USC is one of several institutions, including several historically Black colleges and universities, that received violent threats targeting Black students Thursday morning. At least six HBCUs received threats, with some temporarily going into lockdown, The Associated Press reported. The threats also reached UCLA, according to Morning, Trojan. 

Erroll Southers, associate senior vice president of safety and risk assurance, confirmed to the Daily Trojan on Thursday that USC and federal law enforcement found the threat that was addressed to the University to be a hoax.

The Daily Trojan also reviewed a series of threatening text messages sent individually to a Black student’s phone claiming Friday “would be remembered in USC history” and that “Black girl magic will take on a whole new meaning,” though the Daily Trojan could not confirm the validity of the texts.

Southers wrote in a statement to the Daily Trojan on Friday that a student reported a message they had received, but he didn’t specify what the message stated. 

“Our Department of Public Safety and threat assessment team addressed that matter directly,” Southers wrote in Friday’s statement. “The Office of Civil Rights Compliance has been reaching out to those reported to be impacted to offer support.”

Southers wrote that the message did not appear related to the campus-wide hoax.

“The University isn’t providing any clarity for that and just leaving it up to us to figure it out,” said Devon Njonjo, a senior majoring in industrial and systems engineering, Thursday evening. “That’s just a very disheartening thing to see, because what are we supposed to do as students?”

On Thursday morning, students at the Kaufman School of Dance were among the first and only students to be directly notified of the threats to the University, he said. 

Njonjo — the co-president of Brothers Breaking B.R.E.A.D., a student organization for Black men — discussed the threat in a group chat with other Black student leaders. They decided to write and circulate a statement spreading the word and urging those who felt unsafe to call DPS and report suspicious circumstances.

On Thursday, more than 10 of the University’s Black student groups, spanning cultural and professional organizations as well as members of the Divine Nine, posted the statement. Njonjo said the University continued to leave students in the dark.

“As someone in leadership in a few orgs, it’s one of those things where I very much feel a responsibility to have big conversations like how we did earlier this morning, or try and provide that notice to people,” Njonjo said. “There should still be in-place structures or care coming from the school, and it was just crazy to see that that’s not happening.”

By roughly 3:20 p.m. on Thursday, Njonjo said that Damarea Parker, supervisor of the Center for Black Cultural and Student Affairs, informed the students that he had communicated with DPS and confirmed the threat to the University was a hoax.

The threats come one day after conservative activist Charlie Kirk was shot and killed at Utah Valley University during a stop on his “The American Comeback Tour.” They add to a rise in false shooting and bomb threats at college campuses over the past two weeks, including a false bomb threat at Leavey Library and Doheny Memorial Library on Sunday.

Editor’s note: This story was updated Sept. 12 at 9:50 with a statement from the University.