Oct. 23 — On Tuesday, Nov. 5, the choice is clear. The Sun endorses Vice President Kamala Harris for President of the United States. She is the only candidate who can guarantee that, after Election Day, the rights that protect the very essence of our University as a center of discourse and dissent will survive.
Former President Donald Trump, on the other hand, represents everything Cornell, at its best, stands against. Trump relishes violence against dissenters, endorses racist campaigns of mass deportations and promises to eliminate academic freedom. If re-elected, his second term won’t simply be dangerous — for many of us at Cornell, it will be unliveable.
Simply put, Trump wants to destroy the future of democracy — Harris will bolster it and give young people the opportunity to thrive. And her vision doesn’t just include those wealthy enough to pay the high sticker price of a college degree: The Biden-Harris administration has canceled more than $175 billion in student loan debt for borrowers. If elected, Harris has vowed to redouble those efforts.
Harris also believes in democracy in the workplace: Biden and Harris have run the most pro-labor administration in generations. Harris’s record on labor rights matters for our commu-
nity, as Cornell Graduate Students United fights for a first contract that will raise labor standards for thousands of students. If re-elected, Trump wants to erase these negotiated gains. His policies all but guarantee the evisceration of the right to organize a union and would further usher in an era of crony corporatism.
On campus protests, Trump’s platform is beyond dangerous. It’s not one view he detests: It’s the very concept of dissent. He’s cheered on as police raided encampments, threatened to deploy the National Guard against domestic opponents and called for “vanquish[ing] the radicals” when referencing pro-Palestinian activists. If elected, Trump’s crackdowns will be a brutally violent suppression of all outside viewpoints. Activists especially should choose a future that invites dissent. Regardless of her position on any one issue, Harris will let your voice be heard. If Trump wins, not everyone will walk away from this election with the same rights, particularly activists on the Left. Withholding your vote as an act of resistance means giving control over your voice to a man who is hostile to your very existence.
Take Trump’s word for it: “We pledge to you that we will root out the communists, Marxists, fascists and the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country that lie and steal and cheat on elections.”
Anything short of a vote for Harris will strangle the right to speech and protest, jeopardizing the very existence of our democracy. The Sun endorses Harris not only because of her policy positions, but importantly because there is simply no other choice. The price of a second Trump term is too steep, not just in academia and for protesters, but for every single democratic institution that too many Americans take for granted. Trump draws on our worst impulses and offers our bleakest possible future. This November, voting for Harris is imperative. Do not stay home on Election Day.
How to C ast Your Vote
By GABRIEL MUÑOZ Sun City Editor
Oct. 23 — As the voter registration deadline approaches on Oct. 26, The Sun prepared a voting guide with all the information needed to vote locally on Tuesday, Nov. 5.
HOW CAN I REGISTER TO VOTE?
In New York State, U.S. citizens 18 years of age or older who have been residents of the state for at least 30 days and do not claim the right to vote elsewhere are eligible to vote. Individuals who are currently incarcerated for a felony conviction, ruled “mentally incompetent” by a court or simultaneously claim the right to vote in another state are not eligible.
All full-time Cornell students on the Ithaca campus will have reached the 30-day eligibility mark by Election Day.
States set their own voter eligibility requirements and registration deadlines, which may differ from those in New York. For information on other states’ voter eligibility guidelines, visit your state’s Board of Elections website.
For students who wish to vote in
Tompkins County, they can either register to vote online or in person.
To register online, the county website links to the online voter registration application. The application requires voters to use their New York state ID, the last four digits of their social security number and the zip code currently on record at the DMV to input their Ithaca address. After receiving a confirmation email, residents may go to the voter lookup site, and input “Tompkins” for county and personal information to confirm registration and polling location.
For voters who are registering by filling out the New York State Voter Registration form, they should provide a form of identification including their DMV number or social security number. they should submit by mail or in person to the Tompkins County Board of Elections located at 128 E. Buffalo St. in Ithaca by Oct. 26.
Early Voting
New York offers early voting from Oct. 26 to Nov. 3. Anyone who is registered as a Tompkins County voter and wishes to vote early can do so at Ithaca Town Hall at 215 N. Tioga St. or Crash Fire Rescue at 72 Brown Rd.
Opening hours for each day of early voting can be found on Tompkins County’s early voting webpage.
Early Mail Voting
Any registered voter can apply for a mail-in ballot. The deadline to request an early mail ballot is at least 10 days before Election Day. Ballots can be requested by a physical form mailed to the Board of Elections or through an online portal. Early mail ballots can also be submitted in person at a polling site in the county. Requests for early mail ballots submitted in person must be received by the day before the election.
Absentee Voting
Voters are eligible for an absentee ballot if they are unable to physically vote in the county on Election Day for reasons including being absent from the county during Election Day, being unable to go to the polling station because of an illness or serving as the primary caregiver of an ill individual.
The absentee ballot has to be postmarked to the Board of Elections office by Nov. 5, brought to an early voting location by Nov. 3 or brought to the Board of Elections office or polling site by 9 p.m. on Nov. 5.
Voting on Election Day
A list of all polling places in Ithaca
is available at the Tompkins County Board of Elections. Robert Purcell Community Center will be the only polling place on campus for this election. New York residents can also check their poll site on the New York Board of Elections website. On the website, users can input their address and find their polling location and a list of all incumbents running for election.
Election Day is on Tuesday, Nov. 5, and polling locations will be open from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. Voters who are in line but have not voted by 9 p.m. will still be allowed to vote so long as they remain in line.
New York workers can take time off on Election Day to vote under Section 3-110 of the New York State Election Law. Anyone with fewer than four consecutive non-working hours may take up to two paid hours off of work and as many unpaid hours as needed, so long as they give at least two-days notice to their employer.
Those who require assistance to vote or need instruction on how to operate the voting machine may ask a poll worker for guidance.
Gabriel Muñoz can be reached at gmunoz@cornellsun.com.
RUTH FREMSON / THE NEW YORK TIMES
A LISTING OF FREE CAMPUS EVENTS
Today
Convergence Fiber Art Exhibit
8 a.m. - 4:30 p.m., Jill Stuart Gallery Human Ecology Building
“songs for tomorrow morning” an installation by María Alejandra Bulla 9 a.m. - 5 p.m., Music Library Reference Desk
Serving Up Sustainability Plant-Forward Dinner 5:30 p.m. - 8:30 p.m., North Star Dining Room
Development Economics Practice Job Talk: Sergio Peurto 1:25 p.m. - 2 p.m., 525 ILR Conference Center
Cornell Center for Historical Keyboards recital: Andrew Willis 7:30 p.m., Barnes Hall
The Corne¬ Daily Sun
Tomorrow
WCM Fall Scientific Computing Training Series: Python 9 a.m. - 10 a.m., Virtual event
Cornell Soft Matter Discussion: Jennifer Schwarz Noon - 1 p.m., G01 Biotechnology Building
Middway Music for Organ: Ivan Bosner 12:30 p.m., Sage Chapel
Introduction to
The Corne¬ Daily Sun
CML Stages Walkout at Trustee Meeting
Oct. 19 — Over 150 protesters staged a walkout outside of the Law School during Friday’s Board of Trustees meeting, calling on the University to divest from weapons manufacturers supplying Israel with arms.
The Coalition for Mutual Liberation, a pro-Palestinian student activism group, announced the walkout two weeks in advance, tabling at Klarman Hall to encourage participation and organizing a mass meeting on Wednesday to answer questions and make signs.
The walkout occurred on the same day as a similar protest on Brown’s campus held by the Brown Divest Coalition.
Demonstrators first gathered at Ho Plaza at 1 p.m. on Friday to deliver speeches prior to the walkout. Many hid their faces with masks, hoods, hats and keffiyehs. Between speeches, those who did not cover their faces were encouraged to wear masks distributed by people circulating through the crowd.
“I have just one question — When does it end?” one speaker asked the crowd. “How do you tell a mother that their child is an acceptable casualty? How do you tell a child that their parents had to die because the IDF claims they were in the same area as a group of resistance fighters?”
Prof. Juliana Hu Pegues, Literatures in English, delivered a speech criticizing Boeing’s history of defense contracting for profit, which was punctuated with chants of “F*ck Boeing!” from the crowd. These outbursts were soon replaced with cries of “F*ck Cornell!” and “F*ck Kraig Kayser” ’MBA ‘84, chariman of the Board — chants that were reprised later in the walkout.
During the speeches, The Sun observed a masked protester bumping into Amanda Silberstein ’26, vice president of Cornellians for Israel and Cornell Chabad, who wore a Star of David, a ‘bring them home’ tag and carried a water bottle with an Israeli flag sticker. A masked protester locked eyes with her and thrusted his backpack into her before screaming that she was in his way, according to Silberstein.
Released Footage Shows Pro-Palestinian Protesters Pushing Past Police at Career Fair
By ERIC REILLY Sun Assistant Managng Editor
Oct. 19 — Cornell has released footage of pro-Palestinian activists pushing past police at a Sept. 18 protest that shut down a career fair in Statler Hotel featuring defense contractors Boeing and L3Harris. The three-minute-long video, which includes footage from Cornell University Police Department officers’ body cameras and a main lobby camera, shows the moment when masked students breached the entrance and shut down the event.
The footage, released on Saturday, refutes claims from student activists that the protest was peaceful.
In the video, several CUPD officers can be seen guarding The Statler’s entrance. Three of the officers formed a barricade across the building’s sliding
doors, briefly holding up their arms to provide resistance before protesters shoved past.
According to a statement by Vice President for University Relations Joel Malina, many community members had asked that video evidence of the “forceful entry” be made available.
“Having completed the preliminary criminal investigation of the event, we are providing video that shows initial forced entry at the Statler lobby and disruptive activity inside the Career Fair,” Malina wrote.
The University has stated that it has used photo and video evidence to identify and refer for disciplinary action 19 activists at the career fair disruption.
Universiry Suspends Four Pro-Palestinian Students For Tree Years
By XIMENA BALLI and AARUSH ROMPALLY Sun Contributors
Oct. 17 — The University on Wednesday banned four pro-Palestinian student activists from campus for three years, according to a press release from the Coalition for Multual Liberation, a student-led activist group. The suspended students can appeal the decision.
The suspensions stem from a Sept. 18 pro-Palestinian protest that shut down a career fair in Statler Hotel featuring defense contractors Boeing and L3Harris. According to the University, protesters “physically forced their way” through two lines of police “with the full knowledge that they were violating policy.” The University previously said it had identified 19 participants in that disruptive protest and referred them for disciplinary action.
The Sun talked to two of the banned student activists who fear their undergraduate careers will be upended.
Jacob Berman ’25, the vice president of Jewish Voice for Peace, was served his three-year no-trespass order on Wednesday in a one-on-one disciplinary meeting with Christina Liang, who directs the Office of Student Conduct and Community Standards. Berman said Liang told him that in three weeks he will be automatically disenrolled from his classes and that he can now only enter campus to go to Cornell Health.
“I asked for a carve-out to attend Shabbat services, which I help lead [for JVP],” Berman said, adding that Liang denied his request to participate in any on-campus religious services.
Berman recalled that Liang told him during their meeting that the University issued the no-trespass order because he had pushed another protester into a campus police officer at the career fair protest, citing a video of the event that appeared on social media. Berman said that the University has yet to show him the video and that the incident was the accidental result of a crowd surge.
By AARUSH ROMPALLY and GABRIEL MUÑOZ Sun Contributor and Sun City Editor
See WALKOUT page 10
Passionate protesters | Students protest outside of Myron Taylor Hall during the Cornell Board of Trustees meeting on Oct. 18.
