Harvard University said on Monday that it had rejected policy changes requested by the Trump administration, becoming the first university to directly refuse to comply with the administration’s demands and setting up a showdown between the federal government and the nation’s wealthiest university.
Other universities have pushed back against the Trump administration’s interference in higher education. But Harvard’s response, which essentially called the Trump administration’s demands illegal, marked a major shift in tone for the nation’s most influential school, which has been criticized in recent weeks for capitulating to Trump administration pressure.
A letter the Trump administration sent to Harvard on Friday demanded that the university reduce the power of students and faculty members over the university’s affairs; report foreign students who commit conduct violations immediately to federal authorities; and bring in an outside party to ensure that each academic department is “viewpoint diverse,” among other steps. The administration did not define what it meant by viewpoint diversity, but it has generally referred to seeking a range of political views, including conservative perspectives.
“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,” said Alan Garber, Harvard’s president, in a statement to the university on Monday.
Since taking office in January, the Trump administration has aggressively targeted universities, saying it is investigating dozens of schools as it moves to eradicate diversity efforts and what it says is rampant antisemitism on campus. Officials have suspended hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funds for research at universities across the country.
The administration has taken a particular interest in a short list of the nation’s most prominent schools. Officials have discussed toppling a high-profile university as part of their campaign to remake higher education. They took aim first at Columbia University, then at other members of the Ivy League, including Harvard.
Harvard, for its part, has been under intense pressure from its own students and faculty to be more forceful in resisting the Trump administration’s encroachment on the university and on higher education more broadly.
The Trump administration said in March that it was examining about $256 million in federal contracts for Harvard, and an additional $8.7 billion in what it described as “multiyear grant commitments.” The announcement went on to suggest that Harvard had not done enough to curb antisemitism on campus. At the time, it was vague about what the university could do to satisfy Trump administration concerns.
Last month, more than 800 faculty members at Harvard signed a letter urging the university to “mount a coordinated opposition to these anti-democratic attacks.”
The university appeared to take a step in that direction on Monday. In his letter rejecting the administration’s demands, Dr. Garber suggested that Harvard had little alternative.
“The university will not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights,” he wrote. “Neither Harvard nor any other private university can allow itself to be taken over by the federal government.”
The government’s letter to Harvard on Friday demanded an extraordinary set of changes that would have reshaped the university and ceded an unprecedented degree of control over Harvard’s operations to the federal government. The changes would have violated many principles that are held dear on colleges campuses.
Some of the actions that the Trump administration demanded of Harvard were:
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Conducting plagiarism checks on all current and prospective faculty members.
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Sharing all its hiring data with the Trump administration, and subjecting itself to audits of its hiring while “reforms are being implemented,” at least through 2028.
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Providing all admissions data to the federal government, including information on both rejected and admitted applicants, sorted by race, national origin, grade-point average and performance on standardized tests.
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Immediately shutting down any programming related to diversity, equity and inclusion.
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Overhauling academic programs that the Trump administration says have “egregious records on antisemitism,” including placing certain departments and programs under an external audit. The list includes the Divinity School, the Graduate School of Education, the School of Public Health and the Medical School, among many others.
In Harvard’s response on Monday, its lawyers said that the university “is not prepared to agree to demands that go beyond the lawful authority of this or any administration.”
Stephanie Saul, Alan Blinder and Miles Herszenhorn contributed reporting.
Vimal Patel writes about higher education with a focus on speech and campus culture.
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