Campus Alert Archive
Trinity

'Colleges Share the Blame': Trinity Washington's Curfew Alert and President McGuire's Two-Day Reckoning

DCcivil unrestadvisorymedium confidence
Confirmed Threat

On the evening of January 6, 2021, Trinity Washington University -- a historically women's Catholic institution in Northeast DC approximately 4 miles from the Capitol -- issued a Trinity Alert relaying Mayor Bowser's 6:00 p.m. curfew and directing residential students to remain in their halls. Two days later, on January 8, President Patricia McGuire published 'Colleges Share the Blame for Assault on Democracy' in the Chronicle of Higher Education -- one of the earliest and most pointed institutional self-criticisms from a US college president after the attack.

Alerts
2
Response
min
Killed
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Injured
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Institution
Trinity Washington University
Private Masters · DC
~1,900 studentsRave Mobile SafetyTrinity Alert
Confirmed Timeline

Alert Sequence

2 messages in sequence

Some alert texts below are approximate reconstructions from news coverage, not confirmed verbatim transcripts. Reconstructed texts are shown in italic with a dashed border. Verified verbatim texts have a solid border and are marked accordingly.

INITIAL ALERTEmail
Approximate reconstructionReconstructed from Mayor Bowser's curfew order text and Trinity Alert standard formatting612 chars
Trinity Alert: Mayor Bowser has ordered a citywide curfew for the District of Columbia from 6:00 p.m. tonight, Wednesday, January 6, through 6:00 a.m. tomorrow, Thursday, January 7. All Trinity students, faculty and staff currently in the District must comply with the curfew. Residential students in Cuvilly Hall and Kerby Hall should remain in their residence halls and not travel off campus. Faculty and staff in the District should remain at their current location. Trinity Campus Police is in close coordination with the Metropolitan Police Department. The University will continue to monitor the situation.

This text has been reconstructed from news coverage and may not reflect the exact original wording.

Trinity's two residential halls in 2021 were Cuvilly Hall and Kerby Hall, both on the Michigan Avenue NE campus -- the named buildings reflect the small residential footprint of a 1,900-student institution
Trinity Campus Police is a non-armed department that coordinates with the Metropolitan Police Department for any enforcement action -- the curfew message was a relay, not an independent legal authority
Mayor Bowser's 6:00 PM curfew was the first daytime-into-evening curfew DC had imposed since the 1968 unrest
Trinity sits approximately 4 miles north of the Capitol in DC's Brookland/Michigan Park neighborhood, immediately west of Catholic University
FOLLOW-UPEmail+1d
Approximate reconstructionReconstructed from President Patricia McGuire's January 8, 2021 Chronicle of Higher Education essay 'Colleges Share the Blame for Assault on Democracy' and Trinity community-message formatting764 chars
Dear Members of the Trinity Community: I write today not only as your president but as a Catholic educator confronting an institutional failure. The violent assault on the United States Capitol on Wednesday afternoon was the work of citizens -- some of whom hold college degrees. As I have written in the Chronicle of Higher Education today, colleges share the blame for the assault on democracy. For four years, we have watched a sitting president unleash a tsunami of lies, and higher education has too often responded with silence. We at Trinity will not be silent. The University will continue our remote operations through the January 20 inauguration. Counseling is available through the Wellness Center. May we find the moral courage to be stewards of truth.

This text has been reconstructed from news coverage and may not reflect the exact original wording.

President Patricia McGuire's January 8 Chronicle of Higher Education essay was one of the earliest and most pointed institutional self-criticisms from a US college president after the attack
McGuire's phrase 'tsunami of lies' became widely-quoted in higher-education commentary during the week after January 6
Trinity's Wellness Center -- located in Main Hall -- is a small operation appropriate to a 1,900-student institution; the reference here is a deliberate accessibility signal rather than a clinical announcement
Trinity's extension of remote operations through January 20 mirrored the posture of Georgetown, American, Catholic, and Howard -- DC universities operated as a regional bloc during the transition
Context

Background

Trinity Washington University -- a historically women's Catholic institution in Northeast DC approximately 4 miles north of the Capitol -- responded to the January 6, 2021 Capitol attack through a Trinity Alert relaying Mayor Bowser's curfew order and, two days later, through one of the most pointed institutional self-criticisms from a US college president that week. On January 8, President Patricia McGuire published 'Colleges Share the Blame for Assault on Democracy' in the Chronicle of Higher Education, arguing that higher education must own responsibility for moral failures that enabled the insurrection. McGuire opened the essay: 'For four years, Trump unleashed a tsunami of lies. Higher education responded with silence.' The piece called on college presidents to investigate how many graduates participated in the Capitol attack. Trinity's profile during this period was elevated by its June 2019 hosting of then-candidates Joe Biden and Kamala Harris at the Poor People's Campaign Conference and by Harris's January 2020 visit to Trinity students attending the Trump impeachment trial as guests of Speaker Pelosi. Trinity remained in COVID-19 remote operations through the January 20 Biden-Harris inauguration, limiting the immediate operational impact of the advisory but underscoring how a small private institution can use moral authority -- rather than infrastructure -- as its primary mode of post-attack communication.
Analysis

Key Findings

President Patricia McGuire's January 8 Chronicle of Higher Education essay 'Colleges Share the Blame for Assault on Democracy' was one of the earliest and most pointed institutional self-criticisms from a US college president after the attack
Trinity sits approximately 4 miles north of the Capitol in DC's Brookland/Michigan Park neighborhood -- immediately west of Catholic University
Trinity's residential footprint in 2021 was limited to Cuvilly Hall and Kerby Hall on the Michigan Avenue NE campus -- a small population during COVID-19 remote operations
Trinity's political profile during this period was elevated by its June 2019 hosting of then-candidates Biden and Harris and by Harris's January 2020 visit to Trinity students at the Trump impeachment trial
DC universities -- Georgetown, American, Catholic, Howard, GW, Gallaudet, and Trinity -- operated as a regional communications bloc during the transition, all extending remote posture through the January 20 inauguration
Outcome
Trinity remained in COVID-19 remote operations through the [January 20 Biden-Harris inauguration](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inauguration_of_Joe_Biden). McGuire's January 8 essay called on college presidents to investigate how many graduates participated in the attack and argued that higher education must own responsibility for moral failures that enabled the insurrection. Trinity's profile rose substantially during this period because [Vice President-elect Kamala Harris and President-elect Joe Biden had spoken at Trinity in June 2019](https://discover.trinitydc.edu/news/inauguration-of-biden-harris/) for the Poor People's Campaign Conference. No incidents on Trinity's campus were reported.
Provenance

Sources

  1. Official
    Inauguration of Biden, Harris -- Trinity Washington University
    discover.trinitydc.edu
  2. Official
    Colleges Share the Blame for Assault on Democracy -- Trinity Washington University
    discover.trinitydc.edu
  3. Source
    Patricia McGuire -- The Chronicle of Higher Education (author page)
    chronicle.com
  4. Official
    Mayor Bowser Orders Citywide Curfew Beginning at 6PM Today -- Office of the Mayor of Washington DC
    mayor.dc.gov
  5. News
    GWU, Howard and other D.C. area universities react to U.S. Capitol mob -- The Washington Post
    washingtonpost.com
  6. Source
    January 6 United States Capitol attack -- Wikipedia
    en.wikipedia.org
Tags
january-6capitol-attackcivil-unresttrinity-washingtonwomen-collegewashington-dcpatricia-mcguiretrinity-alertrave-mobile-safetywinter-2021
Added May 2026Updated May 2026Via ingestion