A California State University professor who became the first tenured faculty member dismissed from a U.S. public university over pro-Palestinian activism has won her job back through arbitration and is moving forward with a lawsuit against the system.
Sang Hea Kil, a justice studies professor at San José State University, was terminated last November following her participation in campus protests against Israel's war in Gaza. An arbitrator ruled last week that the university violated employment law and ordered her reinstated with back pay.
The decision marks a legal victory for Kil, who filed suit in May claiming the CSU system violated both state employment law and her First Amendment rights. Her legal team argues the termination was unprecedented retaliation for protected speech.
"This is one of the most egregious and extreme examples of repression of pro-Palestine speech that we've seen," Rebecca Brown, one of Kil's attorneys, said at a press conference announcing the lawsuit. "This is a tenured professor who was fired over a free speech activity, a punishment that's usually reserved for professors who engage in conduct like sexual assault or physical violence."
Kil's termination stemmed from a February 2024 campus confrontation where she attended a pro-Palestinian protest. The university accused her of making remarks that encouraged a student encampment and of participating in one herself. She also witnessed what she described as another faculty member assaulting a student at the protest, though that faculty member was suspended and later reinstated.
As faculty adviser for the Students for Justice in Palestine chapter, Kil said she attended the February event in a personal capacity. She later joined a student-led encampment for three nights, citing her academic work on policing and police raids targeting similar encampments in other cities.
"A lot of my work is critical of policing, and I felt, because of what happened in New York and Los Angeles, obliged to camp with students," she explained.
An internal faculty committee that reviewed the incidents recommended against dismissal, finding that while Kil violated some university policies, termination was disproportionate and unjustified. The independent arbitrator agreed, ruling that the charges did not warrant firing a tenured employee and reducing the penalty to a one-month suspension.
"The propriety of imposing the ultimate sanction of employment termination for free-speech activity, even if its exercise clashed with institutional restrictions, is questionable," the arbitrator wrote in the decision.
Kil's case is the first tenured dismissal from a public U.S. university since 2014, when Steven Salaita was fired from the University of Illinois over social media posts critical of Israeli military operations. Her reinstatement comes as universities across the country continue facing fallout from 2024's campus Gaza protests, which led to the suspension, investigation, and removal of numerous faculty and staff members.
Upon learning of the arbitration outcome, Kil said she was relieved but remained committed to advocacy. "The arbitration hearing outcome in my favor shows that the first amendment of the constitution is not dead at San José State University," she told The Guardian, adding that she plans to continue speaking out for Palestinian rights and free speech protections.
The university declined to comment on the personnel matter. Kil's lawsuit continues in Santa Clara County Superior Court.
Author James Rodriguez: "A tenured professor firing over a protest should have been a slam-dunk free speech violation from day one, but it took arbitration and a lawsuit to get there. That's the real story here."
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