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♪ Briana: Tonight on NJ Spotlight News, hundreds of student activists from Columbia University were removed and arrested last night after the NYPD stormed its campus.

But pro-Palestine protests continue, including one just outside Rutgers Law school.

>> This has been organized on the sly, responding both to the ridiculous police violence that Columbia is based on its own students as well as other institutions that have done the same.

BRIANA: Plus, students across the country are caught up on their universities to divest Israel.

What do those close movies mean?

>> may be a better call than the investment is maybe to ask universities to invest in Palestine in the Palestinian territories for the Palestinians , to increase their opportunities.

BRIANA: Also something that historic shift, the DEA is inching toward reclassifying cannabis as a less dangerous drug.

Work at it -- what could it mean here in the state where it is already to go it is going to begin to lessen the stigma of cannabis as the federal government begins to lessen its restrictions on it.

BRIANA: and hundreds light enough to pay their final respects to the United States.

Thus as he lies in state.

NJ Spotlight News begins right now.

♪ Announcer: From NJBS studios, this is NJ Spotlight News with Briana Vannozzi.

♪ BRIANA: Good evening and thanks for joining us this Wednesday night.

I'm Briana Vannozzi.

The Pro-Palestinian movement that began at Columbia University ended in dramatic fashion Tuesday night, after the Ivy League school called in the NYPD to clear out antiwar protesters who have been demonstrating for the last two weeks.

Police showed up en masse using riot shields and armored vehicles to dispersed students from the campus and then climbing a ladder truck into a second story window of Hamilton Hall to remove a group who had broken in and occupied it the night before.

Students were ordered to stay inside their dorms and buildings or risk being arrested.

When all was said and done, more than 100 were taken into custody from the school.

Columbia's president said she regretted 11 police, that she thought she had no choice to keep the community safe.

those on the ground described it as a disturbing 24 hours that mirrored the violent end to similar protests back in 1968.

Campuses across the country, all on edge, with demonstrators calling for an end to the war in Gaza where more than 34,000 Palestinians have been killed.

And demanding their universities divest and cut ties with Israel.

Here in New Jersey, encampments have been set up at Princeton and Rutgers-New Brunswick, but protesters were on the today, taking their demands to veterans' law school in Newark.

Ted Goldberg has the story.

Reporter: records-network limit is the latest school to see protesters campouts.

Two Students, professors and Newark residents are pitching tents and getting ready to stay over until with >> As long as to our demands are met.

We are here until all of that demands are met.

Reporter: Those demands, similar to those from other campus encampments, which include Rutgers divesting from companies associating with Israel.

The people who set up shop outside the Rutgers Law School say they came here for a few different reasons.

>> We have been trying to stand in solidarity with New Brunswick, Rutgers New Brunswick, with demanding divestment from Rutgers University.

>> I think biggest inspiration is from the genocide happening to for the genocide happening to Palestinian folks and how the community that we live in, out Rutgers Newark limit is constantly not talking about it.

Reporter: other inspiration comes from across the Hudson.

NYPD officers a list of more than 100 people at Columbia University while clearing a building occupied by protesters.

People in Newark don't imagine their protest will become that violent.

And they certainly hope it doesn't.

>> This has all been organized on the fly.

responding both to the ridiculous police violence that Colombia unleashed on its own students, and other institutions have done the same.

We are here in solidarity with the encampment in New Brunswick.

>> the simple rallies people have posted, 70 cops are showing up for a handful of people.

This is not a country that people tend protest and not have the fear of police.

What is happening is disgraceful and disgusting and shame on the people that called police.

Since students when they are repressed, they come has 10 times stronger.

Their voices are amplified.

People feel even stronger about the fact that they are being pushed down or simply for their support of Palestinian people and their liberation.

Reporter: The folks here has many of the same demands that people camping out in New Brunswick have come up with a few extra demands specific to Newark including that Rutgers must offer free tuition and forgive all the standing student loan debt for people who live in Newark.

>> they are also asking Rutgers to supply a community that stretch that would provide public housing.

It has been an issue here in Newark, flex card has been one of the drivers of downtown gentrification.

So we are trying to talk about those demands.

>> you can't just ask Rutgers to enter demands and not hold the Newark city is possible.

So talking about over policing, schools, education, a lot of our demands are very important for but of cuties a big issue in Newark, and we have records owning businesses and owning buildings.

