she has direct administrative engagement through meetings with University officials. She attends monthly meetings with Associate Vice Provost and Dean of Students Marlin Nabors and Assistant Dean of Students for Community and Inclusion Gretchen Carlson Natter, alongside student presidents from Hillel at Pitt and Jewish greek life organizations.
“At those meetings, we can express any issues that we’re having. I would say they’re very helpful, kind and reassuring,” Margulis said. “It feels like they’re there for us.”
Still, Margulis said it was “disheartening” how the administration handled last year’s physical attacks on Jewish students and that they could have been “more helpful, especially legally.”
For SJP members, the administrative response has created a “general climate of fear” that discourages students from joining the organization, the representative said. The representative called for the University to “condemn the increasing hostility and discrimination of Arab, Muslim and Palestinian students on campus.”
For some students, concerns about campus climate stem from how the University communicates with its student body, not from censorship or fear of speaking out. Venkie Subramanyam, a junior chemical engineering major, said the issue lies in “a communication gap between the administration versus the students.”
“[The University] should encourage a bigger student voice for anything that could affect a Pitt [student’s] everyday life,” Subramanyam said.
Moving forward
According to a University spokesperson, Pitt has “leaned in” to national free speech initiatives — it became a founding member of the Institute for Citizens & Scholars’ Campuswide Immersion Pilot in August 2023. The University cited the Plan for Pitt 2028 as further evidence of this commitment to free speech.
“In April 2024, as part of the Plan for Pitt 2028, a ‘Free Exchange of Ideas’ was included as one of the plan’s focus areas but also as a key component of the plan’s Accountability and Trust pillar,” a University spokesperson said.
Across these varied experiences, students question whether the administration’s approach to open dialogue has been effective.
“For the past two years, [Pitt has] declared it’s the year of discourse and dialogue. It feels like there’s no teeth,” Milston said. “It feels like we’re doing it because we have to go through the rotation of doing it. Then nothing happens, nothing changes.”
Francis echoed a similar skepticism and emphasized the importance of preserving space for challenging conversations.
“We understand that civil discourse and the sharing of ideas, and especially ones we disagree with, are the things that we need,” Francis said. “Pitt’s downfall will be if our administration as a University cannot recognize this fact.”
In a statement, the University acknowledged that “there are always opportunities to improve.”
“We will continue the work of fostering a campus community supportive of free speech,” the University spokesperson said.