People entering and exiting the Harry Elkins Widener Memorial Library on the campus of Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on April 15, 2025. Joseph Prezioso / AFP
New round in Trump's battle against Harvard: The U.S. government cut an additional $450 million in grants to the prestigious university on Tuesday, following an appeal for dialogue from its administration.
A strong supporter of Israel, Trump accuses Harvard and other renowned American universities like Columbia of allowing student movements against deadly bombings in the Gaza Strip to thrive on their campuses.
Harvard, the oldest university in the United States and one of the highest-ranked globally, has particularly drawn the ire of the Republican president by suing over his government's freezing of two billion dollars in federal subsidies, a decision made after the esteemed institution refused to comply with a series of demands from Trump.
On Tuesday, the Trump administration's task force on anti-Semitism announced that eight U.S. federal agencies had "terminated approximately $450 million in (additional) grants to Harvard," specifically accusing the university of "failing" in its fight against "anti-Semitic bullying" on its campus.
This new salvo against Harvard comes a day after a letter from the university's leadership to Education Secretary Linda McMahon, aiming to restore dialogue on common grounds such as combating anti-Semitism and defending "freedom of thought and expression."
In this letter, Harvard's interim director, Alan Garber, claims to have taken measures to ensure that Jewish or Israeli students and staff do not feel excluded or intimidated on campus, while arguing that federal government measures "undermine" and "threaten" academic freedom.
"Harvard will not relinquish its fundamental principles, protected by law, just out of fear of baseless federal government reprisals," Garber writes in the letter.
Trump has recently depicted Harvard as an "extreme left-wing anti-Semitic institution," a "progressive mess," and a "threat to democracy." In his letter, Garber states that he "refutes" this assertion, asserting that "Harvard is neither Republican nor Democrat, nor the arm of any political party or movement and never will be."
Contacted by AFP, Harvard's administration did not immediately comment on the termination of $450 million in federal funds.
