One of the top universities in the world has had more than $2,000,000,000 of grants and contracts frozen after they said they wouldn’t cave into Donald Trump’s demands to limit campus activism.
In a demanding letter on Friday, Trump’s administration called for government and leadership reforms at the university, as well as changes to Harvard University’s admissions policies.
It also demanded Harvard to stop recognising some student clubs, threatening to withdraw almost nine billion in grants and contracts if they didn’t comply. On Monday, Harvard President Alan Garber said the university would not bend to the government’s demands.
‘The University will not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights,’ Mr Garber said in a letter to the Harvard community.
‘No government – regardless of which party is in power – should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue.’
Hours later, the government froze billions in Harvard’s federal funding, making it the seventh university targeted by the Trump administration as they continue to attack higher education.
Others include Columbia, the University of Pennsylvania, Brown, Princeton, Cornell and Northwestern – all Ivy League schools.
Trump’s administration claims universities allowed antisemitism to go unchecked at campus protests last year against Israel’s war in Gaza.
Harvard has already made extensive reforms to address antisemitism, and said most of the demands from the government aren’t about antisemitism – but about regulating ‘intellectual conditions’, Mr Garber said.
Withholding federal funding from Harvard, one of the nation’s top research universities in science and medicine, ‘risks not only the health and well-being of millions of individuals but also the economic security and vitality of our nation.’
It also violates the university’s First Amendment rights and exceeds the government’s authority under Title VI, which prohibits discrimination against students based on their race, colour or national origin, Mr Garber said.
The administration also pressured the university to stop recognising or funding ‘any student group or club that endorses or promotes criminal activity, illegal violence, or illegal harassment’.
Harvard’s defiance, the federal antisemitism task force said on Monday, ‘reinforces the troubling entitlement mindset that is endemic in our nation’s most prestigious universities and colleges that federal investment does not come with the responsibility to uphold civil rights laws’.
But even Harvard alumni are fighting back, with many writing to university leaders and calling for them to legally contest Trump’s demands.
‘Harvard stood up today for the integrity, values, and freedoms that serve as the foundation of higher education,’ said Anurima Bhargava, one of the alumni behind the letter.
‘Harvard reminded the world that learning, innovation and transformative growth will not yield to bullying and authoritarian whims.’
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