Who’s behind the USF pro-Palestinian protests? Here are 3 key groups.

TAMPA — The University of South Florida this past week became a microcosm of the nation, which is reeling from a wave of pro-Palestinian protests and police crackdowns at college campuses as the war in Gaza rages on.

Officers deployed tear gas and arrested 10 people last Tuesday during a chaotic scene at MLK Plaza, where protesters set up tents and brandished makeshift shields and umbrellas.

That was after a Monday protest at the same spot, where police arrested three people. On Wednesday, nearly 300 demonstrators marched toward the plaza following an off-campus rally in Temple Terrace. The event was calmer, with no major police response.

But who, exactly, is organizing the USF protests? Here are three of the key groups.

Tampa Bay Students for a Democratic Society

Tampa Bay Students for a Democratic Society is a USF student organization with up to 15 members, said Victoria Hinckley, 21, a key organizer. Most members of the left-wing activist group are undergraduates, but graduate students and alumni are also involved. It was founded around 2008.

It’s one of more than 40 local chapters of Students for a Democratic Society, a national organization that launched in 2006 during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. A group by the same name was prominent during Vietnam War protests in the 1960s, popularizing slogans like “make love — not war,” according to the nonpartisan Free Speech Center at Middle Tennessee State University. Florida State University recently suspended its chapter of the group after pro-Palestinian members interrupted a board of trustees meeting.

The USF chapter is heavily involved in activism at the Tampa campus. Until recently, the group was a registered student organization, Hinckley said, but it was suspended last month after entering the Marshall Student Center and asking to meet with Danielle McDonald, associate vice president and dean of students, to discuss demands related to campus diversity.

The group was the lead organizer of the April 29 and 30 protests at MLK Plaza, Hinckley said. Members were inspired by other demonstrations, known as “encampments,” at Columbia and Yale universities, the University of Minnesota and California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt, she said. Such protests erupted nationwide last month as students called for a cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas war and for university endowments to divest from companies tied to Israel’s military operations. The death toll in Gaza has surged to more than 34,000 since Israel launched its campaign in response to an Oct. 7 Hamas attack that left about 1,200 Israelis dead.

The national Students for a Democratic Society also encouraged local chapters to set up encampments, Hinckley said. The umbrella organization hosts webinars for chapters across the country to learn from each other and strategize. Hinckley said she attended one last Tuesday night.

The group relies on donations from community members sent through Cash App and Venmo, Hinckley said. Funds are used for supplies such as food and water and to collect money to help detained protesters make bail. It uses Instagram to promote its events.

No student members were arrested on April 29 or 30, she said. But Hinckley was suspended from campus and, as of Thursday afternoon, was barred from returning to university property due to alleged Student Code of Conduct violations, such as disruptive behavior, according to records reviewed by the Tampa Bay Times. Hinckley, a senior majoring in sociology with a minor in women’s studies, said she was prohibited from attending graduation this past weekend. Another group member was also suspended, Hinckley said.

The university said Hinckley, who was the chapter’s president when it was a registered student organization, led the Monday demonstration. Protesters were told they couldn’t put up tents, but failed to comply with warnings from USF staff, the records say. On Tuesday, the student group held its second protest and told people to come to MLK Plaza because police planned to use force, according to the records. Hinckley “created an unsafe environment,” the university alleges.

Hinckley, who grew up in Brandon, said she doesn’t have Palestinian ancestry. But “it’s important for us to be on the right side of history,” she said, and demand that the war end. She said USF infringed on students’ rights to free speech and protest.

The university in a statement last week said the expression of free speech “must remain peaceful and not violate the law or USF policies.”

“We’re going to fight the suspensions,” Hinckley said. “We’re going to fight the charges.”

She’s unsure if there will be additional on-campus protests after commencement but said she expects rallies in the community.

USF Divest Coalition

The USF Divest Coalition is a student group that formed earlier this year, said member Will Mleczko, 20, a sophomore studying economics. It’s not officially recognized by the university. He declined to say how many coalition members there are.

The coalition launched a hunger strike in March, Mleczko said, hoping to push the university to divest from companies that support Israel’s war effort in Gaza. Eighteen students began the strike, including Mleczko. At least two were hospitalized and several needed medical care. The protest lasted more than two weeks.

Mleczko said the group collaborates with Tampa Bay Students for a Democratic Society and helped organize the April 29 and 30 protests. The coalition grew interested after seeing the Columbia University encampment.

More than 100 students are participating in the coalition on a daily basis, Mleczko said. It’s not part of a national organization.

“We don’t have any sort of hierarchy or leadership. It’s just a group of students,” he said. “We’re not registered with USF, so we don’t have a president or a vice president or a treasurer or anything like that.”

Mleczko, who’s from Illinois, declined to say if he helped found the group.

Two members were arrested last week, he said. Mleczko and at least two others have been suspended from campus. He said he started pitching a tent at the Monday protest and USF’s student conduct case centers around that.

The coalition has a “fair amount” of individuals with Palestinian ancestry, Mleczko said.

“We want to be able to go to university and know that everything is being as ethically sourced as possible — that we’re not helping build this war machine or helping fund a genocide,” he said of non-Palestinian students, including himself.

Tampa Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression

The Tampa Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression is an activist group that formed in 2020 during the nationwide protests over the murder of George Floyd, said Laura Rodriguez, 24, a USF alumna who was a member of Tampa Bay Students for a Democratic Society while in college.

The group was originally called the Tampa Bay Community Action Committee, but rebranded in March. It includes about 15 members, said Rodriguez, a barista who majored in environmental biology and was part of the so-called “Tampa 5,” a group of protesters who were arrested by USF police during a March 2023 demonstration about state efforts to cut diversity programs. Rodriguez is still banned from campus, even though she and the others reached a deal with prosecutors last year to have felony battery charges dismissed.

The Tampa Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression is a chapter of the left-wing National Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression, which was founded in 1973 and focuses on issues ranging from police brutality to prison health care. The national organization and Students for a Democratic Society are affiliated, said Rodriguez, who grew up in Jacksonville.

The Tampa chapter helped distribute bail money to friends or family of those arrested last week, she said. It also assisted in organizing a May 1 rally off East Fowler Avenue alongside several other progressive activist groups. Demonstrators marched to campus and prayed at MLK Plaza.

Palestinian community members in Tampa were interested in holding an event to support USF students, said Rodriguez, whose family is Colombian and Puerto Rican.

The group also participated in a rally outside President Joe Biden’s April 23 campaign stop at Hillsborough Community College’s Dale Mabry campus. About 100 people protested the United States’ support for Israel in the war. Tampa Bay Students for a Democratic Society and the USF Divest Coalition were involved in the event, too.