Judge dismisses ex-student’s lawsuit against Rutgers faculty for 2023 strike

A state judge has dismissed the lawsuit a former Rutgers University student filed seeking compensation for lost educational time after more than 9,000 faculty walked off the job in a weeklong strike in 2023 for better benefits and wages.

Judge Ana Viscomi on Wednesday ordered Jeremy Li’s complaint dismissed with prejudice, which means he cannot refile his claims.

Li sued several faculty unions at 71,000-student school in 2024, arguing that they were public workers barred by law from striking and accusing them of negligence and breach of contract.

Thursday, union leaders celebrated the dismissal as the court’s recognition of the rights of public workers to free speech and collective action. They said Li’s lawsuit was one of many intended to restrict unions’ striking rights, noting his attorneys filed similar complaints against unions in Massachusetts and Kentucky after teachers’ strikes — and those failed too.

“Our students’ learning conditions can only be as good as the working conditions of the faculty and staff who support their education,” said Heather Pierce, president of the Rutgers Adjunct Faculty Union. “Our fight is not only for ourselves, but for our students too. This is not only a win for labor rights—it is a win for the future of public higher education.”

Li was a business student who chaired the Rutgers Republicans, served in the University Senate, and had appeared on Fox News to criticize Rutgers faculty and administrators as anti-Israel and for campus COVID restrictions.