Meet the Columbia Radicals Arrested for Storming a Barnard Building

By Jessica Costescu (Free Beacon)

Nearly half the radical activists arrested Wednesday after storming a Barnard College library are Columbia University students, a Washington Free Beacon review found.

Barnard president Laura Ann Rosenbury, however, stressed that the police weren’t called in because the radicals stormed Milstein Library. Rather, she felt the building needed to be cleared to protect the broader student body because of a bomb threat in the building.

The radicals rushed in through a back exit that an accomplice held open, hoisted an effigy of Rosenbury, and passed out Hamas propaganda. They refused to leave, even after they were alerted of the bomb threat. Law enforcement eventually cleared the agitators from the library, but the protesters refused to clear the courtyard outside and clashed with police. Officers began making arrests.

Wimer is a medical student at Columbia’s Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons. According to screenshots of her LinkedIn that has since been deleted, she is “passionate about global health and human rights” and has “experience in research, program management, and community outreach in multicultural settings.” Wimer is the Class of 2025 president, the programming coordinator for Columbia’s Human Rights and Asylum Clinic, and an active member of Columbia’s chapters of White Coats for Black Lives and Students for a National Health Program, according to an online bio.

A screenshot of Gabrielle Wimer’s LinkedIn before it was deleted.

Puelle is a Columbia senior studying philosophy and sociology. The Columbia Undergraduate Law Review website listed her as its publisher, but the page was removed Thursday afternoon. Puelle is also a research assistant at Columbia’s Labor Lab, according to her LinkedIn. A source familiar with Puelle said she was a resident adviser in the first-year residence dormitory John Jay Hall. She is also a member of Columbia’s Resident Advisers Collective Bargaining Committee, according to the Columbia Spectator.

Hannah Puelle’s LinkedIn photo.

The third, Chung, is a Columbia junior pursuing her bachelor’s degree in English and Women’s and Gender Studies. According to a screenshot of her LinkedIn taken before it was deleted, she is involved in Columbia’s Criminal Justice Coalition and Columbia’s Queer Alliance and was the valedictorian of the high school she attended.

A screenshot of Yunseo Chung’s LinkedIn before it was deleted.

Cannon is the deputy editor of Columbia Spectator’s weekly magazine, the Eye, but the page appears to have been removed.

A screenshot of Symmes Cannon’s page on the Columbia Spectator website before it was removed.

Even though it was a Barnard building that was stormed, the focus will likely center more on Columbia because its students make up the bulk of those arrested. Since President Donald Trump took office, the university has taken a more aggressive posture toward its anti-Semitic students. In the past, however, it has been lenient. It dropped the vast majority of the suspensions leveled against students who participated in illegal anti-Israel protests last spring, for example.

“We have been notified that four Columbia students were arrested as part of yesterday’s disruption at Barnard’s Milstein Library and we are working swiftly through our discipline process. We regret that members of our community participated in this unacceptable disruption at Barnard,” a Columbia spokeswoman told the Free Beacon. “Any violations of our rules, policies, and of the law must have consequences. We remain committed to supporting our Columbia student body of over 36,000 students and our greater campus community during this challenging time.”

Columbia students Wimer, Puelle, Chung, and Cannon did not respond to requests for comment.

The only Barnard student arrested, Dong, is a junior studying computer science. She was listed as a communications intern with the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project, a nonprofit organization working to “fight against mass surveillance in New York and beyond”—the group’s intern page was removed Thursday afternoon. According to an online bio, which was also removed, Dong is “interested in the intersection of technology and activism, hoping to learn more about surveillance systems and possible solutions.” According to her LinkedIn, she is part of Barnard’s Science Pathways Scholars Program, a “highly selective four-year program that supports young students from low-income or first-generation households.”

A screenshot of Tramy Dong’s intern bio.

Dong did not respond to a request for comment.

Barnard’s vice president for development and alumnae relations Michael Farley, however, in a statement claimed that “none of the individuals arrested on our campus Wednesday evening are Barnard students.” It is unclear if Dong was one of the two students the college expelled for storming an Israeli history class at Columbia in January and targeting Jewish students with anti-Semitic flyers. Barnard did not respond to a request for comment.

The radicals stormed Barnard’s Milbank Hall last week to protest those expulsions. A third Barnard student was expelled soon after for storming a Columbia building last spring. The agitators behind Wednesday’s incident demanded the reversal of all three.

A mob led by Columbia University Apartheid Divest (CUAD) and Columbia Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP)—the Ivy League institution’s most anti-Semitic student groups—stormed Barnard’s Milbank Hall on Feb. 26, sending a security guard to the hospital and causing $30,000 in damages. CUAD and SJP also took credit for orchestrating Wednesday’s incident at the Milstein Library.

Once inside, the agitators handed out Hamas propaganda justifying the Oct. 7, 2023, terror attack. They demanded the immediate reversal of the Barnard students’ expulsions, “amnesty for all students disciplined for pro-Palestine action,” and a complete “abolition of the corrupt Barnard disciplinary process.” They also renamed the library after Hussam Abu Safiya, a Gaza hospital director the Israel Defense Forces accused of being a terrorist and holding a rank in Hamas.

Even though the agitators voted to stay overnight, until Rosenbury returned to campus in the morning, a bomb threat reported in the building forced Barnard vice president for strategic communications Robin Levine to try to evacuate the library. She told students, “You need to leave now, this is not a joke,” but the protesters refused to vacate the building, telling her, “you’re lying” and “prove it.”

NYPD Strategic Response Group officers were called to the scene and entered the occupied building, pushing most of the activists off campus. Those who resisted were among the nine arrested.

Holmes is a 26-year-old graduate student at the Columbia affiliate college Union Theological Seminary. He was arrested twice at Columbia during last spring’s illegal pro-Hamas encampments, once on April 18 and again on April 30 over the violent occupation of Hamilton Hall and was charged with third degree criminal trespass. In September, Holmes was featured in a video posted to X where he called for “the overthrow of the corporate totalitarian state.”

The last individuals arrested are 21-year-old Pranavi Davuluri, a student worker at New York City’s School of Visual Arts, according to her LinkedIn, Alexander Nanci-Marr, 20, and Allison Wuu, 18.

In a statement sent to the Barnard community, Rosenbury said that the decision to allow NYPD on campus was due to the bomb threat, not the occupation of the campus library.

“The safety of our campus, and every single person on our campus, must be protected above all else. The moment we received the bomb threat, we had to clear the Milstein Center and inform the authorities,” she said. “The decision to request NYPD assistance was guided and informed entirely by the absolute obligation we have to keep every member of our community safe.”