Hundreds Stanford University graduates staged a walkout as Google CEO Sundar Pichai took the stage as commencement speaker at Stanford Stadium on Sunday, with video of the protest going viral on social media.
Graduates were seen marching out of the stadium in their caps and gowns, several holding Palestinian flags and keffiyehs, as Pichai began his address. Chants of "Free, free Palestine" rang through the stadium.
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SFGate journalist Matt Brown, who captured the scene on video, noted that Pichai made no mention of artificial intelligence in his speech, "unlike other uni speakers getting booed down this year," he wrote on X.
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Stanford grads walk out as Google CEO Sundar Pichai takes the stage as commencement speaker. No mention of AI, unlike other uni speakers getting booed down this year. Story for @sfgate shortly pic.twitter.com/qvS2rJ91Ip
— Matt Brown (@maattttbrown) June 14, 2026
The protest centred on Project Nimbus, a $1.2 billion cloud computing and artificial intelligence contract awarded jointly to Google and Amazon by the Israeli government in 2021.
Stanford Students for Justice in Palestine, which had announced the walkout weeks in advance, argued the project directly supports Israeli government operations amid the ongoing conflict in Gaza. Critics of the contract, which has also drawn repeated internal protests from Google employees, contend that the technology could be used to facilitate military operations in the region.
Pichai, a Stanford alumnus who holds a master's degree from the university, did not address the walkout during his speech.
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He urged the graduating class to embrace resilience over despair. "Choose optimism," he told students.
"It's easy to look at the news of the day and think that we're living in uniquely challenging times. For me, it's helpful to remember that each generation has faced hardship in their own way. We don't get to choose the world we graduate into, but we do get to choose how we frame our circumstances."
BBC World journalist Lily Jamali subsequently approached Pichai after the ceremony to seek his reaction to the walkout by over 100 graduates where Pichai can be seen in the video avoiding the interaction.
WATCH: We asked Google CEO Sundar Pichai for his reaction to 100+ Stanford grads walking out of his speech today. @BBCWorld pic.twitter.com/MqJOO9faWn
— Lily Jamali (@lilyjamali) June 14, 2026
Google has not issued a public statement on the protest.
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