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Barnard suspends WKCR and Spectator reporters who covered Butler Library protest
https://www.columbiaspectator.com/news/2025/05/09/barnard-suspends-wkcr-and-spectator-reporters-who-covered-butler-library-protest/Barnard and Columbia issued interim suspensions Thursday afternoon to four student journalists who covered a Wednesday pro-Palestinian protest in Butler Library, citing “information received” from Public Safety indicating the reporters’ alleged involvement in the protest, according to disciplinary emails obtained by Spectator.
Columbia lifted its interim suspension of WKCR reporter Sawyer Huckabee, CC ’26, nearly five hours after the initial notification, but Barnard interim suspensions are still in place as of Friday morning.
The reporters—Luisa Sukkar, BC ’26, from Spectator and Natalie Lahr, BC ’28, Celeste Gamble, BC ’27, and Huckabee from WKCR—reported on the protest in the Lawrence A. Wien Reading Room and identified themselves as press to Public Safety officers, according to the reporters and a video reviewed by Spectator.
“We’re student press and we’re trying to leave,” Huckabee told Public Safety, according to a video obtained by Spectator, before leaving the building. Around 20 minutes before, Spectator’s reporter at the protest, Sukkar, had similarly declared herself as press before leaving.
Columbia lifted its interim suspension of WKCR reporter Sawyer Huckabee, CC ’26, nearly five hours after the initial notification, but Barnard interim suspensions are still in place as of Friday morning.
The reporters—Luisa Sukkar, BC ’26, from Spectator and Natalie Lahr, BC ’28, Celeste Gamble, BC ’27, and Huckabee from WKCR—reported on the protest in the Lawrence A. Wien Reading Room and identified themselves as press to Public Safety officers, according to the reporters and a video reviewed by Spectator.
“We’re student press and we’re trying to leave,” Huckabee told Public Safety, according to a video obtained by Spectator, before leaving the building. Around 20 minutes before, Spectator’s reporter at the protest, Sukkar, had similarly declared herself as press before leaving.