Columbia University officials said Thursday that the university has expelled or suspended some students who took over a campus building during pro-Palestinian and anti-Israeli genocide protests last spring, and has temporarily revoked the degrees of others who have since graduated.

The university said in a campus-wide email that a judicial panel imposed a series of sanctions on students who occupied Hamilton Hall last spring to protest the war in Gaza.

Colombia did not provide details on how many students were expelled, suspended, or had their diplomas revoked, but said the findings were based on an "assessment of the severity of the behaviors."

The culmination of a months-long investigation comes as the university reels from the arrest by federal immigration authorities of the student and well-known Palestinian campus activist, Mahmoud Khalil, last Saturday. President Donald Trump stated that the arrest would be "the first of many." At the same time, the Trump administration stripped the university of more than $400 million in federal funds for what it called a "failure to combat anti-Semitism" on campus—in other words, allowing its students to protest against Israel. Congressional Republicans have specifically pointed to the failure to discipline the students involved in the Hamilton Hall takeover as evidence of the university's inaction.

A former university employee said, "Columbia's expulsion of innocent students who exercised their First Amendment right to free speech, and the expulsion of others who graduated last fall or were scheduled to graduate next May, is a cheap acquiescence to the abusive Trump administration in order to recover the funds Trump withdrew last week."

“We are living in critical and difficult times, when the Zionist right is trying to impose its foreign policy priorities and silence all voices that criticize the Israeli crimes against the suffering Palestinian people in Gaza, or the occupied West Bank, which we see and everyone sees every day,” added the former employee, who asked to remain anonymous because he is currently seeking employment at academic institutions on the East Coast and does not want to put his future at risk. “Columbia’s compliance portends that other universities will follow suit, which will destroy the integrity and academic freedom that have made American universities such a distinguished destination.”

The former official declined to comment on the arrest of Palestinian activist and student Mahmoud Khalil, saying only, "It's as if we're in a nightmare; the 'Orwellian society' as in George Orwell's novel 1984."

The university claims that the occupation of the building by anti-Israel protesters following a tent camp inspired a wave of similar demonstrations on campuses across the country.

On April 30, 2024, a smaller group of students and their allies barricaded themselves inside Hamilton Hall with furniture and padlocks in a major escalation of protests on campus.

At the request of university leaders, hundreds of NYPD officers stormed the campus the following night, arresting dozens of people who police claimed were involved in both the occupation and the encampment.

At a court hearing last June, the Manhattan District Attorney's Office said it would not file criminal charges against 31 of the 46 people initially arrested for trespassing inside the administration building.

But students still face disciplinary hearings and possible expulsion from the university.

The final sanctions announced Thursday came after a lengthy process that included hearings for each student led by the long-standing University Judicial Council.

Some students who joined the camp but did not participate in the takeover of the building learned that they would face no further disciplinary action beyond their previous suspensions.

"Regarding other incidents that occurred last spring, the University Judicial Council's decisions upheld the disciplinary measures previously imposed," the university said in a statement.

The disciplinary process has come under scrutiny from House Republicans, who have demanded that university officials turn over disciplinary records of students involved in campus protests or risk losing billions of dollars in federal funding.

On Thursday, Mahmoud Khalil and seven students identified by pseudonyms filed a lawsuit seeking to prevent a congressional committee from obtaining such records for students at Columbia University and Barnard College, a women's institution affiliated with Columbia University.

The lawsuit was filed in federal court in Manhattan against Columbia University, its affiliated Barnard College, and the Republican-led House Education and Workforce Committee, chaired by Republican Rep. Tim Walberg of Michigan, seeking a permanent injunction preventing Congress from forcing the universities to produce the records and preventing the universities from complying with the congressional order.

Last month, the committee sent a letter demanding that Columbia University and Barnard College provide records or risk losing federal funding. The plaintiffs argue in the complaint that the committee is abusing its authority in an attempt to "curb the freedom of speech and assembly based on the expressed viewpoint," and that the investigation "threatens to significantly infringe on First Amendment rights."