Media reports say that Harvard University on April 15 rejected numerous demands from the Trump administration that it said would cede control of the school to a conservative government that portrays universities as dangerously leftist.
Within hours of Harvard taking its stand, the administration of President Donald Trump announced it was freezing US$2.3 billion in federal funding to the school.
Reuters reports that the funding freeze comes after the Trump administration said last month it was reviewing US$9 billion in federal contracts and grants to Harvard as part of a crackdown on what it says is antisemitism that erupted on college campuses during pro-Palestinian protests in the past 18 months.
In response to the funding freeze, the university reportedly referred CNN to its earlier statement that it would not comply with the administration’s demands, specifically focusing on the following: “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.”
Al Jazeera sys the freeze followed Harvard president Alan Garber’s issuing a public letter calling the Trump administration’s demands an attempt “to control the Harvard community” and threaten the school’s “values as a private institution devoted to the pursuit, production and dissemination of knowledge.”
Rejecting the government’s demands, which include reporting foreign students for code violations, reforming its governance and leadership, discontinuation of its diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs as well as changing its hiring and admission policies, especially for international students, Garber reportedly said such interference was “unprecedented” and “beyond the power of the federal government.”
“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,” Garber’s letter continued.
The US Department of Education’s Joint Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism, in a written statement, said Garber’s letter “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.”
Al Jazeera pointed out that while Harvard is not the first institution to be targeted, it has been “the first to sound defiant”, and even indicate “that they might be willing to fight it in court.”
Al Jazeera further noted that the Trump administration has frozen hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding for numerous universities, pressing the institutions to make policy changes and citing what it says is a failure to fight anti-Semitism on campus.
