Videos released last week by a student group and by Cornell University show university president Michael Kotlikoff backing his car into a student after an incident on campus.
Kotlikoff says a group accosted him and surrounded his car after an event. The group denies any intimidation on their part, and says he backed into one student and ran over another student’s foot.
The Cornell University Police Department (CUPD) is investigating the incident. In a statement released Thursday, the Cornell Board of Trustees announced that it has established an Ad Hoc Special Committee to oversee that investigation. Kotlikoff has recused himself from all involvement.
WSKG’s Ithaca area reporter Aurora Berry spoke with News Director Phoebe Taylor-Vuolo about what we know about the incident so far.
This transcript has been edited for clarity.
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Phoebe Taylor-Vuolo: WSKG’s Ithaca area reporter Aurora Berry is here to explain all of this. Okay, Aurora, what is happening?
Aurora Berry: Thursday night [April 30], the university hosted an Israel-Palestine debate series event. The next day, Cornell's president, Michael Kotlikoff, released a statement describing an incident that occurred directly after the event. It says he was followed by a group of “students and non-students” he said have a history of ongoing verbal and online abuse against Cornell admin. According to [Kotlikoff], they followed him loudly asking questions, then surrounded his car and banged on it.
However, shortly after I saw that statement, we got videos from the group involved in the incident, Students for a Democratic Cornell. One clip shows Kotlikoff reversing his SUV into a student while backing out of a parking space. The person taking the video then shouts that his foot was run over.
PTV: Okay, so lots to unpack here. Does Kotlikoff’s statement say anything about someone being hit?
AB: No, it doesn't. We also asked the university directly if anyone had been hit by a car, either by Kotlikoff or anyone else.
They directed us to that statement that, again, does not say anything about a person being hit or making contact with a car, but also doesn't outright say that that didn't happen.
This is what Kotlikoff does say about his experience while driving: “I waited until I saw space behind the car and then, using my car's rear pedestrian alert and automatic braking system, was able to slowly maneuver my car from the parking space and exit the parking lot.”
The university released security camera footage of the incident, after multiple news outlets had reported on it and shared video from people at the scene.
PTV: Okay, talk me through what all these videos show.
AB: I'm going to do my best to describe these videos. However, everyone is going to picture different things when they hear the words “hit,” “strike,” “make contact with,” etc.
I would really encourage listeners, when you find the time, [to] watch these videos on our website and on the university newspaper’s [website] too.
We obtained video of the group walking with Kotlikoff to his car and asking questions, mostly related to university discipline. The Cornell Daily Sun [the student-run newspaper] published a video we didn't get at the time, of the time between Kotlikoff getting in his car and when he reverses into that student. This is 38 seconds of video, by the way, including the time it takes for him to enter the parking lot and start the car, to the second time that his vehicle strikes the person standing behind him.
So this all happens very quickly. The person behind the SUV is identified as Hudson Athas. He's a student. He's standing there as the car reverses. It reaches where he's standing, and Athas sort of walks back with the car pressing against his body. So it's reversing, he's walking backwards at the same pace.
This is a couple of seconds. The car stops. [Athas] then shifts so that his body is not pressed up against the car anymore. Then, Kotlikoff reverses again, and the contact looks different this time. Athas bends a little bit as the car makes contact with his torso. People are exclaiming. Another person, Aiden Vallecillo, shouts that he ran over his foot, and that's the end of that video.
The university released a video from a security camera showing the incident from a different angle.
PTV: Okay, so what's going on in that video?
AB: So that video also shows him backing into Athas. It appears to make contact with him. Then [the video] fills in the gap after that: after [Athas is] hit the second time, the vehicle has reversed enough to be able to turn out and starts moving forward. So Athas is still standing. He doesn't fall over at any point during this. The car stops and reverses again. After the car is turned enough to start to leave the parking lot, someone steps in front of it.
They're there for like 10 seconds. Kotlikoff is moving forward, the person is walking in front at a pace where they're not making contact, then they get out of the way and Kotlikoff drives out of the parking lot.
It also shows the size of the group—around seven people—and also doesn't appear to show banging, as described in Kotlikoff's original statement.
PTV: At this point, we know what Kotlikoff has said about this incident. What does the group have to say?
AB: The group vehemently denies banging on the windows of Kotlikoff’s car. Aiden Vallecillo spoke with WSKG about this incident. He's the guy who was heard yelling about his foot. He says that he spoke with police after the incident when first responders were called to the scene, but he's unsure of how to proceed, given the university police's relationship to the university president.
PTV: What was this group asking Kotlikoff about before all of this went down?
AB: In the videos that we obtained, the group appears to be asking about student discipline and how student code of conduct violations are handled. There has been a lot of discussion about that over the past couple of years, because of the suspension and arrest of pro-Palestinian student protesters.
Kotlikoff even talks about speech and protest in his statement describing the incident extensively. He said the incident was harassment and intimidation with the direct motive of silencing speech.
But the student group says his actions are an example of students' free speech being silenced at Cornell, and exists within a larger pattern of students being unfairly punished for speech and protest.
They're now asking for a couple of things: that includes an apology from Kotlikoff, student-led control of the [university] Code of Conduct, a town hall about recent changes to the code, and an end to the suspension of nonviolent student protesters.
PTV: That was WSKG Ithaca area reporter Aurora Berry. You can find her reporting on this and videos of the incident online at wskg.org.