COURTESY OF CORNELL UNIVERSITY
Footage found | Pro-Palestinian protesters push past police officers at Statler Hall before shutting down a Sept. 18 career fair featuring defense contractors Boeing and L3Harris.
Ithaca Teachers Association Protests for Cornell Funding Co-Op Residents Say Cornell Does Not Provide Enough Maintence Support
By ROHITH TSUNDUPALLI and MATT MICHAILOFF Sun Contributors
Oct. 21 — With Cornell’s guarantee of housing ending after sophomore year, Allan Chu ’26 faced the challenge of finding an affordable off-campus living situation. After exploring a number of options, he found that cooperative housing offered a cost-effective solution.
“Financially, [living in a co-op] is so much cheaper. I remember my freshman year, a triple cost close to $5,000,” Chu, the president of RedBud Cooperative, said.
However, co-op leaders told The Sun that University administration has not provided enough support to maintain this living option. Neglected houses have faced caved-in roofs and collapsing floors, according to residents, while the co-op program has seen little expansion.
Cornell owns the co-ops, and they are considered a form of on-campus housing. However, the co-op residents are still responsible for certain house maintenance.
According to Remy Kageyama ’25, the president of the Watermargin co-op, the houses are facing difficulties in responding to the deteriorating nature of the aging houses.
“Our roof is collapsing and will collapse in nine years unless we raise 500,000 dollars to pay for it because Cornell won’t pay for it,” Kageyama said.
Kageyama noted that over the past few years, four out of Cornell’s eight co-ops have had floors collapse. Residents are required to sign a contract that assumes responsibility for these damages, according to Kageyama.
“I think the main thing the co-ops are kind of upset about, regarding the University, is how our contracts are set up, where we are in charge of our own maintenance and repairs,” Kageyama said.
Another complaint across the co-ops lies within Cornell’s control of rental rates. Triphammer previously priced rental rates by room size, according to graduate student Vincent Eynon ’24, a Triphammer Cooperative resident.
According to Eynon, the University mandated co-ops to standardize room rates both between residents in the same house and among different co-ops.
Chu shared similar sentiments by mentioning that Redbud has been facing challenges due to the University’s recent efforts to increase rents. This has become a pressing issue for many co-ops as they try to balance the costs of residency with the necessity for funding to fix problems when they arise.
Students are additionally frustrated with Cornell’s lack of efforts to expand and showcase co-ops as a housing option.
Eynon said that co-ops are “definitely against what Cornell would consider normal.”
To continue reading this article, please visit www.cornellsun.com.
Rohith Tsundupalli and Matt Michailof can be reached at rt535@cornellsun.com and mcm398@cornell.edu.
By EMMA COHEN and SHUBHA GAUTAM Sun Contributors
Oct. 17 — Over 100 community members joined the Ithaca Teachers Association to call for a substantial increase in University funding of the Ithaca City School District on Wednesday, Oct. 16. Attendees rallied for $10 million in annual contribution by the University, up from the current $650,000.
The event featured several speakers including Ithaca Mayor Robert Cantelmo, ICSD Board member Jill Tripp and a student from DeWitt Middle School.
ICSD receives 75 percent of its operating costs from local property taxes. ITA President Kathryn Cernera said since Cornell is a tax-exempt institution but owns the majority of land within ICSD’s jurisdiction, the district is left with inadequate funding.
The district is currently facing a $7 million deficit, even after shutting down several programs and increasing class sizes this past school year according to Cernera. If the University was taxed at the same rate as other properties in Ithaca, they would pay approximately $46 million to ICSD annually. The request for $10 million, according to Cernera, is reasonable considering this.
Organizers intentionally planned for the rally to occur on the day Jennifer Tavares joined Cornell as its new director of the Office of Community Relations. The ITA invited Tavares to attend and collect a growing petition calling for an increase in University funding to ICSD, but she did not attend, as pointed out by ITA secretary Aurora Rojer when the rally began.
Maddie, an eighth grader at DeWitt Middle School and speaker at the rally, expressed her frustration with what she saw as diminishing opportunities in the district due to shortfalls in funding.
“I don’t understand how Cornell expects the middle schoolers and high schoolers to excel and be able to get to Cornell if they aren’t giving us the opportunity to actually excel in school,” Maddie said.
The University’s annual contribution to ICSD increased from $500,000 to $650,000 in late 2023, an agreement set to expire in 2031. Tripp called for $10 million in funding from Cornell in a budget proposed in spring 2024,
which though rejected by ICSD led to the establishment of the Board’s Revenue Exploration Council. She continues to advocate for greater financial contribution by the University.
“[Cornell] pay[s] somewhat to roads. They pay their water and sewer bill, because that’s a service rather than a tax,” Tripp said. “So they bring a lot to the community, and they take a lot from the community. There are at least hundreds of students in the public schools who are the children of staff, faculty and schools, and they receive a public school education that we are very proud of, but it costs money.”
When asked about the proposed increase of $9.3 million, Tripp characterized the current $650,000 of funding as “a gross underestimate and, frankly, somewhat insulting.”
In a statement to The Sun, Vice President for University Relations Joel Malina said the University contributes $2.1 million in property taxes to ICSD for its land not used for higher education. Cornell additionally provides non-monetary support for ICSD in the form of educational programs and other opportunities, such as “the chilled water provided to ICSD property on Lake Street from our Lake Source Cooling system.”
Rally speaker Sam Poole ’28, member of the Cornell chapter of Young Democratic Socialists of America, said recent events brought attention to the corporatization of the University, including its response to the weeks-long United Auto Workers strike and Cornell Graduate Student Union pleas.
“If the events of the past year so far have shown us anything, it is that Cornell, whatever it might say, is a quintessentially corporate university that values profit over people,” Poole said.
Cernera said the ITA does not expect the University to increase its funding to ICSD du e to the rally. The goal instead is to spread the word about how schools are funded to the community, showing how “the way that we fund our schools is just wrong in so many ways.”
“Cornell not paying taxes is not illegal,” Cernera said. “It is totally legal. They do not have to pay taxes. But really the thing that we want to bring into the community is the question of whether they should.”
erc228@cornell.edu and sg2563@cornell.edu.
Emma Cohen and Shubha Gautam can be reached at
Annual County Budget Proposal Sparks Concern
Increases in costs-of-living and a fall in tax revenue raises questions for TCL Budget
By JACK AHERNE and XAVIER ROLSTON Sun Contributors
Oct. 16 — In a year where costs have increased and tax revenue has fallen across the County, legislators have been busy debating and revising the 2025 Tompkins County Budget, which is expected to pass in November.
First introduced on Sept. 3, the proposed annual budget includes tax changes, funding for infrastructure projects and required New York State expenditures. County Administrator Lisa Holmes, who wrote and presented the plan to members of the Tompkins County Legislature, told The Sun that county funds were divided between nearly 30 departments, each with their own roles.
Some of this funding is mandated and decided by the State. In addition, the County must allocate enough funds for other essential services including the sheriff’s department, highway department and other agencies that the County depends on.
Is the County Raising Enough Money?
Taxes within the County pay for the necessary expenses and social programs. While costs are rising, sales tax revenue — the second largest source of revenue — is projected to drop significantly for Tompkins County.
Legislator Shawna Black (11th District) explained that the decline in sales tax is one of the County’s biggest concerns.
“Whenever we see less sales tax, it means less money that we can spend on the things that truly are a priority in our community,” Black said.
Holmes described the decrease in sales tax revenue as a “COVID hangover,” referring to the end of certain economic relief policies coinciding with rising inflation across the country.
“Several years of inflation have affected consumers and their ability to buy and spend,” Holmes said. “That’s led here locally to a decrease in sales tax revenues, and therefore a projection for 2025 that they are going to remain flat.”
Will Property Taxes Increase?
Property taxes are the largest source of revenue for Tompkins County, and in 2025, the property tax percentage will decrease for homeowners. However, Holmes said that the tax percentage is not what most people consider. Instead, they look at the “tax levy,” which is the total amount of money the County wants to raise through property taxes.
Even with a lower property tax percentage rate, homeowners will pay more overall due to rising home values. This year, home valuations increased by 20.5 percent in Tompkins County over the past year, far outpacing New York state’s overall increase of 6.8 percent.
“It’s a very large increase,” Holmes noted, describing it as “atypical.” The median price of a home in Tompkins County rose from $249,000 to $300,000 over the past year.
The initial budget proposal included a 4.34-percent rise in the property tax levy, or a $138 increase to the median valued home’s tax bill. However, county legislators have preemptively agreed to decrease this number.
“So far with the voting meetings and amendments made by the legislature, it is looking to be a 3.29-percent levy increase, and we’re still midway through the process, so that amount is still subject to change,” Holmes said.
What Projects Will This Money Fund?
Spending is more strained this year than in recent history. New York State increased mandated expenditures for Medicaid, childcare and psychiatric expenses for individuals unfit to stand trial, along with other spending categories. Holmes expressed her concerns over these increases to the legislature.
“The County’s mandated expenditures, over which we have little or no control, continue to rise and put pressure on local taxpayers,” Holmes wrote in her Sept. 3 message presenting the budget.
Plans to build a jail, public safety building and homeless shelter are also priorities for legislators. According to Black, the state covers the cost of sheltering services for about six months. The County may fund the remaining months, costing taxpayers an additional $3 million annually for homelessness services.
“With those three big capital improvements, and then the ongoing sheltering around, I mean, we’re looking at a lot of money going out the door,” Black said. “So whenever we talk about having $50 million in the bank, it goes really fast.”
In previous years, there have been extra “unassigned” funds, allowing the County to fund social initiatives and infrastructure projects. This year, there are no funds left over.
“[Additional] funds would have allowed the County to fund the implementation of language access services, the distribution of informational mailings, the expansion of mobile support services and further backing for suicide prevention efforts,” Holmes wrote.
Community Response to Tax Increase
While raising property taxes is necessary to fund the County’s expenditures, it remains unpopular among residents, according to Black. Black called raising property taxes “the last thing that we want to do,” to citizens who struggle to pay their bills.
Kate Seamen — a prominent Ithaca realtor who specializes in helping prospective professors find homes in Ithaca — said that some of her clients have turned down positions at Cornell because of high property taxes. She added that the quality of living is going down, and the cost of living is going up, and those two combined do not bode well for Ithaca.
To continue reading this article, please visit www.cornellsun.com.
Jack Aherne and Xavier Rolston can be reached at jea267@cornell.edu and xr46@cornell.edu
Parents Donate to Mental Healthcare
By Christina MacCorkle Sun News Editor
Oct. 23 — For years, Cornell students have expressed their frustrations with the University’s mental healthcare services, including struggling to book appointments with counselors at Cornell Health and feeling like the counseling team was gravely understaffed.
Now, a $20 million donation to Cornell Health promises to expand mental health care on campus, including by hiring therapists to be directly embedded in Cornell’s undergraduate and graduate schools.
The donation — made by Cornellian parents John and Melissa Ceriale on Thursday — will fund the recruitment of seven new therapists to be placed within Cornell’s schools, according to Julie Edwards, assistant vice president for student health and wellbeing.
These new therapists — directly placed in Cornell’s academic environment — will provide individual counseling, psychoeducational support, mental health guidance related to academic stressors and connections to campus and other
resources, Edwards told The Sun in an email.
Currently, there are two embedded therapists working with students — one in Ithaca within the College of Veterinary Medicine and another in New York City on the Cornell Tech campus. A third was recently hired to support student-athletes and is expected to join the Counseling and Psychological Services team in November.
