BOSTON – Harvard University responded Monday to recent threats from the Education Department to halt its grant funding, highlighting reforms it was undertaking but warning it won't budge on “its core, legally-protected principles” over fears of retaliation.
A letter from Harvard President Alan Garber detailed how the institution had made significant changes to its leadership and governance over the past year and a half. Among the reforms, Garber said, was a broad “strategy to combat antisemitism and other bigotry.”
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Last week, the Department of Education threatened a grant freeze in a major escalation of Trump’s battle with the Ivy League school. The administration previously froze $2.2 billion in federal grants to Harvard, and Trump is pushing to strip the school of its tax-exempt status.
Garber warned that its efforts to change were being “undermined and threatened by the federal government’s overreach into the constitutional freedoms of private universities and its continuing disregard of Harvard’s compliance with the law.”
“Consistent with the law and with our own values, we continue to pursue needed reforms, doing so in consultation with our stakeholders and always in compliance with the law,” Garber wrote. “But Harvard will not surrender its core, legally-protected principles out of fear of unfounded retaliation by the federal government.”
An Education Department spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In call with reporters last week, a Department of Education official accused Harvard of “serious failures.” The person, who spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity, said Harvard has allowed antisemitism and racial discrimination to perpetuate, it has abandoned rigorous academic standards, and it has failed to allow a range of views on its campus.
To become eligible for new grants, Harvard would need to enter negotiations with the federal government and prove it has satisfied the administration’s requirements.
The demands come amid a pressure campaign targeting several other high-profile universities. The administration has cut off money to colleges including Columbia University, the University of Pennsylvania and Cornell University, seeking compliance with Trump’s agenda.
The White House says it’s targeting campus antisemitism after pro-Palestinian protests swept U.S. college campuses last year. It’s also focused on the participation of transgender athletes in women’s sports. And the attacks on Harvard increasingly have called out the university’s diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, along with questions about freedom of speech and thought by conservatives on campus.
Harvard has filed a federal lawsuit over the administration’s demands, setting up a closely watched clash in Trump’s attempt to force change at universities that he says have become hotbeds of liberalism and antisemitism.
In his letter Monday, Garber also attempted to rebut many of the allegations made by the Education Department. He insisted admission to Harvard was based on “academic excellence and promise” and there were no “quotas, whether based on race or ethnicity or any other characteristic” or an “ideological litmus tests” when it comes to hiring.
Garber also dismissed the suggestion that Harvard was a partisan institution and said he wasn’t aware of any evidence suggesting international students were “more prone to disruption, violence, or other misconduct than any other students.”
___ Collin Binkley has covered Harvard for nearly a decade – most of the time living half a mile from campus.