The pro-Hamas protests at college campuses have shown us some true ugliness over the past several weeks. Harassment of and violence against Jewish students, vile antisemitism in general, hatred of America, and destruction of property are just a few of the lowlights. (And yes, we are not calling them anything BUT 'pro-Hamas protests' from now on, because they have nothing to do with helping the Palestinian people.)
With apologies to UCLA, which actually had students wearing bracelets to determine which parts of campus they were allowed to be on, there's probably no better exemplar of awfulness with these protests than Columbia University. At this bastion of Ivy League academic integrity, all of that violence and harassment culminated in the protestors taking over Hamilton Hall, barricading themselves inside, then laughably demanding that the school feed them. Thankfully, this did not go on for too long before police came in and arrested many of them.
But the protesters weren't the only ones in Hamilton Hall the night it was taken over. University staff members were there too. And we're not talking about privileged professors who were (and are) in collusion with the hateful, overprivileged students and outside agitators. We're talking about the custodial and maintenance staff, who were terrorized and held hostage by the same people they clean up after every day.
One of those people was Mario Torres, a 45-year-old custodian who has worked at Columbia for five years. The image of Torres fighting back against a NON-student who was assaulting him went viral on social media, with good reason. It is emblematic of who these protesters are, and it couldn't be more damning.
Yesterday, Torres sat down with Francesca Block of The Free Press for his first media interview after the ordeal. And if you think the photo was bad, wait'll you hear what Torres had to say.
Exclusive: Columbia Custodian Trapped by ‘Angry Mob’ Speaks Out@FrancescaABlock scoops in @TheFP:https://t.co/MjnLNBx8gF
— Bari Weiss (@bariweiss) May 7, 2024
Block begins by describing just who is pictured in that viral photograph:
As the mob invaded Hamilton Hall in the early hours of April 30, a facilities worker was photographed pushing a demonstrator against a wall.
Later, it emerged that the protester was a 40-year-old trust fund kid named James Carlson, who owns a townhouse in Brooklyn worth $2.3 million. The man who tried to hold him back was Mario Torres, 45, who has worked at Columbia—where the average janitor makes less than $19 an hour—for five years.
James Carlson is a trust fund baby who lives in a multimillion-dollar home. Torres is your average blue-collar worker trying to protect himself and his workplace.
Like we said: emblematic.
(The good news is that Carlson has been charged with five felonies. The bad news is that it is in New York City, where he'll probably get off with a slap on the wrist.)
'We don’t expect to go to work and get swarmed by an angry mob with rope and duct tape and masks and gloves,' [Torres] said.
'They came from both sides of the staircases. They came through the elevators and they were just rushing. It was just like, they had a plan.' Mario said protesters with zip ties, duct tape, and masks 'just multiplied and multiplied.'
At one point, he remembers 'looking up and I noticed the cameras are covered.' It made him think: 'This was definitely planned.'
'Like they had a plan.' Imagine that.
Torres went on to describe how he immediately just started thinking about his family and how he was ever going to get out of the building safely. And then he laid into Columbia itself:
Torres has not been to campus since the incident. He says he does not feel safe. 'When it comes to the public safety, the workers’ safety, people don’t feel comfortable walking through a mob to punch in to get into campus. That’s crazy,' he said.
He added that he’s worried Columbia might take disciplinary action against him for speaking out. He worries about losing a job he loves. He worries about supporting his young family.
'Is Columbia going to retaliate and find a reason to fire me? Is someone going to come after me? So I’m taking a big risk doing this, but I think that they failed. They failed us. And I think that’s the bigger story. They failed us. They should have done more to protect us, and they didn’t.'
We don't know if any attorneys have reached out to Torres, but we're thinking he's got a pretty rock-solid civil suit against Columbia. We hope he does sue them and take them to the cleaners. Because they were derelict and complicit in the uprising.
We do know, thanks to Bari Weiss, that there is a GoFundMe to help Torres.
There is a GoFundMe to help Mario Torres get the legal support he needs:https://t.co/AgugzOWZ1p
— Bari Weiss (@bariweiss) May 7, 2024
Torres' full video interview with The Free Press is about 20 minutes long. If you have the time to watch it, it is even worse than these written excerpts can capture.
