“Harvard’s failure to protect students on campus from anti-Semitic discrimination — all while promoting divisive ideologies over free inquiry — has put its reputation in serious jeopardy.”
The Trump administration is reviewing over $9 billion worth of federal funding going to Harvard as the administration has been investigating colleges and universities over their handling of antisemitism on campus.
The federal government will be reviewing $255.6 million in contracts with the Ivy League school as well as $8.7 billion in grants that are being dispersed from the government over the course of multiple years, according to the Wall Street Journal. The review is not only focused on the Harvard campus, but also its affiliate organizations such as Boston-area hospitals.
This comes after the Trump administration pulled $400 million in grants going to Columbia University over similar antisemitism concerns. The New York-based university agreed to a list of demands from the Trump administration surrounding disciplinary measures for antisemitism after numerous incidents on campus, including agitators masked in keffiyehs entering a Jewish history class and distributing antisemitic propaganda.
Other universities have seen similar targeting of Jewish students amid the many different Gaza encampment protests taking place on college campuses last spring. At UCLA, for example, Jewish students were physically blocked from going on campus.
Harvard was one of the 60 schools that the Department of Education has contacted, warning that there would be consequences if they did not protect Jewish students on their campus. “This administration has proven that we will take swift action to hold institutions accountable if they allow anti-Semitism to fester," General Services Administration official Josh Gruenbaum told the outlet. "We will not hesitate to act if Harvard fails to do so.”
Harvard president Alan Garber wrote in a letter on Monday, claiming that if the Trump administration cut off funding for the school, life-saving research would be stopped. Of note, Harvard has an endowment of over $53 billion with annual operating expenses of $6.4 billion.
“We fully embrace the important goal of combatting antisemitism, one of the most insidious forms of bigotry. We fully embrace the important goal of combatting antisemitism, one of the most insidious forms of bigotry,” Garber said. “Urgent action and deep resolve are needed to address this serious problem that is growing across America and around the world."
Secretary of Education Linda McMahon wrote in a press release, “Harvard’s failure to protect students on campus from anti-Semitic discrimination — all while promoting divisive ideologies over free inquiry — has put its reputation in serious jeopardy."
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