According to their website, the services currently provided by Cornell’s CAPS include drop-in consultations for students in need of a “one-time brief conversation with a provider,” short-term individual therapy, group counseling, workshops and referrals.
When asked why Cornell Health lacks long-term one-on-one counseling services, Edwards wrote that “most college health counseling centers are not resourced to provide long-term clinical support” and that “students needing or desiring this level of care can be referred to local in-person and telehealth providers.”
The gift will also fund the expansion of Cornell’s well-being coaching program.
Well-being coaches partner with students in one-on-one meetings and use “evidence-based skills to help students examine personal strengths, values and motivation for change, learn new life skills and strategies for success,” Edwards said in her email.
Well-being Coaching is not a clinical service and coaches are fulltime Cornell staff from a range of backgrounds, including West Campus deans and academic advisors.
The Ceriale’s gift will also allow Cornell Health to hire a position dedicated to managing the Wellbeing Coaching program and coordinating the program’s outreach to students.
Vice President Ryan Lombardi expressed his gratitude to the Ceriale family for their “remarkable gift” in an email to The Sun.
“I look forward to seeing the impact of these resources as they enhance our support for students and energize the programs already driving student well-being and success,” Lombardi wrote.
Oct. 20 — “You guys are really nice people,” said comedian and actor Jaboukie Young-White to a crowd of around 250 Cornellians dazed by exam season. “But then I saw the nets under the bridges, and I was like, ‘They need this.’”
The Cornell Multicultural Community-Fueled Activities Board — an organization that aims to bring diversity through entertainment on campus — hosted its first comedy night of the semester Saturday evening in Alice Statler Auditorium starring Young-White and opener Sydnee Washington, both acclaimed Black and gay comics.
Washington, an Emmy-nominated comedian and actress, opened the show with a story about her senior year of college, when she was kicked out for
plagiarizing a final paper. Her warning to students was simple: “If you’re in college, you cannot plagiarize. You can sell weed, because my ex-boyfriend was doing that. You can sexually assault, because my neighbor was doing that — but you cannot plagiarize.”
“There’s a couple things that you cannot do if you’re in school, what are they?” Washington asked the audience.
“Protest,” a student shouted, the room bursting with laughter.
“Protest — I think that’s specific to right now, because I don’t think we were protesting back then when I was in the ’50s,” Washington said, joking about her age (Washington is in her late 30s).
Washington’s 20-minute opener hyped the audience up for YoungWhite, the main event for the night. Young-White, a writer for the hit Netflix comedy series “Big Mouth,”
brought together a stream-of-consciousness act that included a slideshow on which insect species he thought were gay, an anecdote about how his X account was banned by the FBI during the 2020 George Floyd protests for posting instructions on how to combat the National Guard and his dating history.
“I’m dating right now,” YoungWhite said. “My ex really wanted kids, and I was like, ‘that is not why I chose to be gay.’”
Audience members told The Sun that the hour-long comedy routine brought important representation to campus — and a reprieve from exams.
To continue reading this article, please visit www.cornellsun.com
Rowan Wallin and Ashley Lee can be reached at rgw77@cornell.edu and 27leylee@gmail.com
Millions for mental health | Cornell parents John and Melissa Ceriale donated $20 million to Cornell Health to significantly expand access to mental health care on campus.
Christina MacCorkle can be reached at cmaccorkle@cornellsun.com
The Corne¬ Daily Sun
Independent Since 1880
142nd Masthead
GABRIEL LEVIN ’26
Editor in Chief
MAX FATTAL ’25
Associate Editor
HENRY SCHECHTER ’26
Opinion Editor
MARIAN CABALLO ’26
Multimedia Editor
MING DeMERS ’25
Photography Editor
ERIC HAN ’26
Arts & Culture Editor
SYDNEY LEVINTON ’27
Arts & Culture Editor
JADE DUBUCHE ’27
Social Media Editor
JESSIE GUILLEN ’27
Graphics Editor
JOLIN LI ’27
Layout Editor
PARIS CHAKRAVARTY ’27
Layout Editor
LEILANI BURKE ’25
Assistant Photography Editor
KARLIE McGANN ’27
Assistant Photography Editor
KIRA WALTER ’26
Lifestyle Editor
DANIELA ROJAS ’25
Assistant Lifestyle Editor
NICOLE COLLINS ’25
Weather Editor
Sophie Gross
JULIA SENZON ’26
Managing Editor
ERIC REILLY ’25
Assistant Managing Editor
MARISA CEFOLA ’26
News Editor
MATTHEW KIVIAT ’27
News Editor
CHRISTINA MacCORKLE ’26
News Editor
JANE McNALLY ’26 Sports Editor
GABRIEL MUÑOZ ’26 City Editor
KAITLIN CHUNG ’26 Science Editor
LAINE HAVENS ’25 Science Editor
ANUSHKA SHOREWALA ’26
Assistant News Editor
OLIVIA HOLLOWAY ’25
Assistant News Editor
DOROTHY FRANCE-MILLER ’27
Assistant News Editor
DINA SHLUFMAN ’27
Assistant News Editor
ALLISON HECHT ’26
Newsletter Editor
Sophie Gross is a sophomore in the College of Arts and Sciences. Her fortnightly column Observing aims to analyze popular and academic culture at Cornell in an attempt to understand current social and political trends sweeping the country. She can be reached at sgross@cornellsun.com.
Make Leisure Cool Again
Have you ever been in a casual conversation with friends when suddenly, someone brings up how much work they have to do? Then suddenly, you want to tell them how much work you have to do? Then next thing you know, it turns from a casual conversation into an all out war? I’m sure you have had, or at least witnessed an exchange like this. Why do people care so much (myself included, mind you) about winning the gold medal for being the busiest? Well, it seems that we have made being overworked cool.
It’s not just in these conversations that I feel the weight of this norm we have created. In every crevice of university life, I see this obsession with productivity manifesting. Most of my friends and acquaintances are involved in numerous clubs, many of them pre-professional clubs with the same amount of work as a three-credit class. According to some of my professors and national data, more and more students decide to double major each year; often, it seems, this is not because of the possible economic benefits, but because their peers are, or to pad their resumes.
So, it seems to be that there is a certain clout associated with having a full Google calendar. I mean, I get it: All those color blocks give a person an aura of accomplishment, I guess. And yet, as more students pack their schedules, rates of moderate to severe depression also have seen a major increase. I don’t think it would be crazy to suggest a correlation between these two sets of data: In my own life, there is a direct association between how much work I am doing and anxiety. A funny thing happens; Instead of feeling anxious while doing
Juliana Hu Pegues
Juliana Hu Pegues is an associate professor in the Department of Literatures in English. Tey can be reached at jhupegues@cornell. edu.
I’m With the Students: F*ck You, Boeing
On Sept. 18, over 100 pro-Palestine students, faculty and staff shut down a career fair at Statler Hall attended by defense contractors Boeing and L3Harris, two of the 10 companies directly named in the divestment referendum passed by Cornell undergraduate students last spring. Following a walkout organized by the student-led Coalition for Mutual Liberation, protesters disrupted the career fair through noise and chants, including “F*ck you, Boeing.” While I did not attend the protest, I co-sign their sentiment and support the student mandate to support a ceasefire in Gaza and divest from weapons manufacturers that support the ongoing war in Gaza. When it comes to Boeing, it’s personal.
One of my uncles worked for Lockheed for 50 years, and another uncle was a country director for Pan American World Airlines. Pan Am also brought my parents together; they met when my father served as Pan Am’s airport manager in Taipei, Taiwan, and my mother worked as his assistant. Our loyalty to the air industry includes an enduring identification with Boeing. After all, Pan Am and Boeing collaborated on multiple long-haul planes and are most well known for their development of the first jumbo jet, Boeing’s 747. My dad often explained why the 747 was the best plane in the world, and my childhood memories include playing with my prized inflatable toy Pan American Boeing 747, its iconic blue globe printed on the tail.
criminal. If their letter was written in an FWS course, I would most certainly ask them for a revision; in the parlance of our profession, they have failed to substantiate their argument.
There is a reason that protest is called civil disobedience. The protesters were boisterous, loud and created chaos by banging pots and pans. Profane, crass and disruptive the protest may have been; violent it was not. Even the allegation that some protestors “push[ed] aside” CUPD officers is relatively benign, which might be why the language of pushing past has become elevated to shoving and forcible entry by the president and provost in their communications. Stating that someone is criminal without evidence does not make them criminal, but it does constitute criminalization. Given the international and immigrant students; given the Black, Brown, Arab and Asian students; given the Indigenous students who have received temporary suspensions last spring and this semester, we cannot continue to ignore the racism underlying such fear-mongering rhetoric such as “intentionally menacing,” or the use of terms such as “repeat offender,” “assault” and “sexual predation” when discussing temporary suspensions of student activists.
schoolwork, as seems intuitive, I get anxious when I’m not doing schoolwork. And no, it’s not that feeling of impending doom one feels because they are procrastinating something with a due date. Rather, every time I feel that I am not being “productive” in some kind of way, I feel guilty.
It is at this crux where I pose the question: If we give so much weight to busyness and to productivity, what does it even mean to be productive? What are we as students actually producing; after completing a problem set, it’s not like I have created anything new. So how, and more importantly, when, are people creative?
The answer is when our minds are free.
Instead of feeling guilty for having leisure time, we should revere it. It is only with leisure that people have space to be thoughtful. These moments of nothingness are what allows people to grow as individuals and as intellectuals as well. The last time I read a book or wrote something not related to an assignment was summer, as it was the last time I had time enough to be bored. A university like Cornell is not meant to teach just within the classroom; half of the learning at a university should be outside of class, and I don’t mean homework! We need to rethink how we see leisure time, viewing it as crucial to personal and academic development, rather than just a period of laziness. Doing one major instead of two does not make someone less accomplished or intelligent, and we need to break from this way of thinking so we might all benefit from releasing some of the tension from Cornell’s pressure cooker environment.
There is another way to situate my personal and familial nostalgia, one that takes into account larger historical forces. My parents worked for Pan Am in the backdrop to the Vietnam War, as part of Taiwan’s development as a major transit site bringing U.S. soldiers to serve their tours of duty. Pan Am operated R&R, or rest and relaxation, flights during the Vietnam War, creating the infrastructure for sex tourism throughout Asia after the war. My own story is embedded within what scholars have termed the military industrial complex, and the attendant profits made from gendered and colonial violence. For Boeing’s part, its B-52 bombers were instrumental in nearly 114,000 U.S. combat missions in Vietnam, and Boeing would greatly expand its weapons manufacturing in the years following. Today, the majority of Boeing’s profits come from its defense contracts.I offer this reassessment of my family’s story because this is what critical inquiry demands of us and what, I believe, we aim to teach our students, to consider knowledge within larger systems of power, even and especially when we are complicit in said structures.