Reporter: the parties to date list the protesters into didn't make any arrests and there weren't any serious confrontations.

In Newark, and Goldberg, NJ Spotlight News.

BRIANA: Jim Nantz from protesters vary at each university, but nearly all have called for some form of divestment from Israel.

The movement started with Palestinian activists inspired by international sanctions put on South Africa that helped bring about the end of apartheid.

And while divestment has a long history, the practicality of doing it is complicated or higher at institutions.

Our guest is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and associate professor at Brown University for his corporate board just yesterday agreed to meet with student protesters and vote on their divestment proposal.

He does need to explain why universities are so opposed to the demand.

Donnie Bahar, thank you so much for joining me.

They really come to get a conversation to have.

As we know, Brown is going to vote in October on whether to divest.

How feasible is this and how difficult is it for a college to move its investments into funds that are, I suppose, morally and socially responsible?

GUEST: Well, nobody really knows to excess portfolio that universities have.

And I am not sure that the protesters are asking for such a wide definition in terms of divestment, because they are talking about any other conflict in the world, there are plenty of them and there are many firms active in many countries, there is a lot of activity with China and they are not talking about that.

I think they are particularly focused on the case of Israel.

And I want to -- there is really nothing to divest from.

Student protesters are overestimating significantly the amount of investment that universities have in Israel.

And I think when they open the books, they are going to be quite disappointed because there will be nothing much to divest from because it's a very small economy with very few firms actually in the stock market.

I can expand on this, but I think they will be quite disappointed.

BRIANA: Yes, some of the cause of the ground at demonstrations particularly surround defense funds, funding of weapons and military funding and the like.

You say that there is not all that much to divest in Israel in order for these people -- to fool out?

GUEST: Right, I don't think the protesters have done the diligence to explain exactly what they mean by that, and reheating you, but when talking about direct investments in publicly traded firms in Israel of an industry, there is about one hundred 20 firms all of the U.S. stock market exchanges that are is rarely, out of about 9000 securities, that is a very, very tiny amount.

I would be very surprised if any of those firms showed up in any of the portfolios of these universities for from what it is worth, and a portfolio of the average American.

So I don't think there will be a lot of space, it will be a big surprise.

If they are talking in a much broader definition of divesting from any firm that has any activities in Israel, I think that is an over-the-top request.

Israel, the economy is quite integrated in the world not only with the U.S. Also in Europe, Europe is the main trading partner of Israel.

And if we are thinking about the Googles of the world and Meta and Amazon that most of them have a foreign R&D center in Israel, there is about 300 centers in Israel, a lot of these firms invest in Israel to benefit from the innovation that happens in the country, what is called the start of the nation.

So it may be a better call than divestment is maybe to ask universities to invest in Palestine in the Palestinian territories for the Palestinians to increase their opportunities.

I think that is a very laudable goal and I don't see anybody speaking about that.

You really want to move towards finding a solution, I think the answer is to invest, not to divest.

BRIANA: Dany Bahar is a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings institute and also a.

He said adding some contests to this.

-- thank you so much for adding some contests to this.

Meanwhile, lawmakers are still drafting the letter issue in the state, proposed reforms to the Open Public Records Act.

It is largely used by journalists and the public to get access to government records that have uncovered some of the state's biggest corruption stories.

Last night at panel of experts gathered to digest some of the changes that they say would got the law as they saw it.

Senior political correspondent David Cruz reports.

Reporter: Legislative leaders say the general public hears more about property taxes and other so-called pocketbook issues than they do about the Open Public Records Act.

"It is you people in the media and they say, who are starting things up.

It is true, a lot of the backlash that led to the failure of the initial update in March came from groups like the society of professional journalists Last night the group has a forum on Rider University's campus intended to keep the attention on the lawmakers who pulled the OPRA consultation with stakeholders and perhaps some amendments.

>> I just want to question people, it isn't dead.

They are still working on it.

They made that clear.

I did district offices of this weekend.

The responses are that lawmakers have not seen any amendments but they are working on them and that probably within the next two weeks, we will see some hearings planned.

>> one of the new sponsors is 20 rule, the Senate Republican Leadership, and that is ominous because if the Democratic caucuses don't have enough votes and the Republicans and then some votes, that indicates they could test it anyway.

