Police officers swept onto the ordinarily serene campus of Emory University in Atlanta after demonstrators erected tents on Thursday morning, leading to the latest clash in a pro-Palestinian protest movement that has cascaded across American campuses this week.
As the demonstrators at Emory screamed, officers wrestled with protesters on the ground and escorted others away. From a few dozen yards away, onlookers stared and recorded the scene with their cellphones.
The authorities did not immediately say how many people had been arrested in Atlanta, but across the country, more than 400 protesters have been taken into police custody since April 18, when the arrests of more than 100 protesters at Columbia University in New York set off a wave of student activism nationwide.
University administrators have responded at several campuses by calling in law enforcement, removing encampments and threatening academic consequences. Some Jewish students have expressed concern for their safety, and politicians have demanded a crackdown on the growing demonstrations.
The Boston police arrested 108 protesters at Emerson College late Wednesday, just hours after the Los Angeles police arrested 93 people on the University of Southern California campus who had refused to disperse. In each case, it was unclear how many of the arrested demonstrators were students.
Earlier on Wednesday, dozens of police officers, many of them in riot gear and some on horseback, arrested 57 people at the University of Texas at Austin. Most of them have already been released from custody. Diana Melendez, a spokeswoman for the county attorney’s office, said charges were dropped in many of the cases after the office found legal “deficiencies” in their arrests.
At Emory, demonstrators accused the police of using pepper spray or tear gas to break up the protests. The university did not immediately comment on the claims, but a spokeswoman, Laura Diamond, said protesters were “activists attempting to disrupt our university as our students finish classes and prepare for finals.” The university, Ms. Diamond added, “does not tolerate vandalism or other criminal activity on our campus.”
In a statement on Thursday, Emory said that “a couple of dozen people” had been taken into custody, but that the university could not say whether any charges had been filed. Videos reviewed by The New York Times showed a state trooper appearing to use a stun device on a demonstrator who was on the ground.
“We have to do everything we can, despite the repression by the state or the university to try to shut us down,” said Bella Montealegre, an Emory student who said “solidarity with Columbia” had drawn many of her classmates to the protest area. “We have to continue to be steadfast toward Palestinian freedom.”
As universities struggled to quell the unrest, some lawmakers have called for stronger measures, including House Speaker Mike Johnson, who on a visit to Columbia on Wednesday asked the White House to take action and said it should eventually consider using military force.
Universities have deployed the police and suspended students, under pressure from such lawmakers, as well as donors and alumni, who have called the demonstrations antisemitic.
Still, new protests continue to erupt, spreading far beyond the universities where they first took hold. Many student activists say they are galvanized by the clampdowns on largely peaceful protests on other campuses and the universities’ financial ties to companies that protesters say are making weapons being used on Palestinians.
There was little sign that the movement was losing steam: About 100 demonstrators set up tents at Harvard on Wednesday night, even after the university warned that students could face discipline.
J. David Goodman, Sean Keenan and John Yoon contributed reporting.