In their letter to Cornellians regarding the career fair action and in multiple utterances since, the president and provost characterize the protest as “involv[ing] violence” and protesters as “violent.” They describe “intentionally menacing” protestors who “screamed into bullhorns,” “banged cymbals, pots, and pans,” and “shouted profanity.” The president and provost attempt to construct violence through their use of alarmist and hyperbolic language, when in fact none of the actions they depict are actually violent or
The language and tactics of the administration would be ridiculous were they not so dangerous. Not only does the administration’s rhetorical construction of violence for nonviolent civil disobedience provide pretext for their broad suspension powers under the Interim Expressive Activity Policy, but it also obfuscates the real and actual violence at hand, which brings us back to Boeing. According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health, as of Oct. 9 of this year, over 42,000 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed, over 99,000 have been injured and approximately 10,000 are missing. This unprecedented level of death and destruction in Gaza relies on defense contractors such as Boeing. The company is the fourth largest U.S. defense contractor, and Boeing sends more weapons to Israel than any other manufacturer in the world. Boeing’s F-15 fighter jets and its inappropriately named Apache helicopters are indispensable to Israeli Air Force attacks on Gaza. Amnesty International reports that Boeing-produced Joint Direct Attack Munitions were used in two unlawful Israeli air strikes that killed 43 civilians in central Gaza. Evidence shows that Boeing’s GBU-39 small diameter bombs were used in an airstrike on unprotected tents in the Tel al-Sultan refugee camp in Rafah, starting a fire that killed at least 46 people and injured 240. SDB bombs have been implicated in additional attacks on residential buildings and at least three schools housing displaced persons. Cornell administrators would have us believe that pro-Palestine protestors on this campus are violent; this is deeply insulting given the abhorrent large-scale violence that students, staff and faculty are attempting to confront. Though profanity seems woefully insufficient, f*ck Boeing. I’m done being complicit in the violence of war and genocide. I support our students and their ethical and moral vision: divest now.
Prof. Joseph Margulies
Joseph Margulies is a Professor of Law and Government. He served as lead counsel in the War on Terror Supreme Court civil rights case Rasul v. Bush. Margulies can be reached at jm347@cornell.edu.
Learn Everything, Disclose Nothing
Editor’s Note: Cornell released footage from the Sept. 18th career fair protest the day after this column was published online.
Recent events on campus have got me thinking about surveillance. I litigate, study and teach in two worlds: post-9/11 civil liberties, and the excesses of the criminal legal system. These worlds converge in the surveillance state. The attacks of Sept. 11 stimulated an explosion in surveillance technology, which quickly made its way to conventional policing. Law enforcement all over the country now has an unprecedented ability to monitor and surveil both public and private activity. Though this observation is hardly new, fewer people have described the driving ambition of the surveillance state. What is the goal of all this sophisticated technology? You can sum it up in four words: learn everything; disclose nothing. Surveillance works best when people do not know they are being surveilled. Law enforcement wants to capture the public’s behavior — what they write, who they meet, where they browse — precisely when people think their behavior is unmonitored. To accomplish this, surveillance grows more invasive even as it becomes less visible. So, what does all this have to do with us? On September 23, Interim President Kotlikoff announced the administration’s response to the protesters who entered the Statler ballroom. He wrote that the demonstrators “displayed highly disruptive and menacing behavior” when they “forcibly entered the hotel by pushing aside Cornell Police Officers” and “forced their way past additional officers at the entrance to the Statler Ballroom.” A week later, the Interim President sent another note, insisting that the protest “was not a peaceful or harmless rally.” On the contrary, students “used force” to “breach” the Statler ballroom. They “physically forced their way through” two lines of police protection and “pushed police out of the way.”
These are serious allegations, and it is impossible to read them without conjuring an image of incipient violence. But how do we know if they are true? I suppose we can take Kotlikoff’s word for it, but fortunately, we don’t have to. All members of the Cornell University Police Department wear body cameras while they are on active duty. They have since early 2017. At that time, Chief Kathy Zoner and Deputy Chief Dave Honan welcomed the cameras.
As Zoner told a campus media outlet,“While body-worn cameras certainly are only a part of what goes into investigating criminal cases and public complaints, we and the community are on the same page that this equipment provides greater opportunity for objective review.” Honan said CUPD “wanted the cameras so the community could know that Cornell’s officers are doing what is expected ... video gives us an additional tool to investigate.”
Body cam footage is not the magic
pill that many people imagine it to be. It only captures the image directly in front of an officer, which means it often misses a great deal that might be part of an officer’s reasonable decision-making. But in this case, because the demonstrators allegedly approached the police in a small, contained space and “physically forced their way through” the police lines, the footage would almost certainly allow us to see for ourselves precisely what happened. And we know Cornell officers were wearing their cameras at the Statler; Kotlikoff claimed an officer’s body-worn camera.”
So, we don’t need to take the word of the Interim President that the students were “menacing.” We can gather the evidence and make up our own mind, which strikes me as the very purpose of higher education and infinitely preferable to a world in which we are consigned to trust the carefully chosen language of those with skin in the game. Meanwhile, Vice President of Student Life Ryan Lombardi recently described “how Cornell is preparing for another semester of campus tumult.” It seems the University is increasing its capacity to surveil by installing cameras in new and renovated buildings. That much has already been reported by The Sun. But we should read this fact alongside another: Cornell is currently revising University Policy 8.1, which regulates how the university will conduct video surveillance on campus.
The current version of 8.1 remains in effect while it is being revised. It states in part that Cornell “aims to provide a secure environment for members of its community and to protect personal safety and property, assisted by video surveillance systems technology. Such technologies, however, must be used only to meet the University’s critical goals for security, and in a manner that is sensitive to interests of privacy, free assembly and expression.” This all sounds nice, but the fact is, it’s being revised, and we have no idea what the new policy might provide.
I am not by nature alarmist. I wasn’t at the Statler and don’t know what the police body cam footage might reveal. Perhaps it fully supports what the Interim President has written. It is also possible that the new policy on video surveillance will be, both in theory and practice, “sensitive to [the] interests of privacy, free assembly, and expression.” But at least right now, we have no idea whether either of these things are true. We know that footage exists but that it has not been disclosed; we know that the University policy on surveillance is being amended, but we know nothing about what the final product might be or the process which produces it. Both these omissions are intolerable.
For those who till these fields, it’s all starting to look familiar: Learn everything; disclose nothing.
Ilana Livshits
Ilana Livshits is a second year student in the College of Arts & Sciences. Her fortnightly column Live Laugh Livshits focuses on politics, social issues and culture at Cornell. She can be reached at ilivshits@cornellsun.com.
Language As Violence: On Weaponized Neutrality
Last fall, following Hamas’ attacks in Israel on October 7, I wrote a column addressing former President Martha Pollack’s attempted apolitical stance on the Isreal-Hamas war as both a failure and a testament to Americans’ greater detachment from the gravity of war. One year later, I write to call attention to Cornell’s new administration following suit in former President Pollack’s mistakes.
Earlier this month, Interim President Michael Kotlikoff, who recently began his two-year term, spoke with The Sun on his intent to maintain personal neutrality and work toward institutional neutrality: “I’ve made a personal decision [to adopt institutional neutrality]. …I’ve always felt, personally, that it’s the right stance for a university. I don’t feel comfortable as a president opining on broad political issues, and since I’m coming into the presidency new, it actually is an advantage to be able to adopt that stance right from the start.” President Kotlikoff overlooks, however, that language is inherently opinionated. His very word choice is anything but neutral.
In his statement “On the Career Fair disruption and Code of Conduct violations,” President Kotlikoff willfully warps the language of peaceful protest. As Associate Editor Max Fattal writes, Kotlikoff “intimates that ‘preventing,’ ‘frightening’ and ‘harassing’ all constitute forms of violence, which broadens his definition to include any tangible impact (stopping anything that’s being protested) or the production of discomfort (making others feel frightened by the activism).” To take this one step further, Kotlikoff asserts that Career Fair attendees and recruitment officers need to feel “frightened” and “harassed” — rather than simply uncomfortable — by a group of students with a megaphone, Palestinian flag, and keffiyehs. His reliance on anger-inducing buzzwords reveals a crack in his “neutral” perspective of protest. The severity of his language is even more so farcical considering that the disruption of the Career Fair by the Coalition for Mutual Liberation was not, in fact, violent, in the sense that there was no “physical force or weapons to hurt, injure, or kill other people,” as defined by Collins Dictionary. Even more so, it was not an entire descent into disorder: it was a targeted disruption aimed at shutting down a Boeing and L3Harris recruitment event to pressure the administration into cutting ties with these companies. The “intimidation” was intended to remind the Cornell community of Boeing and L3Harris’s political agenda: supplying weapons to Israel.
One does not have to agree with CML’s politics to recognize the strength of its protests. Protests are meant to disrupt: only with disruption can activists fight against dominant power systems. The reason that
protests organized by Cornellians for Israel are not disruptive is that the organization can plainly see that the University is on its side. Likewise, Zionist protesters do not wear masks at vigils — while consistently do — because they are not threatened with disciplinary action. To borrow from Martin Luther King Jr.’s Letter from Birmingham Jail, “Lamentably, it is an historical fact that privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily.” I hope that a few minutes of disruption will momentarily remind people of morality and disrupt their apathy.
Vice President of University Relations Joel Malina’s language is even more insulting to the joke of an institutional attempt at neutrality. In a private meeting with Hillel’s network, Malina described comments that Prof. Wunpini Mohammed, communication, reposted on X as “troubling.” Prof. Mohammed simply expresses her political (and anti-Zion -
One does not need to agree with CML’s politics to recognize the strength of its protests
ist) stances on social media; Malina’s position as Vice President of University Relations allows the greater interpolation that the University finds pro-Palestinian activism troubling. In another instance of a laughable attempt at institutional neutrality, Malina’s language toward Prof. Russell Rickford, history is nothing short of demeaning. “Prof. Rickford, for lack of a better word, is very savvy when it comes to staying on this side of our policies… [he] very intentionally did not enter The Statler,” during the aforementioned protest. Malina’s phrasing suggests that Prof. Rickford is acting with a level of cunning or trickery to avoid consequences, or in a less-than-honorable way, rather than straightforwardly adhering to the rules. He neglects to mention Prof. Rickford’s respect for Cornell University, his deep commitment to teaching and, most importantly, that Prof. Rickford chose to abide by illogical campus policies. The recent failed attempts at University neutrality are a mere reflection that political neutrality is a reinforcement of more politically powerful (and likely hateful) forces. So, to President Kotlikoff, Malina, and the wider Cornell administration, your “neutrality” speaks louder than you realize. You’ve made your stance clear: against faculty, staff, graduate students and undergraduates who speak up for what they believe in. With my heart filled with love for the Cornell community, I ask: Take your hands off the student body — we actually have the dignity to acknowledge that we’re taking a stand.
SC I ENCE & TECH
Google Faces Legal Trouble After Landmark Antitrust Case
By KYLE CHUN Sun Contributor
After a landmark antitrust lawsuit regarding anti-competitive practices, Google faces a court order to open its app store, Play, to competitors. The Department of Justice may also ask the company to divide to promote competition in the search engine sector.
Back in August, a U.S. District Court ruled that Google maintains an illegal monopoly within the search engine industry, blocking competitors from gaining a significant portion of the search engine market.
“You can’t have half of a search engine.”
Prof. George Ha y, law
The court found that Google established contracts with large hightech companies, including Apple and Android, as the default search engine on these devices and their web browsers. The U.S. District Court found that this strategy effectively pushed out competitors like Microsoft Bing and DuckDuckGo, enabling Google to dominate the market.
By monopolizing the Internet search
By LAUREN HSU Sun Science Editor
Hurricane Milton swept through the Yucatan Peninsula, Cuba and Florida from Oct. 8 to 10, leaving its mark in history as the fifth most intense Atlantic hurricane and third fastest intensifying hurricane recorded.
Rapidly intensifying hurricanes are defined as those whose wind speeds increase by 30 knots in 24 hours, equivalent to 34 miles per hour within a day — Hurricane Milton intensified at over double this rate, at 80 knots in 24 hours from Oct. 6 to 7. Rapid intensification poses a serious threat, as residents have little time to evacuate.
