Newsom's 'failure' to 'do anything' to stop university violence slammed by lawmakers

California Assembly Leader James Gallagher and state Senate Minority Leader Brian Jones want to pull state grants from universities that permitted anti-Israel agitators to set up encampments.

Hours after officers in riot gear cleared an increasingly dangerous anti-Israel encampment at UCLA, top California Republicans on Thursday excoriated Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom for a lack of urgency and a failure to act decisively to end the continued campus unrest.

GOP lawmakers also placed university leaders on notice, warning that legislators are already discussing pulling state grants from schools that allow the occupations to persist. 

"We should not be giving Cal Grant money, state money, to students who are trampling on other people's rights," Assemblyman James Gallagher told reporters. "They should lose funding. And they did very little to protect students' rights. They should be punished for their failure to act.

"We as Republicans want accountability for this. No more words or failure to say anything or do anything, like we've seen out of Gavin Newsom, but actual actions to hold people accountable."

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Hundreds of students protest outside the Palestine Solidarity Encampment on the campus of UCLA in Los Angeles Wednesday, May 1, 2024.  (Keith Birmingham/MediaNews Group/Pasadena Star-News via Getty Images)

Republicans in the state legislature are also "calling for budget action" to hold university administrators accountable by "withholding part of their budget if necessary," state Sen. Brian Jones said.

"And the students that are found guilty of a crime, they lose their Cal Grants," he said.

UCLA FALLS TO ANARCHY