Less than two months ago, I reported on the Trump administration’s attempt to threaten federal funding to strong-arm its way into controlling some of the world’s most prestigious universities, including Harvard University. Columbia University initially relented, but Harvard took a different approach by fighting back over the last few weeks. Below is a timeline of the major events in the battle between the Trump administration and Harvard University:
March 31, 2025
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The United States Department of Education, Health and Human Services and General Services Administration announced it was reviewing all federal grants to Harvard University. The federal grants totalled nearly $9 billion in funding. Their review comes as part of a wave of federal funding cuts to some of the most prestigious educational institutions in the US, including other universities like Columbia, Princeton, Cornell, Brown, the University of Pennsylvania and Northwestern. This is an unprecedented action taken by a sitting American president against any group of educational institutions.
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April 11, 2025
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Just as it had done with Columbia University, the Trump administration wrote a letter with specific demands they expected to be met for Harvard to continue receiving federal grants for their university. The demands included changing admissions policies, revising hiring practices to exclude DEI initiatives, entrusting power away from students and untenured faculty, reforming student discipline policies, instituting a mask ban during protests and discontinuing DEI programs and offices. Within a few days of sending the letter, which Harvard released to the media after they rejected its listed demands, some Trump administration officials claimed they sent the communication prematurely. Despite having the signatures of three high-ranking members in the United States Department of Education, Health and Human Services and General Services Administration, the source claims that the Trump administration did not give final approval. Regardless, the Trump Administration stands by the letter’s demands r.
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April 14, 2025
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The Trump administration formally freezes 2.2 billion dollars in federal grants and $60 million in contracts to Harvard University. Harvard has the largest endowment of any American university at approximately $53 billion. With this war chest, some experts believe they are the best-positioned university to successfully fight the Trump administration. The impact however will prove to be immediate in the science and medical research conducted at Harvard.
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April 21, 2025
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Harvard files the first of two major lawsuits against the Trump administration. Harvard sues the Trump administration over the federal funding freeze of $2.2 billion. Harvard argues that their First Amendment rights are being violated and that the procedures used to freeze funds are also illegal. In the weeks that followed, nearly 1000 stop-work orders on research grants to Harvard worth over $2.4 billion were carried out. The case for this lawsuit will be heard in court on July 21st, 2025.
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May 2, 2025
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The Trump administration includes Harvard in its next endeavor to submit universities to its will: tax-exempt status. Trump declares that Harvard will have its tax-exempt status revoked. In addition, donors to the school write off gifts on their taxes. If Harvard’s tax-exempt status is eliminated, these two benefits would cease to exist. Harvard has yet to specify a legal challenge. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is the organization that decides tax-exempt status for groups and corporations. Federal law does not allow the president to direct the IRS to carry out investigations. The IRS can challenge a corporation’s tax-exempt status if it finds the group guilty of unfair practices or too much political activity. Even if the IRS were to revoke its tax-exempt status, Harvard would be able to contest the revocation. Most experts believe Harvard would be successful in this effort to overturn that potential ruling.
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May 5, 2025
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Linda McMahon, the Secretary of Education, dashes hopes for any new federal funding for research at Harvard. McMahan announces Harvard would no longer be eligible for these types of grants. This decision was made under the guise of the allegation that Harvard has failed to fight anti-semitism on its campus. Most would argue that federal funding is the lifeblood of research on university campuses. Without access to these federal funds, programs and departments, universities would be in danger of shutting down for good over the long term, not to mention the irreversible impact on science and healthcare research. Harvard president Alan Garber responds the following day with a letter, but the lasting impact is uncertain.
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May 13-15, 2025
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The federal government carries out a series of new funding cuts of over $500 million, citing persistent “pervasive race discrimination and anti-Semitic harassment plaguing its campus.” These cuts are added to the initial lawsuit filed by Harvard, which will be litigated this summer. The university continues to defend its attempts to combat anti-semitism on its campus. With a death by a thousand cuts approach, the Trump administration continues to demonstrate the lengths it will go to destroy one of America’s most revered institutions of higher education.
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May 22, 2025
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After earlier threats made by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem, the organization finally declares that Harvard can no longer admit international students. This would mean that Harvard would not be able to enroll foreign-born students, who currently make up approximately 25% of their student body, to the University. DHS also demands that current international students enrolled at the school need to transfer to another institution. This declaration sparks the second Harvard lawsuit against the Trump administration, which is announced the following day. Within hours of the lawsuit being filed, Judge Allison Burroughs of the US District Court of Massachusetts ruled to halt the government’s efforts to block Harvard’s international student program. Further arguments for the case are set for June 16, 2025. In the interim, Harvard is allowed to continue enrollment of international students and maintain the enrollment of current students. The impact of the Trump administration’s actions is already immediate with some international students rescinding their commitments to enroll at Harvard this year or transferring out of the school.
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June 4, 2025
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Trump signs a proclamation to suspend Harvard’s international students’ visas. This is a clear attempt by the Trump administration to work around the ruling against his initial attempt to ban international students from the university. Within hours, Judge Burroughs blocks the proclamation and folds the issue into the ongoing second lawsuit to be heard in court in mid-June. Judge Burroughs comments that the proclamation would cause Harvard to “sustain immediate and irreparable injury before there is an opportunity to hear all parties.”
So far, the Trump administration has created a three-pronged approach to attack Harvard: federal funding, tax-exempt status and its foreign exchange program. These calculated attacks have been justified under the allegation of anti-Semitism and racial discrimination, both issues that Harvard earnestly made efforts to rectify. Regardless, Trump appears resolute in his plan to control Harvard’s every step when it comes to the university’s operations. While Harvard has over $53 billion in endowments, much of this money is specifically earmarked for specific programs over extended periods. As a result, Harvard may only have so much fight left in its arsenal to combat Trump’s powerful administration. The soul of not only Harvard but frankly any American university lies in the hands of our nation’s courts. The beginning of the next collegiate academic year may be very different from what American university students are used to based on those courts’ decisions.