According to Prof. Jonathan Lin, earth and atmospheric sciences, the frequency of these rapidly intensifying tropical cyclones will only increase in the future. Furthermore, the proportion of hurricanes of Milton’s magnitude will also increase.
This is because greenhouse gas emissions raise the amount of thermodynamic energy available to tropical cyclones. “Think of tropical cyclones as things that extract heat from the ocean and convert that energy into kinetic energy, which is the wind swirling,” Lin said.
Low vertical wind shear, or small changes in wind speed and direction with altitude, also enable hurricane intensification. The effects of climate change on
market, Google could boost digital ad prices, increasing its ad revenue. This created a positive feedback loop, allowing Google to further dominate the search market. The ruling found that Google violated Section 2 of the Sherman Antitrust Act, which bars businesses from monopolizing interstate commerce.
Google disagreed, asserting that consumers use the search engine simply
JASON HENRY/THE NEW YORK TIMES
because they prefer it. Google intends to appeal, claiming that the DOJ’s proposals are “radical” and that consumers can choose to change their device’s default browser. Google argues, therefore, that it has won users through its quality.
However, Google still faces mounting legal pressure, as a U.S. District Court ordered significant app store changes on Oct. 8. Google must now
allow Android users to download competitor platforms. Furthermore, Google cannot pay device manufacturers to preinstall Play.
The DOJ seeks to break up parts of Google to remedy its violations of antitrust law. The DOJ’s divestment proposals, such as forcing Google to divest its Chrome browser and Android OS, are due in November.
Despite the DOJ’s plans, a major Google Search split seems unlikely, according to Prof. George Hay, law. “You can’t have half of a search engine,” said Hay, who believes the remedy to Google’s behavior would not be to compartmentalize the company. Instead, Google would likely need to share some of its data with competitors.
Google also faces pressure in web advertising and the exploding AI market. If it loses its monopoly, the search market could develop drastically, allowing competitors to flood in. On a larger scale, antitrust wins could set a new legal precedent for disrupting high-tech monopolies, allowing the industry to innovate at an accelerated pace.
Google is due to propose its own remedies in December, and a hearing is set for April next year.
Kyle Chun can be reached at
Cornellians Reflect on the Effects and Implications of Hurricane Milton
vertical wind shear are unclear, because it varies by location.
Although climate change affects long-term hurricane patterns, it did not directly cause Hurricane Milton. “There has been a lot of talk, for example, of the Gulf being extremely warm for this time of year,” Lin said. “That is true, but doesn’t necessarily mean that that has caused Milton itself.”
Like all other hurricanes, Hurricane Milton originated from a tropical disturbance, which is a cluster of thunderstorms in the tropics. In addition to being the sec-
ond Category 5 hurricane in 2024 after Hurricane Beryl, Hurricane Milton impacted Florida less than two weeks after Hurricane Helene.
Lauren Bliss ’28 flew to her hometown east of Orlando on Oct. 12 for fall break and noticed differences in attitudes toward Hurricane Milton compared to past tropical storms. “We’ve been through a lot of hurricanes. This is the one I’ve seen my hometown most scared of,” she said. Accordingly, Bliss’s hometown prepared more for Hurricane Milton than for
other storms. “This is the first time I’ve ever seen stores completely out of stock. For some reason, people stocked up on toilet paper again,” she said.
Bliss spent the night of Oct. 9 on the phone with friends at home, screen sharing live news coverage of the hurricane as it hit Tampa, Florida. During the night, they watched the roof of the Tropicana Field stadium partially collapse, and Bliss’s friends experienced power outages.
Although Bliss’s travel plans were unaffected, she returned home to find a 40-foot-tall pine
tree fallen in her backyard. Bliss recalled seeing piles of debris waiting to be collected in driveways and several more fallen trees littering the sidewalk.
Kalia Cheung ’28 flew to Tampa International Airport for fall break on Oct. 11 and visited Orlando and Bradenton, Florida. Cheung had initially planned to stay at the University of Southern Florida but pivoted when Hurricane Milton caused campus closures and student evacuations.
“We’ve been through a lot of hurricanes. This is the one I’ve seen my hometown most scared of.”
Lauren Bliss ’28
“I saw the aftermath in Tampa, just trees being cleared,” Cheung said. “In Bradenton, we saw stop signs flipped over, street signs down and fences blown.”
Hurricane Milton will not be the end of rapidly intensifying hurricanes. “We can derive physical theories for how hurricanes intensify, and it tells us that rapid intensification will increase everywhere, not just in the Atlantic basin, but other places as well,” Lin said.
Lauren Hsu can be reached at lkh58@cornell.edu.
ksc224@ cornell.edu.
Reluctant remedy | Google faces a court order from the U.S. Department of Justice for maintaining an illegal monopoly within the search engine industry.
Horrific hurricane | Hurricane Milton swept acoss Florida, including the above community in Clearwater, from Oct. 8 to 10 and had far-reaching consequences locally and nationally.
ZACH WHITTMAN / NEW YORK TIMES
Packing For Paris: What To Bring Abroad Bridging Study and Practice: A Look Into the ILR Labor
By Maia Mehring By Giuliana Keeth
Maia Mehring is a sophomore in the School of Industrial and Labor Relations. She can be reached at mjm743@cornell.edu.
Packing was one of my worst enemies while I was preparing to travel to Paris. Nothing really prepares you for the physical and mental stress of packing to spend a prolonged period of time in a country thousands of miles away from home. October 15th was the confirmation date for study abroad students next semester, so for those of you who have just committed, it’s time to start thinking about what you want to bring!
Even though I made an entire spreadsheet to track the most important things that I needed to pack from home, it still took me nearly a whole day to have the satisfaction of zipping up my luggage and taking it downstairs. There are a lot of things to keep in mind when packing for studying abroad. Since it is such a complicated process, I’ve taken the initiative of splitting it up into the essentials:
Documents
Firstly, and most importantly, you must make sure to pack all of your important documents in a safe and accessible space. Your passport and any other forms of identification you’ll need for your flight have to remain in a backpack or carry-on bag within hands reach.
For documents such as your study abroad acceptance letter, accommodation summaries, vaccination cards, etc., I recommend digitally scanning each and transferring them onto a hard drive that will only be used for that purpose. You could buy a banker’s bag on Amazon and put the hard drive there, making sure to keep the bag keys in a place you’ll never forget.
Remember, you can always buy clothes, blankets, and toiletries in your new home—replacing a passport on the other hand will entail an incredibly complex and uncomfortable visit to the nearest U.S. Embassy or Consulate.
Toiletries
Even though I was super excited to explore the world of French skincare and beauty products, there are toiletries I use that I would not be able to find in a nearby Monoprix or Carrefour grocery market. If I tried to order them on Amazon France, I would be paying nearly three times the price just for shipping and handling.
Although cleanser or deodorant may be the last thing you are thinking about
when packing, trust me and leave a little bit of space to pack away a couple boxes of your most reliable toiletries. Once you arrive in Paris and have to get used to a new lifestyle, not adding your most basic skin care plan to the list of changes might mean a lot more.
Technology
Packing your headphones, computer chargers, and phone chargers seems like second nature when preparing for any trip. However, you need to remember that electricity voltages in France are not the same as in the United States. Make sure that you either buy a voltage converter or an electrical adapter so that you can charge all of your electronic devices during your stay. Both are equally important while abroad so be sure to make your purchase according to what your specific device requires. It’s important to determine which category it falls under so that you don’t end up frying circuits if it’s rated for a single AC voltage. Most modern phones and computers have input ranges and will not present this problem, but it’s better to be safe than sorry.
Reminders Of Home
The hardest obstacle for me to overcome during my first two weeks in Paris was dealing with homesickness. I had spent my last month in the United States carefully planning this trip and my arrival to the city, but nothing could prepare me for the loneliness I felt when I first landed and realized my family and friends were thousands of miles away. Somehow, it was almost as if I had conveniently forgotten that studying abroad meant I would lose all of my habits and lifestyle for an entire semester: no more studying with friends every weeknight, no more Target trips and smelling the candles at Bath and Body Works (which, by the way, I had no idea the store closed!), or even getting to taste my mother’s cooking at home.
Yet, that is the beauty of studying abroad. You are purposefully uprooting yourself and transplanting your life into a completely new environment. Like trees, we would not be able to survive without taking some traces of our past with us.
I’m not saying that you should take half of your bedroom with you when you study abroad. But, make sure
to take a couple small pictures of your loved ones and small reminders of the places you feel most at home in the United States. Being able to see these traces in your room despite all of the changes you are undergoing keeps you rooted and helps you stay positive and enthusiastic during your journey abroad.
Clothes
You might be asking me, how could you put clothing at the bottom of this list? Honestly, I have to admit that when I was packing, making sure I was bringing enough clothes was the very first thing I worried about.
After having lived a month in Paris, though, I’ve come to regret a lot of the decisions I took when choosing outfits. If you don’t live close to the Cornell campus and have to fly back home each semester, this step will probably be much easier for you.
But for those of you who have the privilege of toting an entire carload of items for move-in, listen up. I will emphasize this technique for packing: layering. Instead of trying to pack multiple set ou tfits, try and make sure that everything you are taking with you can be used in a variety of ways, especially when it comes to matching with a jacket you like. I took way too many articles of clothing that only combine with one jacket, leaving me stranded midway through the week with no cohesive outfit to create.
Also, make sure that you are packing with the weather in mind. If you are planning to study abroad in the fall, make sure you have enough warm sweaters and transition jackets so that you do not feel chilly in October and November before you can don a thick, winter jacket. If you are studying during the Spring semester, make sure you take winter wear, but also keep in mind that you don’t want to be absolutely melting once the temperature warms up. Don’t forget, you are going to Paris, the capital of fashion! Prioritize leaving some space for new additions to your wardrobe that you will want to take back and wear at Cornell.
You’ve reached the end of the essential packing list! Woohoo! Ensuring that you have everything packed is the most crucial step before studying abroad. Bon voyage et bonne chance!
The 22nd annual ILR Labor Roundtable is right around the corner, with the date for representatives in labor-related professions across the country to converse with students set for Friday, Nov. 15.
The ILR Labor Roundtable is a collaboration between the ILR School and the ILR Worker Institute in the form of an event bringing labor professionals and students together in hopes of “introducing practice to people pursuing the study,” said current Labor Roundtable Coordinator Zohar Grinvald ‘24.
Beginning at 1:15 p.m. and ending at 5:00 p.m. on Nov. 15, students can connect with those working in labor (primarily union leaders, negotiators, and attorneys) on an intimate level and learn about the current state of the labor movement at large.
Some of this year’s roundtable speakers include Michael Herron, an arbitration advocate and contract negotiator at the United Federation of Teachers, Sarah O’Quinn, senior government relations officer at the International Labour Organization, and Emily Rodekhor ’15, vice president of the Ithaca Fire Association.
The ILR Labor Roundtable event was first organized 22 years ago by students with the guidance of Professor Kate Bronfenbrenner ’76, who is also the director of Labor Education Research at the ILR School.
“When students first get to ILR, there is an executive and management event where they learn all about corporations,” she told the Sun. “But there was nothing to introduce them to labor.”
Thinking back to the original founders’ intent, Bronfenbrenner stressed the importance of diversity among the professionals chosen to participate in the event. “[The founders] made a point of making sure that those who were invited were people from all different occupations in the labor movement,” she said. “[This] gives students an opportunity to see what the possible careers in labor are and what the new generation of the working and labor movement is.”
Beyond diversity in occupations, ensuring students saw themselves represented in terms of gender and race was a critical component of the mission.
