A San José State professor has filed a civil rights lawsuit against the university after her termination over pro-Palestinian protests two years ago was recently overturned.
Sang Hae Kil, a justice studies professor, accused the university and California State University, the system that oversees 23 colleges across the state, of civil rights violations, discrimination, retaliation and creating a hostile work environment, according to the lawsuit.
Court records show the lawsuit was filed in Santa Clara County Superior Court in late May, but it was not announced until Monday.
A San José State University spokesperson did not respond to The Times’ request for comment.
Kil came under fire two years ago amid widespread protests over the war in Gaza after the attack against Israel in October 2023 by Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that the U.S. has designated as a terrorist group.
She was the second professor at the university at the time to face disciplinary actions in connection to the protests but was the only one fired, according to the lawsuit.
Last week, an arbitrator overturned that decision and ordered the school to reinstate the tenured professor. Attorneys for Kil said the university was in the process of reinstating her.
“I am relieved that this long, grueling ordeal has come to an end for me,” Kil said in a written statement announcing the lawsuit. “I am happy the arbitrator found in my favor, and I get my job back.”
The lawsuit stems from three demonstrations that Kil attended beginning in February 2024. That month, a protest was held outside a classroom in Sweeney Hall where a guest lecturer, Jeffrey Blutinger, was speaking about the war.
Blutinger, a Jewish studies professor at Long Beach State University, had argued that Israel was not committing genocide in Gaza and that the protests on university campuses seemed supportive of Hamas.
At the time, Kil, who was then serving as a faculty advisor for Students for Justice in Palestine, told The Times that students disagreed with Blutinger’s views.
According to the lawsuit, Kil attended the demonstration in her personal capacity and not as an advisory to SJP, which did not organize or sponsor the demonstration.
While Blutinger was speaking, history professor Jonathan Roth attempted to take video of the protesters in the hallway and got into a physical altercation with a female student who tried to block him from doing so.
Video of the incident showed the professor grabbing and twisting the arm of the pro-Palestinian student. Roth was placed on administrative leave but returned to work shortly afterward, according to the lawsuit.
In April, Kil received a letter from the university notifying her she was under investigation for the Feb. 19 protest. Officials accused her in the letter of violating the university’s time, place and manner policy, which sets rules on free speech activities on campus.
Attorneys for Kil allege in the lawsuit that she requested a copy of the policy ahead of the protest but did not receive it until days later.
On May 14, a day after students created a San José State University for Gaza encampment, university officials sent a letter to Kil informing her she had been placed on administrative leave.
In the letter, the suit says, university officials were amending their investigation to include a May 8 protest she had attended in which urged students to violate university policies, among other allegations.
Attorneys for Kil allege in the lawsuit that she had spoken out against the university’s time, place and manner policy and its affect on free speech, she also told students that if they were “thinking about doing an encampment” that it wasn’t too late.
“Dr. Kil did not instruct students to violate any campus policies or engage in any specific behavior,” the lawsuit states.
In June, the university sent her a termination letter. She appealed the decision with the Faculty Hearing Committee, an independent board that investigates and adjudicates disputes involving faculty members.
In November, the committee found that Kil had likely violated some university policies but that the violations were not egregious enough to warrant her dismissal.
But the university ignored the committee’s findings, prompting Kil to seek arbitration, which was held in March. Last week, the arbitrator overturned the university’s decision.
“SJSU’s unequal treatment of Dr. Kil resolves any doubt: SJSU terminated Dr. Kil because she spoke out in support of Palestine as an Asian-American, queer woman,” said Rebecca Brown, an attorney with Hadsell Stormer Renick & Dai said in the statement. “SJSU’s actions threaten free speech rights and academic freedom across the country.”
The attorneys say in the lawsuit that the treatment of Kil stands in “sharp and alarming contrast to its treatment of other faculty” who does not share her political views or association with other groups including Palestinians.
“For example, Dr. Jonathan Roth — a white, heterosexual, male professor at SJSU who publicly supports Israel and expresses anti-Arab, anti-Palestinian, and anti-Muslim sentiment — physically assaulted a Palestinian demonstrator at the same demonstration that triggered the investigation into Dr. Kil,” the lawsuit states. “SJSU did not seek his termination and even allowed him to return to his teaching position.”
The firing was not only a great loss for her students and the community, but it also caused her psychological harm, including anxiety and depression, Kil’s attorneys argue in the lawsuit.
The attorneys say Kil had spent years advocating for students and ensuring the university was inclusive.
“When the opportunity to speak out in support of Palestine and stand in solidarity with Palestinian, Muslim, and Arab community members on campus arose, Dr. Kil was compelled to attend,” the lawsuit states.
“Our public universities have an educational mission and constitutional mandate to protect free speech, but SJSU made the cowardly choice to fire its own professor because they did not agree with her personal political views,” Brian Olney, an attorney for Kil, said in the statement. “The University tried to destroy Dr. Kil’s thriving career but they cannot silence her voice.”
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