T. A. Gardner
Thread Killer
Most of the graduate students who would be on campus on an early August evening would be employees. Many, if not most, of the employees at a university are graduate students.
The management of the university hired the graduate students, and gave them a place to live, because they wanted the graduate students there. They did not want the Neo-Nazis there.
Then they have ZERO reason to interact with the neo-Nazis. They should have left it to the campus police, or local police to deal with. As employees they had no authority to act to counter protest what the neo-Nazis were doing.
University of Virginia is not an open university, and that is not what an open university means.
There is an assumption that the public can enter university property, until they are trespassed off. Once they are told they are not permitted to enter, they are banned from entering.
The exception to that would be students, employees, or residents. That requires more of a process to ban them from the campus.
Open campus means anyone can come on campus. Certain areas might be restricted, but the commons, open grounds, and streets are anyone's to use.
If they weren't permitted to have their protest, then that's on the administration and campus police to deal with, not some rank and file employee(s).