Trump administration will cut another $ 450 million in federal subsidies for Harvard University – in addition to the $ 2.2 billion already cut – further squeezing its ideological pressure on the oldest and richest university in America amid a broader battle for controlling campuses in the country.
“Eight federal agencies throughout the government are announcing the freezing of approximately $ 450 million in Harvard subsidies, which is in addition to the $ 2.2 billion that were suspended,” said the White House Track String to combat anti-Semitism on Tuesday morning in a statement that called Harvard campus of “a fertile terrain for discrimination.”
“There is an obscure problem on the Harvard campus, and by prioritizing the appearance of responsibility, institutional leaders have lost the school’s claim to support taxpayers,” said the statement signed by the lawyers of the Department of Education and the Department of Health and Human Services.
Harvard did not immediately respond to the last statement of the White House. The government’s task force did not respond to requests for more information about which agencies are freezing the financing, instead, referring to CNN for the lawyers’ declaration.
Harvard is the largest – but not the only one – the Trump administration’s largest target of elite educational institutions in a long list of complaints, including diversity initiatives, financial controls and admission of international students. Columbia University and Ohio State University- where he studied Vice President JD Vance- are among the other institutions that have lost federal resources, even after accepting some of the government’s demands.
Impasse on financing
The Trump government’s initial freezing in Harvard’s financing was announced on the same day the university’s leaders said they would not agree with several changes requested by the government in a letter of April 11, including “governance and leadership reforms” and an audit of the “diversity of points of view” of students and staff.
Harvard filed a lawsuit against Trump’s administration a week later, telling a judge that the government was trying to “use the retention of federal financing as a lever to gain control of academic decision making at Harvard.”
“The university will not give up its independence or renounce its constitutional rights,” said university president Alan Garber at the time. “Neither Harvard nor any other private university may be allowed to be taken by the federal government.”
Both parties are scheduled to give oral arguments in this case at the end of July, and the financing is likely to remain frozen so far.
The administration’s initial letter intended to trigger negotiations instead of being a final requirement, Linda McMahon Secretary of Education told CNBC last month.
Garber wrote a letter to McMahon on Monday (12), saying that there may be “common ground” between school and administration, but arguing that his efforts are “undermined and threatened by the excessive reach of the federal government.”
In addition to losing promised funding, Harvard is facing several investigations by the Trump administration, accusing the school of possible civil rights violations in his treatment of Palestinian pro-prostouts last year and alleged discrimination by the prestigious Harvard Law Review.
Harvard investigated
The equal employment Opportunity Commission also launched an investigation last month, said Wall Street Journal, with Commissioner Andrea Lucas citing Harvard’s efforts to diversify his teachers and scholarships assigned to “sub-present minorities” as examples of possible white, Asian, male and heterosexual candidates.
Harvard did not directly address these allegations, but when requested to comment, a spokesman directed the CNN For part of Garber’s letter to McMahon on Monday (12).
“We look for the best educators, researchers and scholars in our schools,” wrote Garber. “We have no quotas, whether based on race or ethnicity or any other feature. We do not employ ideological turnaround tests. We do not use declarations of diversity, equity and inclusion in our hiring decisions.”
This content was originally published in Trump government freezes another $ 450 million in Harvard resources on CNN Brazil.
Source: CNN Brasil
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