“Many students had a stereotype of this older White guy in a gray suit and patent leather shoes that was from the 1950s. [The participant lineup] was always a mix of men and women and people of color,” Bronfenbrenner said.
Ellen Stutzman ’04, a founder of the first roundtable at the ILR School and now chief negotiator for the Writers Guild of America West, echoed Bronfenbrenner’s sentiments regarding the purpose of the event. A student of Professor Bronfenbrenner’s, Stutzman wanted to expand opportunities available to students to learn about careers in the labor movement.
“It was a piece of my labor activism at Cornell, which is where I got interested in the labor movement,” Stutzman recalled. “The whole experience made me want to work in the labor movement, and the labor roundtable was great
because you got to see a breadth of careers.”
The day is organized so that students get to speak to each professional for 20-30 minutes. Before being seated at tables in the Statler’s Carrier Ballroom, visitors will give a 30-second pitch -about who they are and their careers. Participating professionals rotate between the tables and students can come and go as they please.
“[Conversations include] anything from what is actually going on in labor right now to what a job in labor means,” Grinvald said. In her experience, roundtable interactions with union leaders, negotiators and arbitrators, attorneys, and others have often been student-guided through targeted questions for the professionals.
Though orchestrated by the ILR School, students of all majors and backgrounds are invited to the event. After helping coordinate last year’s roundtable, Rachel Marcus ‘26 was particularly enthusiastic about encouraging students studying other disciplines to attend.
“The people marketed towards the most are those who may want to pursue a career in the labor movement,”shesaid.“However,alotofpeopledon’t really know about the labor movement in general.” Grinvald reiterated that the roundtable is applicable to courses of study outside of ILR. “Work is relevant to everyone. Every industry, every profession,” she said. UAW Local 2300 President Christine Johnson will participate in the event, creating an opportunity for students to engage in meaningful conversations regarding the recent United Auto Workers strike on campus and the agreement workers made with the university.
Attendees have the opportunity to develop connections that lead to internships and jobs going forward. Grinvald explains that coordinators have also experienced a “community-building side effect” as a result of their networking efforts while finding participants.
Bronfenbrenner expressed the value of the skills student coordinators hone through planning a roundtable event of this caliber. “The students who are actually on the planning committee get to learn to plan an event like this, and the contacts they meet each year end up being people who call me asking for the students’ names wanting to hire them.”
Grinvald recommends that students prepare meaningful questions for the professionals ahead of time. “They’re taking time out of their day to talk to you. They’re expecting questions. Students get to really chart the event.”
Stutzman highlighted the power insight into the labor movement gives students. “Unions are the best counterweight that exists to corporate power in this society.”
“I think if you’re at all interested in the labor movement, either working in it or just learning more about it, it’s a really great opportunity,” said Marcus. The speakers are different every year, and they bring with them diverse lived experiences and stories to share with students.
Giuliana Keeth is a junior in the College of Arts & Sciences. She can be reached at gmk74@ cornell.edu.
ZOHAR GRINVALD / SUN LIFESTYLE CONTRIBUTOR
&
Bon Iver’s SABLE,: Identity and Self-Forgiveness
By YAELIN HOUGH Arts & Culture Contributor
It’s been five years since genre-defining, indie-folk band Bon Iver released i,i. To say I’ve been waiting for their next release would be an understatement.
Bon Iver’s latest EP, SABLE, , captures a familiar, raw melancholy reminiscent of their 2007 breakthrough debut album, For Emma, Forever Ago The essence of “cabin-folk” is palpable throughout both, not only in the sentimental lyrics but also in the raw emotion of the songs. If For Emma, Forever Ago was the beginning of Bon Iver’s journey, SABLE, embodies the lessons learned along the way. Abandoning the experimental folktronica sound of i,i , the three songs in SABLE, offer a cleaner sound, featuring layers of fingerstyle guitar and frontman Justin Vernon’s signature guttural falsetto. Written during a period of anxiety and self-doubt, SABLE, distinguishes the identity of Justin Vernon from that of Bon Iver; as Vernon says in a statement released with the album, “being Bon Iver meant playing a part.” Wrapped up in a modest twelve minutes, SABLE, draws inspiration from all of Bon Iver’s previous albums, unraveling Vernon’s identity in three short songs.
The album opens with a shrill hum, a disorienting lead-up to the first song, “THINGS BEHIND THINGS BEHIND THINGS.”
“…”, the title of the intro track, not only introduces the album but declares it; it hooks the listener by
creating a haunting air of anticipation.
The first real song of the album, “THINGS BEHIND THINGS BEHIND THINGS,” begins with a palpitating, muted guitar rhythm, followed by two trebly guitars swelling and receding in a melancholic guitar line. The song is by far the most instrumentally involved of the three: with an echoey synth and violin backing the two main guitars, the song is an atmospheric and chamber-folk style start to the album.
Justin Vernon’s husky baritone voice cuts through the instrumental mix as he sings about an insecurity of his own identity and a loss of grip on his art: “I get caught looking in the mirror on the regular / and what I see there resembles some competitor.”
The song, which was first written in 2020, encapsulates the anxiety and uncertainty in a changing world. It is poignant in the ambiguity of its repeated refrain: “there are things behind things behind things/and there are rings within rings within rings.” Using the image of the rings of a tree, Vernon admits to fearing his inability to escape time. Strangely enough, the song itself serves as an escape. Within its melodic and lyrical stagnancy, time seems to stop, taken over by the melancholy of the guitar line, the haziness of the fading synths, and the heaviness of Vernon’s voice.
Featuring little more than a reverb-boosted guitar line and vocals, “S P E Y S I D E” is a pleasant transition into Bon Iver’s more transcendental, singer-songwriter style. Originally released as a single, “S P
E Y S I D E” holds its own both as a stand-alone song and also as an essential component of the album. Defined by a quivering falsetto and clean, wistful vocals, the song, like the previous one, remains relatively stagnant in its composition. In both “THINGS BEHIND THINGS BEHIND THINGS” and “S P E Y S I D E,” Bon Iver tastefully avoids any of the experimental instrumentation of his previous albums. The song’s power, then, lies foremost in his honest lyrics. It’s emotionally raw, it’s an apology, it’s an inner monologue: “Man, I’m so sorry / I got the best of me.” Almost self-indulgent in its honesty, “S P E Y S I D E” is an intensely raw catharsis and a pivot around which the album centers.
The music winds down completely with the final track of the album, “AWARDS SEASON.” Defined by its instrumental emptiness, “AWARDS SEASON” begins with a hollow, whistling sound before Vernon begins to sing. If “S P E Y S I D E” was an apology, “AWARDS SEASON” is self-forgiveness. The song starts off tentatively, both in its lyrics and instrumentation: “I can handle / way more than I can handle.” Although the lyrics may sound like the beginning to another apology, the song turns quickly to something more like acceptance. As the soft whistling in the background grows to a howling wind and the chords on the piano begin to ring like church bells, “AWARDS SEASON” climaxes with an ensemble of horns. It is a mix of self-forgiveness and resignation; it is the state of understanding in confu -
sion. The longest song on the album, “AWARDS SEASON” never quite ends; the wind grows softer and the whistling shallower, but there is no true end to accepting yourself. The song fades out, and the listener is left longing for a resolution that Vernon does not grant.
In Bon Iver’s SABLE, is the emergence of a newfound confidence. The culmination of a three-yearlong breakdown, SABLE, takes the listener through a journey of suffering and self-forgiveness; as each track loses more instruments, Vernon’s poignant lyrics and heady vocals take absolute control over the album. Although Vernon does not provide a conclusion, he provides a glimpse of himself, transcendental in its honesty. It is this exact honesty with which SABLE, was written that gives Bon Iver’s music a tangible soul.
Student Artist Spotlight: Nadia Holcomb
On Oct. 11, I visited BFA student Nadia Holcomb ’25 at her studio space in Tjaden Hall for an interview. We discussed artistic mediums, post-grad plans, how her unique experiences have informed her art and what art as a whole means to her. Holcomb, who is in her final three semesters of her BFA, has just recently returned from spending two years living in monasteries — an experience that profoundly shaped her artistry.
The walls of Holcomb’s studio area are covered in pinned-up artwork, including finished pieces and works in progress. Her work comes in many different mediums, and her foremost priority is mark-making. Holcomb’s process, though ever-changing, lately starts with choosing a material she thinks will make interesting marks, for example, a large sheet of butcher paper. Next, Holcomb says: “I kind of surrender. I try to just let go of myself and just do something intuitively and not think about it too much.” Her art is a call and response, where every mark on the page leads to the next. “I’ll make a mark, then I’ll respond to that. I’ll look at it and just do the next thing and think
as little as possible. I don’t want to get caught up in shaping it into something or defining it,” Holcomb shared. She views her art as an intuitive, instinctive exercise. She rotates through multiple pieces at a time as part of her process, seeking to be as uninhibited and automatic with her work as possible. Much of this way of thinking, Holcomb expressed, relates to the time she spent living in monasteries.
Although she has spent time in Hindu, Buddhist and Catholic monasteries, Holcomb identified her three-month stay at an Eastern Orthodox skete to be the most impactful. “It was a very intense experience. It felt like I was there for a lifetime, not only three months,” she said, “I was just living for something else, in a way that felt really meaningful and fulfilling, but also really intense at times.” One of her responsibilities while there was to do manual labor around the monastery. To Holcomb, “It’s not about the sweeping, it’s more about yourself and letting your life be used for this greater thing.” She feels a similar catharsis in intaglio printing, another of her preferred mediums. Intaglio printing, or copper plate printing, involves etching a design into copper
and immersing it in a bath of acid. Holcomb finds it rewarding because “it’s very intense and there’s a lot of process, and you’re really manually laboring.”
Holcomb came into Cornell as an entomology major, a far cry from the BFA she’s pursuing today. But to her, the choice to switch wasn’t a difficult one at all. Upon coming to college, Holcomb felt profoundly unfulfilled, asking herself: “What is the point of living if I can’t create?” Holcomb has been an artist for her entire life; she views art and life as inextricably linked ideas. “In a large sense, we are all artists,” Holcomb said, recalling how the toddlers she used to work with would always be creating art. Staying an artist into adulthood, however, she sees as a struggle that all artists face.
When asked about the way she views art as a whole, Holcomb again finds its meaning mirrored in the monastic idea of something greater. “To me, the best way for me to describe it is as a matter of faith. I mean that in a non-religious way … Art is trying to capture this thing that is beyond itself. When I’m working, it’s so easy for me to get caught up in what I’m doing and overthink it. I want to control the piece and
make something good, but I have to constantly remind myself that it’s not about me … if I make it about me, it’s going to be so limited because I’m so limited.” It comes as no surprise, then, with such poignant ideas about art, that Holcomb’s work betrays expression rather than representation. Viewing her art is an emotional experience, one that makes you wonder about something bigger than the art itself. Her work connects to a larger, universal feeling, one that she tries to channel into it as selflessly as possible.
As for post-grad plans, Holcomb is approaching life the same way she approaches art: one step at a time. Joining a monastery or working the land are both viable options, but making art will always be part of her. “I will continue to make art. I don’t see it as a professional practice. I’m not trying to be a professor or work in a gallery. This is just something that I need to explore right now, and for the rest of my life.”
Holcomb will be graduating next fall, so if you feel that poignant con -
Yaelin Hough is a freshman in the College of Arts & Sciences. She can be reached at yh2299@ cornell.edu.
COURTESY OF JAGJAGUWAR
Melissa Moon is a freshman in the College of Arts and Sciences. She can be reached at mm3457@cornell.edu.
