University of Virginia President Says Protesters Who Shrouded Jefferson Statue ‘Desecrated’ Campus

Students, faculty members, and others at the University of Virginia on Tuesday night shrouded the campus’s prominent statue of Thomas Jefferson with black fabric. The protest occurred on the one-month anniversary of the “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Va., and was intended to criticize the “perceived inaction” of the university’s president, Teresa A. Sullivan, on the night of August 11, when white supremacists surrounded students who had gathered to protest their presence on the campus.

The Cavalier Daily, the student newspaper, reported that protesters on Tuesday marched with signs saying “TJ is a racist,” “End Hate Now,” and “Black Lives Matter,” while chanting “No Trump, no KKK, no racist UVA.” Signs were placed on the Jefferson statue calling the third president and founder of UVa a “racist” and a “rapist.”

The protesters called attention to a list of demands formulated by the Black Student Alliance, titled “March to Reclaim Our Grounds.” One demand was that the university “remove the Confederate plaques on the Rotunda,” a high-profile campus building. In keeping with the demands, the protesters asked that UVa place a new plaque next to the statue, recontextualizing it as “an emblem of white supremacy,” reported The Daily Progress, a local newspaper.