Reporter: The Senate Republican Leadership has been more outspoken on the OPRA bill and along with the Senate Budget Committee Chairman, has cited public safety in addition to economic burden on municipalities as a reason for Opra reform.

>> Those folks are out there sending in OPRA requests for body-camera video's of young women, then listing them on the Internet.

We are trying to get the bad actors to stop doing that.

Some folks have made some really creepy, creepy requests of municipalities and cities around the state, quite frankly.

Reporter: But requests like that and it should be noted that lawmakers have presented no actual evidence of them from would be rejected by the current OPRA live, says an attorney who represents media organizations and others who have had their OPRA requests rejected.

She has become one of the resistants OPRA changes and the target of criticism from Dr. Bill Foster's office.

Limiting access to the body cams would just make and prevent corruption and misconduct harder from the truth as it is about police brutality, committing police brutality.

We have somebody capturing that police found a flask in the coastal Vice President's heart.

An active investigation.

Prior to hiding it from the camera.

>> Not only is informational road going to explode, the misinformation world is also going to explode.

People have to have confidence in the ability of citizens to get information and they have to have confidence that the ability of journalists to get information.

So this is not a trivial matter in any way, shape, or form.

Reporter: There is still no date set for a hearing on OPRA.

Lawmakers will not say what stakeholders they are meeting with or what they are saying to another an email select voice messages for tests.

And they will not have to.

They are immune to the very OPRA lost basically are trying to make better for you.

The, NJ Spotlight News.

BRIANA: In a stunning move, the Biden administration is considering reclassifying marijuana as a less dangerous drug, easy stations nationwide, putting it in a category that includes steroids and Tylenol with codeine.

The move could be An incentive for Congress to deal with cannabis reform today.

Today, Senator Cory Booker, whose long pushed to declassify marijuana, joined other members of Congress introducing this cannabis Administration and Opportunity Act to push the.

-- to push the country even further by raising cannabis at the Melissa Rose Cooper reports of the effects of either change.

>> I think it would be an important and historic step the largest and most impactful piece of federal cannabis reform in history.

Reporter: Adam's senior vice president of a can of this company which has three dispensaries in New Jersey.

Reacting to reports that marijuana could soon be classified as a less dangerous drug at the federal level.

.

According to the Associated Press, the DEA wants to move it from the schedule one listing, which includes substances like Enes Dedic and heroin, to a lesser level, reclassifying it as a three drug.

>> Number one from start to listen to the stigma of cannabis that the federal government begins to loosen restrictions on number two from opening of the research from lots of new pathways for cannabis to be studied by researchers to find out more about it.

All Americans, no matter how you feel about cannabis, agreed that that is positive.

Reporter: the movement also give cannabis operators of financial boost.

>> There is a test which means that cannabis industry cannot take normal business, so they have been buried under a heavy tax rate since they started.

By removing that law, which actually happens once it gets to schedule 3, it operators will have more income and they will be able to take deductions and also, it will be a much more viable industry to get investment.

Reporter: As of right now, the proposed reclassification would only apply to medical marijuana , and cannabis advocates say it wouldn't have much of a positive impact in the Garden State.

>> we created a policy in New Jersey to legalize cannabis by ignoring the schedule one status of marijuana, and moving it down to schedule three we will not affect our industry very much.

And for consumers, it could be an added problem.

Schedule three drugs are things like ketamine and things that require a prescription from it right now we have an over-the-counter regulated adult use market for cannabis in New Jersey.

Schedule 3 doesn't quite fit in with what we already have.

Reporter: Instead, he says marijuana needs to be rescheduled and completely removed as a controlled substance.

>> That would equalize cannabis alongside alcohol and to really fall in line with how students have already regulated it.

Keep in mind that millions of Americans, including 3 million voters in New Jersey have gone to the post office to change our state constitution and allow retail cannabis, and in most states, allow it to be homegrown permits keeping marijuana within any schedule doesn't make sense any longer.

Reporter:.

Reporter: Jeff Brown, the Executive Director of the Cannabis Regulatory Commission releasing a statement saying, " If or when the announcement comes, we look forward to this facilitating conversations with cannabis operators and customers in New Jersey."

Advocates state it any move to reclassify marijuana would still have to be approved by the Attorney General and allow for a period of public comment, which could take months.