By MELISSA MOON Arts & Culture Contributor
Fill in the empty cells, one number in each, so that each column, row, and region contains the numbers 1-9 exactly once. Each number in the solution therefore occurs only once in each of the three “directions,” hence the “single numbers” implied by the puzzle’s name. (Rules from wikipedia.org/ wiki/Sudoku)
Road Rage by Elliot Kim ’28
Cornell’s Biggest Fright by Serin Koh ’25
“Christmas” by Hannia Arevalo ’27
CML Protests Trustee Meeting
WALKOUT
Continued from page 1
“I wasn’t saying anything [or] doing anything offensive, simply standing there observing, being myself, and this man decided to resort to violence just because he simply disagreed with me,” Silberstein said. “As someone who believes in the power of free speech and respectful discourse, it’s frankly disheartening and troubling that peaceful dialogue has been replaced by violence and has really become unattainable on this campus.”
She identified the masked protester as Hasham Khan ’26. Khan told The Sun his backpack accidentally bumped into Silberstein, whom he did not see. Khan said Silberstein pushed herself against the backpack. He denied Silberstein’s claim that he screamed at her, saying he apologized as he was walking away.
“I wasn’t saying anything [or] doing anything offensive, simply standing there observing, being myself, and this man decided to resort to violence just because he simply disagreed with me.”
Amanda Silberstein ’26
“I turned around to see her willingly pushing herself into my backpack. I said, ‘don’t do that. My bad,’ clarifying don’t push yourself into me and my bad if I pushed into you, and then I kept walking.”
After 45 minutes of speeches, the crowd began to march down College Avenue to the Myron Taylor Hall courtyard. As they walked, they chanted “Disclose, divest, we will not
stop, we will not rest.” Cornell University Police Department officers directed traffic as the protesters crossed the intersection.
About a dozen CUPD officers, Public Safety Ambassadors and private security guards lined the Myron Taylor Hall courtyard and protected building entrances. Protesters entered the courtyard and assembled in a tight circle close to one of the doorways.
At the center of their circle, demonstrators erected a tent on the courtyard grass.
“We are putting up these tents as a symbol of Palestinian resistance,” protesters said. “People in Gaza continue to be displaced, living in tents that are moments later bombed and set ablaze by Israel. This is a symbol of our solidarity with the liberation of people.”
At around 2:15 p.m., protesters began beating on a drum. Officers moved in single-file, placing themselves between the protesters and a door leading into Myron Taylor Hall and directing the demonstrators to stop hitting the drum. The protestors moved away from the doorway while chanting “CUPD, KKK, IDF, they’re all the same.”
“Cornell trustees, we see you. You fund genocide too,” chanted protesters as they marched out of the law school at about 2:45 p.m., pouring a red liquid over the stairs leading out of the courtyard before heading towards West Campus along Campus Rd, slowing traffic.
Protesters dispersed shortly after arriving at the bottom of Libe Slope.
The walkout comes days after the University suspended four students because of their involvement in a career fair disruption in Sept. 18, barring them from campus for three years.
At time of publication, CUPD’s online crime log does not list any arrests in connecw-
Aarush Rompally and Gabriel Muñoz can be reached at arr252@cornell.edu and gmunoz@cornellsun.com.
Four Pro-Palestinian Students Banned From University for Three Years
SUSPENSION
Continued from page 1
“This doesn’t stop with Taal,” Berman said, referring to Momodou Taal, the international graduate student who garnered worldwide media attention after Cornell suspended him for participating in the career fair shutdown. “It’s a scare tactic. … Students should not be afraid of speaking out when the University is frankly going back on its promise of free speech.”
“Interim measures remain in place to protect the University community, including protecting ongoing activities essential to the mission of the University.”
Joel Malina
An OSCCS representative declined to comment. A University spokesperson referred The Sun to an Oct. 10 statement in which Vice President for University Relations Joel Malina explained that students facing punishment under Cornell’s interim protest policy can appeal decisions or resolve them through discussions with OSCCS.
“Interim measures remain in place to protect the University community, including protecting ongoing activities essential to the mission of the University,” Malina wrote.
Atakan Deviren ’27, former co-chair of Cornell’s chapter of the Young Democratic Socialists of America, is among the four students barred from campus for three years. Deviren’s suspension comes after he was arrested last week, along with two others, for not adhering to police’s orders to remain outside of the Statler Hotel and pushing past officers who were guarding the entrance of the building according to a Cornell University Police informational release.
“They what to break my spirit. But I won’t let them.”
Atakan Deviren ’27
Like Berman, Liang ordered Deviren to an in-person meeting on Wednesday, where she served him a no-trespass order. Deviren said Liang refused to tell him what specific charges the University was disciplining him for.
“They don’t have to have any evidence of wrongdoing,” Deviren claimed. “They can essentially just do whatever they want, and I am at the mercy of the school.”
Deviren remains defiant. Compared to the “thousands upon thousands of people [who] are dying in Gaza,” he called his suspension “a drop in the bucket.”
“They want to break my spirit,” Deviren said. “But I won’t let them.”
Ximena Balli and Aarush Rompally can be reached at xsb2@cornell.edu and arr252@cornell.edu.
Football Bounces Back to Beat Bucknell
By ELI FASTIFF and ANIKA KOLANU Sun Staff Writers
Coming off a three-game homestand, football (2-3, 1-1 Ivy) aimed to snap its losing streak in a non-conference matchup against Bucknell (3-4, 1-0 Patriot). After a hard-fought battle from the offense against Harvard under Friday night lights last week, it was time for the defense to rise to the challenge. Both sides of the ball came together on Saturday, securing the 34-21 victory over the Bison.
After winning the coin toss, Cornell’s offense hit the ground running with senior quarterback Jameson Wang leading a six-play, 75-yard drive, capped off by a 20-yard touchdown catch and run by sophomore wide receiver Samuel Musungu.
Bucknell attempted to counter, cutting through a Cornell defense that had given up more than 30 points in back-to-back games. Quarterback Michael Hardyway, making his first career start for the Bison, took just six plays to get his team into the red zone.
On third-and-seven, Hardyway scrambled out of the pocket and sprinted towards the goal line. However, just before the Bison QB could even the score two Cornell defenders upended him, forcing a fumble which senior linebacker Luke Banbury jumped on at the one-yard line.
Sensing the early momentum, sophomore running back Ean Pope took off on a 54-yard run on the first play of the drive. A few plays later, Wang connected with junior wide receiver Parker Woodring for 32 yards. Poised to take the 14-0 lead, Wang underthrew a fade, resulting in his first interception of the season.
Quickly, Banbury returned the favor. Three plays after Wang was picked off, he jumped a Bison route and ran the ball back for a 24-yard pick-six, giving the Red the 14-0 lead.
After a Bucknell three-and-out, Cornell’s offense took the field and kept up the pressure. The resulting 63-yard drive ended with the second Wang-to-Musungu touchdown pass and a 21-0 Red lead with over a minute still left in the first quarter.
After trading punts to start off the second quarter, the Bison started play with a fumbled handoff recovered by senior defensive lineman Maxwell Van Fleet — the third Bucknell turn-
over of the afternoon. With solid field position, Cornell took four plays to get the ball to the one-yard line. However, a holding penalty wiped out a Cornell touchdown, and the Red eventually settled for a field goal.
Down 24-0, the Bucknell offense finally came to life, confusing Cornell with passes over the middle and eventually drawing a pass interference penalty to get the ball in scoring position. Two Logan Bush rushes later and the Bison were in the end zone for the first time that afternoon.
After another field goal from sophomore kicker Alan Zhao with just about a minute
to go, Cornell was ready to enter halftime up 20. But a penalty on the kickoff gave Bucknell excellent field position, and Hardyway capitalized, finding a receiver in the endzone to make it 27-14 as each team left for their respective locker rooms.
Despite racking up over 100 yards in penalties, Cornell entered halftime with a two-score lead, fueled by 348 yards of total offense and a commanding possession advantage. Wang amassed 222 yards through the air with two touchdown passes — both to Musungu — boasting an impressive 144.5 QB rating. Pope led the Red on the ground, averaging over nine yards per carry on eight attempts.
Returning from the halftime break, the Cornell defense held the Bison to another three-and-out. Soon after, Bucknell’s defense forced a punt, but Banbury — arguably the player of the game — got right back to work, forcing another fumble. Wang found Woodring, bringing Cornell’s lead back up to 20.
Down 34-14 in the fourth quarter, the Bison mounted multiple long drives, one resulting in a turnover on downs and another in a touchdown.
Despite a second Wang interception late in the fourth, the score would finish 34-21, and the Red would head home with its first win against Bucknell since 2016.
To continue reading this story, please visit www.cornellsun.com.
Anika Kolanu and Eli Fastiff can be reached at akolanu@ cornellsun.com and efastiff@cornellsun.com, respectively.
Sun Staf Football Picks — Week Five
LEILANI BURKE / SUN ASSISTANT PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR
SUNBURSTS: Fall Foliage Fun
As the turning of the leaves marks the start of the second half of the semester, Cornellians have enjoyed the fall foliage and autumn activities.
By SUN PHOTOGRAPHY DEPARTMENT
SUNRISE | Students walk to class as the sun rises over Libe Slope.
WORKING HARD | Taking advantage of the warm weather, a student studies under a tree on the Arts Quad.
EZRA | Leaves begin to fall in the Arts Quad, surrounding the Ezra Cornell statue.
AMPLE APPLES | Baskets of several apple varieties are up for sale at Indian Creek Farm.
BAILEY | At Bailey Hall, signs of autumn emerge as the leaves turn red.
KING DAVID | Cornellians and Ithacans alike spend their fall weekends apple picking at Indian Creek Farm. A King David apple was one of the varieties available.
THE SLOPE | A student trudges up Libe Slope.
UP IN THE AIR | A hot-air balloon flies above Indian Creek Farm.
(Nathan Ellison/Sun Staf Photographer)
Photo
(Nathan Ellison/Sun Staf Photographer)
(Jaein Ku/Sun Staf Photographer)
(Nathan Ellison/Sun Staf Photographer)
(Matthew Korniczky/Sun Staf Photographer)
(Karlie McGann/Sun Assistant Photography Editor)
(Karlie McGann/Sun Assistant Photography Editor)
(Karlie McGann/Sun Assistant Photography Editor)
Election 2024
Zooming in on the Ballot
New Yorkers to Decide on Equal Rights Amendment
Voters will consider amendment to ofer explicit protections for abortion, gender and sexual orientation
By SKYLAR KLEINMAN Sun Senior Writer
Oct. 9 — After nearly two dozen states banned or restricted access to abortion following the overturn of Roe v. Wade in 2022, New York voters will determine whether the state protects abortion in its state constitution this election.
The Equal Rights Amendment, also known as Proposal 1, makes New York one of ten states where voters will have the opportunity to vote for an abortion-related state constitutional amendment.
Proposal 1 guarantees “equal protection” against discrimination based on “sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, pregnancy, pregnancy outcomes and reproductive healthcare and autonomy,” in addition to traits that have been protected under past laws, such as race, color, ethnicity and national origin.
If passed, the proposal would amend Article I, Section 11 — the Bill of Rights to the New York State Constitution — to expand on current protections against discrimination on the basis of race and religion.
Progressive organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union and Planned Parenthood have rallied behind the amendment, claiming that it will effectively protect access to abortion, LGBTQIA+ rights and other issues that have been in unstable political territory since 2022.
