Dozens of college students gathered at Schenley Plaza on Friday afternoon to protest increased federal immigration enforcement action in the Pittsburgh region and nationwide.
“Everyone should be able to walk around this campus and feel safe,” said Connor Chapman, a graduate student worker at the University of Pittsburgh.
Attendees brought homemade signs emblazoned with phrases like “hate never made America great” and “ICE out.” Impromptu speeches were interspersed with chants of “No Trump, no KKK, no fascist USA” and other popular protest slogans.
Pitt students also called for a more robust response from school administrators to an advertisement for a U.S. Customs and Border Protection recruitment webinar recently that appeared on a Pitt job board. The school has faced backlash for the post in recent days, despite no university involvement with the event.
CBP posted the ad to Handshake, a third-party networking and career search tool used by universities across the country, and was automatically shared to Pitt’s career center events calendar, said Pitt spokesperson Jared Stonesifer.
“The presence of these third-party opportunities does not indicate endorsement or partnership by the University,” he told WESA in an email.
Stonesifer added that a career fair hosted this week “does not include representatives from U.S. Customs and Border Protection or Immigration and Customs Enforcement.”
The post was taken down prior to Friday’s demonstration.
Still, attendees said administrators should be more vocal about keeping federal immigration officers off campus.
“I want Pitt to take some … accountability,” said student and protest organizer Stella Abrams. “I don’t care if you didn’t organize the event, you advertised for it, didn’t you? Instead of quietly standing aside and saying, ‘Oh, this wasn’t us,’ say, ‘We’re not gonna collaborate with ICE anymore.’ Say, ‘We’re gonna protect our students.’”
In response to questions from WESA, Stonesifer said “Pitt has no agreement or relationship with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency or Customs and Border Protection.” A message sent to students, faculty and staff on Friday afternoon said the school is “not aware of any increased or targeted immigration enforcement activity on our campus.”
But the Trump administration’s escalating focus on deporting immigrants with no criminal records, some of whom are in the asylum process, have communities on high alert.
“We have so many students on campus who feel unsafe with ICE already as it is, whether or not they’re citizens,” Abrams said.
In her view, the school’s response to those concerns has been inadequate.
“We have a significant international student community and it’s part of what makes Pitt great. And if Pitt is not gonna stand up against ICE, that’s a problem.”