For NJ Spotlight News, I am Melissa Rose Cooper.

>> Support for the medical report is provided by Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield in New Jersey.

BRIANA: In à la Spotlight on Business Report, students aren't the only ones protesting.

Labor organizations probably in Newark demanding better unemployment protections for roughly 100,000 unemployed workers in New Jersey.

It comes after a report earlier this month found those workers are left out of the state's unemployment insurance system, with immigrants, low income workers and people of, most effective.

Senior correspondent Joanna Gagis reports.

>> Thousands and thousands lack the resources needed to effectively recover from loss of employment!

Reporter: Nearly a dozen workers organizations gathered in military Park today to commemorate International workers Day and to use the moment to propose a new plan for New Jersey's most vulnerable workers New Jersey job bridge program.

>> We are here celebrating Ama Daetz, International workers Day -- celebrating it mmay day.

Reporter: Development was less of a recent report from the Center for popular democracy that showed that more than 700,000 workers at from the state's unemployment benefits program.

>> New Jersey is at the forefront of what unemployment insurance systems should look like across the country, that there are still a lot of workers who are not receiving unemployment benefits either because they are ineligible for they are having trouble accessing the benefits.

>> That means extending the safety net through independent contractors, to gig workers, the workers without an immigration status, to those who are seeking work right now, to the formerly incarcerated people as they rejoin the workforce, the self-employed, and the caregivers.

That is why we are here today.

We are here to say, past the job bridge programo folks like Marlene who says she has paid into the unemployment fund for years but couldn't access the benefits when she needed them.

>> I am considered an essential worker.

I worked in products factory for over 20 years and due to health issues, I had to resign and I was not able to get any support at all.

Reporter: The state Department of Labor has pointed to the high marks New Jersey received in that report and the efforts they are still making to reach those left out.

>> One of the drivers of this department is to provide equitable access and work hard to reach some of the most vulnerable populations.

Our work through the community partners is doing a lot of that in reaching workers and ensuring that eligible workers are receiving benefits.

Reporter: As legislators finalized this year's budget, this group is asking them to fund this program may be by taxing massive corporations that have benefited the most from low-wage workers.

>> New Jersey has a large warehousing and logistics industry that benefits a lot from working class freelancers and gig workers.

We need -- -- they are able to pay much lower wages because of the fact that those workers are currently excluded from unemployment benefits.

We are thinking of other industries that really thrive on trying to keep wages and benefits low.

>> There is a lot of expectation when it comes to undocumented workers.

Here in New Jersey, the Department of Labor is very active in the recent past in fighting, combating that expectation.

They see a lot of Ridgecrest, -- wage theft, failure to pay wages.

Reporter: John Moreno is with the painters union and says even if it is a controversial idea, undocumented workers should be protected by unemployment benefits.

>> Our union support workers regardless of their status and we are backing the job bridge program because it doesn't list any worker behind.

All workers are entitled to a safe and dignified workplace.

Reporter: So this may date marks the first of the month and the first day of what is sure to be a long fight ahead for these roots to bring the program to reality.

In Newark, Joanna Gagis, NJ Spotlight News.

BRIANA: On Wall Street, stocks were mixed today after the Fed left interest rates unchanged and reiterated plans to hold them study.

Here is how the markets closed.

♪ BRIANA: Finally tonight, family, friends and members of the public on the life of Congressman Donald Payne Jr., paying their final respects today as he lies in state at the Essex County historical courthouse in Newark.

The 65-year-old died last week after being hospitalized following a cardiac episode.

He represented New Jersey's 10th congressional district since 2012, succeeding his father who also died in office.

Payne, Jr. dedicated his life to public service having served as a councilman and county commissioner before being elected to Congress.

Governor Murphy ordered state flags to fight at half today and tomorrow, when funeral services will be held at the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Newark.

May he rest in peace.

And that does it for us tonight.

But make sure you tune in to chatbox with David Cruz tomorrow night.

After talking last week to the Democratic candidates looking to replace Senator Bob Menendez, he goes with Republican candidates Curtis Bashaw.

What if there at 6:00 p.m. on the YouTube channel.

I am Briana Vannozzi.

For the entire NJ Spotlight News team, Thanks for being with us.

Have a great evening.

We will see you back here tomorrow.

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