Sasha Ahuja, the campaign director for pro-ERA organization New Yorkers for Equal Rights, hopes that voters will consider the “long-term” protection of their rights when considering Proposal 1 on the ballot.
“In June of 2022, Americans – and New Yorkers – were shocked that the Supreme Court overturned protections that we thought were safe all across the country,” Ahuja said. “It’s just a stark reminder that laws can be changed at any time, and the strongest and most protective thing we can do is make sure that our rights and freedoms are protected in our state’s constitution.”
In light of Dobbs, the New York legislature passed Proposal 1 in its second consecutive session in Jan. 2023, paving the way for the proposal to appear on the ballot this election.
According to Ahuja, the proposal will “close loopholes” in existing protections against discrimination in New York’s constitution.
Though legislation such as the New York Human Rights Law, the New York Reproductive Health Act of 2019 and the Marriage
Equality Act of 2011 offer some protection against discrimination, no current constitutional provision protects the broadened categories outlined in the proposal.
New Yorkers for Equal Rights is one of several progressive groups concerned about the stability of these laws while they lack a constitutional basis.
These concerns echo those of the New York State Legislature which expressed the need to adopt a “modern vision of equality” that “demands comprehensive equal protection” through the proposal.
The legislature also added that “many individuals are themselves members of numerous communities, identities, and protected classes, and true equality and justice demand protections that recognize the interconnected nature of discrimination.”
Voters across Tompkins County — such as Yvonne Fogarty, a member of the Tompkins County Democratic Committee — are
working to champion the proposal locally by encouraging New Yorkers to “vote yes on Prop 1.”
“We have yard signs that we’re giving out,” Fogarty said. “We’re talking to everybody who comes in to pick up other yard signs. The people who are canvassing for Josh Riley are mentioning it when they go door-to-door.”
Josh Riley, the Democratic candidate for the NY-19 Congressional district, has publicly supported both Proposal 1 and the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment at the federal level.
Rep. Marc Molinaro (R-NY), the incumbent for NY-19, has recently gained national attention for becoming the first Republican to co-sponsor legislation on federal IVF protections, alongside Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY).
Molinaro has also opposed a national abortion ban and affirmed his belief that “health decisions should be between a woman and her doctor, not in Washington,” in an advertisement titled “Where I Stand” released in August. He has not commented on Proposal 1.
However, Democrats have cast doubt regarding Molinaro’s dedication to pro-choice policies, pointing to his recent campaign collaboration with Rep. Kat Cammack (R-FL), the co-chair of the House Pro-Life Caucus.
The City of Ithaca Republican Committee did not respond to a request for comment regarding their stance on Proposal 1.
According to Ahuja, while New Yorkers generally support protections against discrimination and on abortion, one of the biggest challenges facing Proposal 1 is ensuring that New Yorkers know that it is on the back of their ballots.
Alanna Congdon, the Tompkins County Republican Commissioner, said that the Tompkins County Board of Elections is working to encourage voters to remember to vote on Proposal 1.
To continue reading this article please visit www.cornellsun.com
Skylar Kleinman can be reached at skleinman@cornellsun.com.
How NY-19’s Candidates Get Teir Funding
By GISELLE REDMOND Sun Contributor
Otc. 23 — Rep. Marc Molinaro (R-NY) and his Democratic challenger, Josh Riley are vying for New York’s 19th Congressional seat in one of this year’s most heated and consequential House of Representatives races. Over the course of the race, the two candidates have taken starkly different approaches to funding their bids.
In his campaign funding, Riley has pledged to not accept donations from corporate political action committees, while Molinaro has been greatly boosted by pro-Isreal and business-oriented PACs. And yet, by mostly relying on individual contributions, Riley has managed to outraise Molinaro by more than $3 million at the time of publication.
Molinaro was elected to the House in 2022 after narrowly beating out Riley by 4,000 votes. In a swing district just two weeks away from Election Day, fundraising could prove to be the deciding factor in this race by allowing candidates to further promote and staff their campaigns.
The Sun broke down the numbers to find where the candidates are getting their money from.
Riley’s campaign has received nearly $6.7 mil-
lion in individual contributions and about $8.1 million overall, according to the Federal Election Commission. Individual contributions are donations typically made by singular citizens who feel particularly invested in a campaign, as opposed to larger organizations or businesses.
Of $1.4 million Riley has raised outside of individual donations, more than $440,000 has come from other political committees, including a host of unions and association political action committees advocating for abortion rights, worker’s rights and increased funding for public schools, according to the FEC.
Molinaro, on the other hand, has raised nearly $5 million for his campaign, with $2.1 million coming from individuals, according to OpenSecrets.
While about 83 percent of Riley’s campaign has come from individual donations, individual contributions compose only 44.2 percent of Molinaro’s campaign.
Since 2023, Molinaro has accepted approximately $1.7 million from PACs to fund his campaign— equaling nearly 35 percent of his total funding.
Notably, Elon Musk’s America PAC has donated $570,600 to Molinaro’s campaign alongside millions to Republican candidates running for House seats around the country.
Molinaro’s campaign has also accepted tens of thousands of dollars from pro-Israel PACs, and significant support from the Congressional Leadership Fund and the National Republican Campaign Committee.
Many top donations also come from organizations representing asset management, oil transportation and real estate.
Molinaro has taken a firm anti-immigrant stance, repeating rhetoric said by Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump during the Sept. 10 ABC Presidential Debate. Last month, Molinaro shared a post on X that promoted the idea that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio are eating pets and wildlife.
Additionally, Molinaro has accused Riley in ads and campaign states of being too lenient on border policy, claiming that Riley would allow illegal immigrants to take jobs that should belong to U.S. citizens.
In turn, Riley has criticized Molinaro’s strict opposition to abortion, highlighting Molinaro’s record of voting for restrictions on abortion services. Riley’s ads have claimed that Molinaro is in favor of a national abortion ban, a claim Molinaro denies.
Giselle Redmond can be reached at gr389@cornell.edu.
Vying for votes | People cast their ballots at Alice Cook House during the Ithaca Elections, 2023.
JULIA NAGEL / SUN FILE PHOTO
Election 2024
Ithaca Ballot Guide
• TO VOTE, COMPLETELY FILL IN THE OVAL NEXT TO THE CHOICE
• Use only the marking device provided or a number 2 pencil.
• If you make a mistake, don’t hesitate to ask for a new ballot. If you erase or make other marks, your vote may not count.
NY-19th (D) — House Seat
Josh Riley
cally focus on specific issues and values.
As an Endicott, New York native, Riley connected his experience of growing up in a blue-collar community to his political goal of uplifting the working and middle class.
“[When] I was growing up, I saw us lose [blue collar] jobs when the plants closed down,” Riley said. “In our economy and in our politics, the deck has really been stacked against working families across upstate New York, … so I’m running for Congress to change that.”
Josh Riley will face incumbent Rep. Marc Molinaro (R-NY) in a heated rematch for New York’s 19th Congressional District, which stretches from Tompkins County in the west to Rensselaer in the east. In 2022, Riley narrowly lost to Molinaro by just 1.5 points in a contested race.
Riley received $242,500 from PACS so far with $200,000 coming from ideological interests, which typi-
Born and raised in Binghamton, Webb has been a lifelong resident of the Southern Tier. After graduating from a public high school, Webb became a first-generation student of SUNY Broome Community College and later Binghamton University.
In 2022, Lea Webb was elected to represent the then-newly redrawn 52nd State District. Once she was sworn in in January 2023, she officially became part of a historic class of 18 incoming Democratic senators made up entirely of women for the first time in the 245-year history of the New York State Senate.
This past year, Webb sponsored a unanimously passed a maternal health care bill, which requires that the Department of Health summons a workgroup to study and evaluate the development of various reproductive developments and issues.
Amid many issues, Riley stressed the importance of codifying abortion rights, labeling the overturning of Roe v. Wade as “one of the worst decisions the Supreme Court has ever made.”
“Congress should undo that damage by passing the Women’s Health Protection Act, which is a federal law that would put Roe v. Wade’s protections back into place,” Riley said.
The act, if implemented, would establish the legal right to abortion in all 50 states and “protect health care provider’s ability to provide abortion services.” The bill passed the House in 2022 but did not pass in the Senate after failing to get the necessary 60 votes.
Riley pointed out that Molinaro voted against the consideration of the bill.
Born in Yonkers, New York, Molinaro has been involved in state politics since he was a teenager. At just 18 years old, Molinaro was elected the mayor of Tivoli, New York, earning him the title of youngest mayor in the U.S. at the time.
Since then, Molinaro represented the 103rd district in the New York State Assembly in 2006, was a Dutchess County executive in 2011 and ran for governor of New York in 2018. In 2022, he won the race for New York’s 19th Congressional seat in the House of Representatives, and he plans on keeping it.
Historically, Molinaro has stated he is “personally pro-life” and has voted according to that position.
In 2023, he voted for the BornAlive Abortion Survivors Protection Act which mandates that if a healthcare provider is present during an attempted abortion, they must care appropriately in the very rare
Webb has also been able to make advancements in combating a variety of other concerns regarding reproductive health.
As chair of the NYS Senate Committee on Women’s Issues, Webb dedicated her time to passing legislation on issues impacting women such as menstrual product accessibility, protection against fibroids and ovarian cancer and measures to prevent human trafficking.
“We’ve made tremendous strides in New York to fully protect reproductive rights,” Webb said. “But there’s still work to be done.”
Webb believes that Sigler’s silence regarding issues of abortion on reproductive rights is representative of his views.
“I think he is hoping that no one will notice that he’s an anti-choice extremist on this issue,” Webb said.
Before running for state senate, Sigler spent 20 years as a sales manager for Park Outdoor Advertising and has served in the Tompkins County Legislature for 14 years.
In an interview with The Sun, Sigler said he is a “more practical person” than the incumbent. According to Sigler, Webb’s current policies on reducing the reliance on fossil fuels have led to cost increases and “people struggling to pay bills.”
“They would like to say we’re not using natural gas. … What have they done toward that goal?” Sigler said. “It has been very unsuccessful, [and] it has raised the rates of electricity in this state by a lot.”
While in office, Webb passed legislation to ban carbon
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instance when there is a premature birth.
According to VoteSmart data from 2023, the Planned Parenthood Action Fund gave a 9 percent rating in recognition of his opposition to policies supporting abortion access.
After many attempts to get in contact with Molinaro, his campaign team shared a statement from the representative that read: “Josh Riley thinks Cornell students are stupid.”
“On Israel, he’s trying to play both sides and on his open border policy — Josh can’t explain why he’d let fentanyl poison students or let cheap illegal immigrant labor steal post-grad jobs,” the statement read. “I’ll always tell you where I stand: I’m pro-border security, pro-American jobs and pro-Israel.”
The National Right to Life Committee rated him at 100 percent in support of pro-life causes.
dioxide fracking and supported investments in green technology jobs and workforce development.
Another main focus of Sigler’s campaign is reducing local crime rates. He said the state has implemented “a bunch of bad policies” such as bail reform that, according to Sigler, allow many to avoid punishment for certain crimes.
“We had a bunch of bad policies that kind of went through,” Sigler said. “Bail reform was the problem and it still is. I mean, you talk to regular cops who work in the street, they’ve actually stopped arresting for certain things, but they know if they bring them in, the judges will just let them go.”
Taehee Oh can be reached at toh@ cornellsun.com.
TAEHEE OH Sun Senior Writer
JONATHAN BRAND Sun Senior Writer
JONATHAN BRAND Sun Senior Writer
DALTON MULLINS Sun Senior Writer
Jonathan Brand can be reached at jbrand@cornellsun.com.
