President Donald Trump’s crusade against Harvard University is facing another hurdle after a judge ruled that the federal research funding freeze he instituted was unconstitutional.
U.S. District Judge Allison Burroughs said on Wednesday that the cancellation of more than $2 billion in federal grants to the university amounted to “retaliation, unconstitutional conditions, and unconstitutional coercion.”
The ruling vacates the funding freeze “as violative of the First Amendment” and prevents the government from freezing further federal funding to the university using the same reasoning.
Trump began his battle with the historic university earlier this year in response to what he argued was unchecked antisemitism on campus, claiming that the school’s handling of campus protests organized in response to Israel’s actions in Gaza was insufficient and left Jewish students vulnerable.
In addition to instituting funding freezes, Trump told the school to overhaul its admissions policies, threatened its tax-exempt status, and attempted to revoke the university’s ability to host international students.
The university refused to comply with the administration’s orders, with Harvard president Alan Garber writing in a letter to the community, “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.”
Where other universities, including Columbia, Brown and the University of Pennsylvania, settled with the Trump administration, Harvard filed suit, calling the Trump administration’s attack on the school ”the stuff of tyranny.”
Burroughs issued a temporary order in June that blocked anyone from implementing the president’s proclamation regarding international students at Harvard, and the university is continuing to challenge the president’s edict in court.
The judge wrote in her opinion that an examination of the administrative record “makes it difficult to conclude anything other than that Defendants used antisemitism as a smokescreen for a targeted, ideologically-motivated assault on this country’s premier universities, and did so in a way that runs afoul of the APA, the First Amendment and Title VI.”
“Further, their actions have jeopardized decades of research and the welfare of all those who could stand to benefit from that research, as well as reflect a disregard for the rights protected by the Constitution and federal statutes.”
White House spokesperson Liz Huston told the Daily Beast that the administration “will immediately move to appeal this egregious decision, and we are confident we will ultimately prevail in our efforts to hold Harvard accountable.”
Huston said, “Just as President Trump correctly predicted on the day of the hearing, this activist Obama-appointed judge was always going to rule in Harvard’s favor, regardless of the facts.”
“To any fair-minded observer, it is clear that Harvard University failed to protect their students from harassment and allowed discrimination to plague their campus for years. Harvard does not have a constitutional right to taxpayer dollars and remains ineligible for grants in the future.”
Harvard University directed The Daily Beast to a statement from Garber that read, “The ruling affirms Harvard’s First Amendment and procedural rights, and validates our arguments in defense of the University’s academic freedom, critical scientific research, and the core principles of American higher education.”
“Even as we acknowledge the important principles affirmed in today’s ruling, we will continue to assess the implications of the opinion, monitor further legal developments, and be mindful of the changing landscape in which we seek to fulfill our mission.”
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