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Harvard will not comply with the Trump administration’s demands to dismantle its diversity programming and limit student protests in exchange for its federal funding, University President Alan M. Garber ’76 announced in a message to affiliates Monday afternoon.
“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,” he wrote.
The announcement comes two weeks after three federal agencies announced a review into roughly $9 billion in Harvard’s federal funding and days after the administration sent its initial demands, which also included banning masks and committing to “full cooperation” with the Department of Homeland Security.
And on Friday, the Trump administration delivered a longer and more focused set of demands than the ones they had shared two weeks earlier, asking Harvard to derecognize pro-Palestine student groups, audit its academic programs for viewpoint diversity, and expel students involved in an altercation at a 2023 pro-Palestine protest on the Harvard Business School campus.
It also asked Harvard to reform its admissions process for international students to screen for students “supportive of terrorism and anti-Semitism” — and immediately report international students to federal authorities if they break University conduct policies.
It called for “reducing the power held by faculty (whether tenured or untenured) and administrators more committed to activism than scholarship” and installing leaders committed to carrying out the administration’s demands.
And it asked the University to submit quarterly updates, beginning in June 2025, certifying its compliance.
Garber condemned the demands, calling them a political ploy disguised as an effort to address antisemitism on campus.
“It makes clear that the intention is not to work with us to address antisemitism in a cooperative and constructive manner,” he wrote. “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.”
Attorneys representing Harvard sent a letter to officials from the three agencies on Monday.
“Neither Harvard nor any other private university can allow itself to be taken over by the federal government,” two attorneys from Harvard wrote in a letter to federal officials. “Accordingly, Harvard will not accept the government’s terms as an agreement in principle.”
Garber’s response on Monday follows an intense campaign from Harvard faculty and Cambridge residents to resist the Trump administration’s demands.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
Harvard Will Fight Trump’s Demands
Harvard will not comply with the Trump administration’s demands to dismantle its diversity programming and limit student protests in exchange for its federal funding, University President Alan M. Garber ’76 announced in a message to affiliates Monday afternoon.
“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,” he wrote.
The announcement comes two weeks after three federal agencies announced a review into roughly $9 billion in Harvard’s federal funding and days after the administration sent its initial demands, which also included banning masks and committing to “full cooperation” with the Department of Homeland Security.
And on Friday, the Trump administration delivered a longer and more focused set of demands than the ones they had shared two weeks earlier, asking Harvard to derecognize pro-Palestine student groups, audit its academic programs for viewpoint diversity, and expel students involved in an altercation at a 2023 pro-Palestine protest on the Harvard Business School campus.
It also asked Harvard to reform its admissions process for international students to screen for students “supportive of terrorism and anti-Semitism” — and immediately report international students to federal authorities if they break University conduct policies.
It called for “reducing the power held by faculty (whether tenured or untenured) and administrators more committed to activism than scholarship” and installing leaders committed to carrying out the administration’s demands.
And it asked the University to submit quarterly updates, beginning in June 2025, certifying its compliance.
Garber condemned the demands, calling them a political ploy disguised as an effort to address antisemitism on campus.
“It makes clear that the intention is not to work with us to address antisemitism in a cooperative and constructive manner,” he wrote. “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.”
Attorneys representing Harvard sent a letter to officials from the three agencies on Monday.
“Neither Harvard nor any other private university can allow itself to be taken over by the federal government,” two attorneys from Harvard wrote in a letter to federal officials. “Accordingly, Harvard will not accept the government’s terms as an agreement in principle.”
Garber’s response on Monday follows an intense campaign from Harvard faculty and Cambridge residents to resist the Trump administration’s demands.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