Story worth reading because corp news won't let this out. https://t.co/7pQvLKfa6B
— Bett 🇮🇱 (@FuossLC) May 7, 2024
This is an important point. We love The Free Press, not because they are conservative, but because they embrace all viewpoints, including stories that the corporate media will try to bury. You will not see Mario Torres interviewed on 60 Minutes. He won't be on The View or CNN or MSNBC. They want to pretend he doesn't exist. So we thank Block and Weiss' publication for making sure we all know that he does exist.
Wow. Good on him for speaking out. Columbia is falling their students, their faculty, and even their janitorial staff. Despicable.https://t.co/4c5YEFIKJh
— Yehuda Teitelbaum (@chalavyishmael) May 7, 2024
Mario is very brave sharing his story of what happened that evening.
— TheSK💫🦄🤍 (@TheSK2023) May 7, 2024
Torres is brave. And the protesters and university are cowards.
Mario Torres is a hero. @Columbia your students and staff have more courage & clarity than you. It’s humiliating that you cannot keep us safe. https://t.co/YE8D7EWYn1
— Eden Yadegar (@edenyadegar) May 7, 2024
We still can't get over the identities of the two people in the viral video.
What a paragraph https://t.co/vqq4eAJJGu pic.twitter.com/zp2k4Vwvf7
— Shaun Maguire (@shaunmmaguire) May 7, 2024
This millionaire trustafarian douchebag Columbia protester (who reportedly owns a $2 million townhouse) got into a serious physical fight with a janitor, who was doing his janitor job and making about $20 per hour.
— Eric Owens (@ericowensdc) May 7, 2024
That's really helping the oppressed. Amirite? https://t.co/olMh68JpBX
If the corporate media ever DID cover this story, it would end the mythology around these protests in an instant. That is why they don't.
If workers at Columbia don’t feel safe when the students become a mob, what is it like for other Jewish students?👇 https://t.co/VYsMOznIMj
— Xuan Vu (@Xnarkycritic) May 7, 2024
It's a good question. One that Columbia will not answer. Hopefully, they will be forced to answer in court.
On one side you had a criminal mob led by a 40 year old entitled white trust fund brat playing activist and on the other you had a Hispanic working class facilities worker who was attacked while trying to do his job.
— AG (@AGHamilton29) May 7, 2024
Says a lot about those who decided the former are the heroes… https://t.co/7OdeGJQWrk
The rest of that tweet continues, '... who decided the former are the heroes in this story. And who demanded that Columbia not do anything about the mob.'
Once they show up with “zip ties, duct tape, and masks” we should stop calling them “protesters.”
— Steven Keith (@keith44beat) May 7, 2024
'Domestic terrorists' has a nice ring to it. Or even simply 'criminals.'
He’s just a peasant to them https://t.co/BQQauYGolr
— Damsel in Dissent 🇲🇹 🦋 (@starboard_light) May 7, 2024
He's worse than that in their eyes. He's nothing to them.
People really need to go back and study more about the Red Guard in China's Cultural Revolution.
This is not a movement that cares about people of color or the working class. https://t.co/sZUxWonX7t
— Monica Osborne (@DrMonicaOsborne) May 7, 2024
They only care about themselves. Does that sound familiar to a lot of other woke activists?
Columbia faculty who glamorize this should be ashamed. https://t.co/axNsI4j9op
— Hatfield (@hatfield36956) May 7, 2024
Ashamed? They don't know what that word means. But they should be fired, that's for sure.
The janitor met the school's product.
— Blue Shift Blog (@BlueShiftBlog) May 7, 2024
The administration has allowed this culture of hate to flourish while they pat themselves on the back for being "anti-hate". https://t.co/A16fclgzVh
Anti-hate? Anti-racism? Antifa? They all mean the exact opposite.
Do they understand how hard men like him work? What his job means to him? As a provider for his family, and now what, he can't? This infuriates me
— Random Swervy (@RandomSwervy) May 7, 2024
We should ALL be infuriated.
Most people do not know what happened there that night! pic.twitter.com/cspUbNNhVs
— Scott Feely (@SfgRaiders1) May 7, 2024
Most people don't know because Columbia, the New York government, and the media do not WANT them to know.
It's why independent media might be the most important estate in American society right now. Elon Musk's Twitter, Bari Weiss' The Free Press, journalists on Substack, and -- if we may be so bold -- Twitchy and our Townhall family of publications as well.
Mario Torres' nightmare at Columbia University is a story that needs to be told and needs to be heard. The Washington Post and The New York Times won't do it, so we're glad you can hear it here.
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