Harvard does not accept the Trump administration’s demands for deep changes

Harvard University Is Not Going to Give Up: The Trump Administration is Going to Shut Down Learning for the Students, Students and Staff of Harvard

“Harvard had no choice but to comply with the demands of the Trump administration,” said Michael Dorf, a law professor at Cornell University.

“Private universities should be free to choose what faculty they like, who they admit and how much they pay, and which areas of study and inquiry they pursue, regardless of which party is in power,” Harvard President Alan Garber wrote in a letter to students and staff.

“Although some of the demands outlined by the government are aimed at combating antisemitism, the majority represent direct governmental regulation of the ‘intellectual conditions’ at Harvard,” Garber said.

The Trump administration has been targeting major universities for alleged violations of civil rights laws in an effort to eliminate DEI programs across the country. The administration cut $400 million from federal money after pro-Palestinian protests on Columbia University’s campus. Funding of about $1 billion for Cornell and $790 million for Northwestern University was frozen.

University leaders told NPR it has been a struggle to cope with demands from the federal government while trying to focus on the wellbeing of their students, and education.

In March, the federal government said the multi-agency task force was conducting a “comprehensive review” of $9 billion in federal contracts and “multi-year grant commitments” to Harvard.

“The disruption of learning that has plagued campuses in recent years is unacceptable,” the administration’s Joint Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism said in a statement yesterday. “It is time for elite universities to take the problem seriously and commit to meaningful change if they wish to continue receiving taxpayer support.”

The requested changes were in violation of Harvard’s First Amendment rights and the government’s authority to enforce civil rights laws, according to lawyers for the university.

The government’s Joint Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism responded afterHarvard’s lawyers sent a rejection of the administration’s demands.

The Teasers of Higher Education: A Trump-Born-Infeld Call for End of the War on Campus Research and the Role of Tax Exempt Status

The statement said that the disruption of learning on campuses is unacceptable. It is time for elite universities to take the problem seriously and change if they want to continue receiving taxpayer support.

Asked for a response late Monday, a Harvard spokesperson referred back to Garber’s letter, which noted that: “For the government to retreat from these partnerships now risks not only the health and well-being of millions of individuals, but also the economic security and vitality of our nation.”

“Harvard should lose its tax exempt status and be Taxed as a Political Entity if it persists with its support of political, ideological, and terrorist organizations.” Trump said something in a post.

The administration froze more than 2,400 grants and contracts to Harvard within hours after they responded, much of it intended for research on a wide range of subjects.

Ted Mitchell, the president of the American Council on Education, an organization that represents more than 1,600 colleges and universities, said that by taking the lead, Harvard paved the way for other institutions to oppose the administration’s demands.

“If Harvard hadn’t stood up,” Mitchell said, “it would have sent a chill across higher education that would have really hampered the ability of other institutions to define for themselves where that red line is.”

In March, the government announced that 60 universities were under investigation by the U.S. Education Department for allegedly failing to protect Jewish students.

“We are going to choke off the money to schools that aid the Marxist assault on our American heritage and on Western civilization itself,” Trump said in a speech in Florida in 2023. “The days of subsidizing communist indoctrination in our colleges will soon be over.”

Former President Barack Obama, in a statement today, praised Harvard’s response and called the administration’s moves an “unlawful and ham-handed attempt to stifle academic freedom.”

Mitchell said that the catalog of horrors was a very thick one. “There are plenty of things that the administration can seek to do that would throw institutions off kilter. And tax-exempt status is certainly one of them.”

Nearly all colleges and universities are tax-exempt organizations. They are given nonprofit status along with charities, religious institutions and some political organizations.

The tax exemptions for higher education have been proposed to be curbed by Republicans. Many of the nation’s elite institutions were impacted by a tax on university endowments passed by Congress.