UC Santa Cruz condemns students’ on-campus celebration of Hitler’s birthday

UC Santa Cruz condemned a group of its students who gathered on campus to celebrate Adolf Hitler’s birthday last month, the school said.

The unidentified students met on campus on April 20, Hitler’s birthday, and reportedly sang “Happy Birthday” to the Nazi leader and served cake “adorned with hateful and horrific symbols,” Akirah Bradley-Armstrong, the vice chancellor for student affairs and success at UC Santa Cruz, said in a statement.

Just over a week later, on April 28, a UC Santa Cruz student found an antisemitic and anti-LGBTQIA+ flier on their car windshield off campus, the school said. There were “despicable and degrading” claims about the groups on the flier, Akirah Bradley-Armstrong said.

“We unequivocally condemn these — and all — antisemitic and anti-LGBTQIA+ actions,” Bradley-Armstrong said.

Bradley-Armstrong said the actions violated the school’s “Principles of Community” and had been referred to “student conduct for follow up and adjudication.”

The flier was reported to officials with the city of Santa Cruz, according to the school.

On March 5, UC Santa Cruz reported anti-Black and antisemitic graffiti.

While the school did not describe what the graffiti said, it noted that “the spray-painted images and words are horrific and have historically been used to inspire terror and to degrade and dehumanize Black and Jewish people.”

The incident is being investigated by the UC Santa Cruz Police Department.

According to a report released in March by the Anti-Defamation League, antisemitic incidents on U.S. college campuses have increased by 41% in the last year, with 219 incidents reported at more than 130 campuses in 2022.

Stanford University is investigating an antisemitic incident from March, when drawings of swastikas and Hitler were found outside a Jewish student’s dorm room.