CLAYTON — Two activists who participated in a pro-Palestine protest last spring at Washington University now face charges, the St. Louis County prosecuting attorney’s office said Wednesday.

Those charged include Jill Stein, the presidential nominee of the Green Party in 2024, who is accused of hitting a police officer with a bicycle and kicking him at the protest. Stein, 74, was charged Friday with first-degree trespass and fourth-degree assault.

In charging documents, Washington University police said demonstrators were given numerous warnings to leave the university’s private campus. Officers moved in for arrests around 8 p.m. Court documents alleged Stein interlocked her arms with other demonstrators and refused to leave.

In an interview with the Post-Dispatch just days after the protest, Stein disputed accounts that she struck an officer.

“While I was being assaulted with a bicycle, one of the police bent down and picked up my foot in order to try to further destabilize me into falling backwards,” Stein said. “And I wiggled out of his grip, you know, in an effort not to fall back on my head.”

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    Eckstein had already sensed campus hostility toward Israel prior to Oct. 7. But after the attacks, she recalled, her friends “started to give me dirty looks” following her decision to post pro-Israel messages on social media.

    Classic.