An Ohio State professor has been suspended after allegedly lunging at a journalist who was attempting to question the university’s former president — a tense confrontation that was caught on camera and quickly went viral.
Luke Perez, an assistant professor at Ohio State’s Salmon P. Chase Center for Civics, Culture, and Society, was speaking with two freelance reporters in a hallway inside Smith Laboratory on February 9 when the encounter suddenly escalated into what authorities describe as an alleged assault.
One of the reporters, identified as Michael Neuman, tried to walk past Perez when the professor suddenly reached for his phone. Moments later, Perez allegedly grabbed Neuman and forced him to the ground — a chaotic scene captured on video and first shared on Instagram by DJ Byrnes.
Ohio State assistant professor Luke Perez is seen confronting two journalists in a hallway on February 9, 2026 — a tense encounter that quickly spiraled and was caught on camera. D.J. Byrnes/The Rooster via Storyful
DJ Byrnes, who publishes the Rooster newsletter, says Neuman — a documentary filmmaker — was attempting to press Ohio State Vice President E. Gordon Gee with questions about student loan debt when the confrontation unfolded.
“I told you not to put that in my face,” Perez yells over Neuman. “Now, I’m not gonna ask you again, don’t touch me.”
“I didn’t touch you, motherf–ker, who the f–k are you,” Neuman shouts back at Perez.
The professor pushed back on the allegations, claiming Neuman “put his hands on me” and that a camera was thrust inches from his face before the situation spiraled.
Perez, a 12-year veteran of the Air National Guard, is seen turning and walking down the hallway as Neuman and Byrnes can be heard warning that they will call police and seek his arrest.
“That’s a lawsuit for sure,” Neuman says. “Are you f–king kidding me. He hits like a bitch, too. Sucker-punching me and he can’t knock me out? What a bitch.”
Perez is seen on camera suddenly wrapping his arms around Neuman as the confrontation turns physical. D.J. Byrnes/The Rooster via Storyful
The struggle quickly escalated, sending both men tumbling to the floor in a chaotic scuffle. D.J. Byrnes/The Rooster via Storyful
Gee, Ohio State’s president emeritus, was visiting Perez’s class as a guest speaker for a lecture series on “Profiles in American Leadership,” according to the Columbus Dispatch.
Byrnes, a self-described political gadfly, says he had cornered Gee in the hallway to question him about his controversial remarks that Ohio State sexual abuse survivors were engaging in “cancel culture,” the university’s decades-long ties to the late convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, and the privatization of on-campus parking, he wrote in The Rooster.
After Neuman tried to follow up with Gee, Perez stepped in, declaring the questioning over — a confrontation that quickly erupted into a violent altercation.
Perez, a 12-year Air National Guard veteran, started walking down the hallway as Neuman and Byrnes warned they would call the police and have him arrested. D.J. Byrnes/The Rooster via Storyful
“That’s a lawsuit for sure,” Neuman said. “Are you f–king kidding me. He hits like a bitch, too. Sucker-punching me and he can’t knock me out? What a bitch.” D.J. Byrnes/The Rooster via Storyful
Perez was placed on paid administrative leave Tuesday following the alleged assault, as campus police continue to investigate the incident, WSYX reported, citing a university spokesperson.
Byrnes argued that Perez had infringed on their First Amendment rights, noting that Ohio State University, as a public institution, is bound to uphold free speech.
“I thought we were in a bastion of free speech only to end up with a guy physically assaulted,” Byrnes told the outlet. “There’s no other way to describe it other than assault. It was bizarre.”
Perez was placed on paid administrative leave Tuesday following the alleged assault, while campus police continue their investigation into the tense hallway altercation. D.J. Byrnes/The Rooster via Storyful
Neuman is now demanding that Perez face assault charges in the wake of the widely shared, viral confrontation.
“My client wants Perez prosecuted and terminated,” Neuman’s lawyer, Rocky Ratliff, told WSYX. “This is not the actions of an admirable professor or someone who’s professional. If the roles were reversed, he definitely would already be in jail.”
The two men say Perez stepped into the hallway to insist he didn’t consent to being filmed, but they weren’t there for him — their focus was on questioning Gee.
The Chase Center was established after a state bill required Ohio State and four other public universities to actively promote “intellectual diversity” on campus.
Ohio State’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors slammed Perez’s behavior caught on video, calling the actions unacceptable.
“Based on what we know now, this incident is a vivid illustration of a larger problem — the way the Chase Center and other so-called ‘intellectual diversity’ centers have been forcibly and unnecessarily imposed on Ohio’s universities,” the chapter said in a statement to the Columbus Dispatch.
“Unfortunately, this assault — and the embarrassing actions around it — make it clear these centers aren’t really about encouraging civil discourse and intellectual diversity. AAUP-OSU is in favor of free speech for everyone on campus, not just for the ideas that politicians want to promote.”
