By Dhruv T. Patel and Grace E. Yoon, Crimson Staff Writers
Harvard will not comply with the Trump administration’s demands to dismantle its diversity programming, limit student protests, and submit to far-reaching federal audits in exchange for its federal funding, University President Alan M. Garber ’76 announced in a message to affiliates last Monday, 14 April, 2025.
“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,” he wrote.
The announcement comes two weeks after three federal agencies announced a review into roughly $9 billion in Harvard’s federal funding and days after the administration sent its initial demands, which included dismantling diversity programming, banning masks, and committing to “full cooperation” with the Department of Homeland Security.
And on Friday, the Trump administration delivered a longer and more focused set of demands than the ones they had shared two weeks earlier, asking Harvard to derecognize pro-Palestine student groups, audit its academic programs for viewpoint diversity, and expel students involved in an altercation at a 2023 pro-Palestine protest on the Harvard Business School campus.
It also asked Harvard to reform its admissions process for international students to screen for students “supportive of terrorism and anti-Semitism” — and immediately report international students to federal authorities if they break University conduct policies.
It called for “reducing the power held by faculty (whether tenured or untenured) and administrators more committed to activism than scholarship” and installing leaders committed to carrying out the administration’s demands.
And it asked the University to submit quarterly updates, beginning in June 2025, certifying its compliance.
Garber condemned the demands, calling them a political ploy disguised as an effort to address antisemitism on campus.
“It makes clear that the intention is not to work with us to address antisemitism in a cooperative and constructive manner,” he wrote. “Although some of the demands outlined by the government are aimed at combating antisemitism, the majority represent direct governmental regulation of the ‘intellectual conditions’ at Harvard.”
Robert K. Hur ’95, a former Trump appointee, and William A. Burck — two attorneys representing Harvard — sent a letter to officials from the three agencies on Monday.
“Neither Harvard nor any other private university can allow itself to be taken over by the federal government,” the attorneys wrote. “Accordingly, Harvard will not accept the government’s terms as an agreement in principle.”
Garber’s response on Monday follows an intense campaign from Harvard faculty and Cambridge residents to resist the Trump administration’s demands.
On Saturday, nearly 500 Harvard affiliates and Cambridge residents gathered in Harvard Square to urge Garber to resist the demands — a call he appeared to answer on Monday.
Garber’s Monday email marked the most forceful condemnation yet from any Harvard official against the Trump administration’s now months-long campaign against the University.
In the lead-up to the funding review, Garber had tried to quietly walk a middle road between federal pressure and resistance on campus. In March, Harvard ousted personnel at its Center for Middle Eastern Studies, suspended programming focused on Israel and Palestine at the Harvard Divinity School, and terminated its partnership with the oldest university in the West Bank — seemingly a preemptive measure to fend off scrutiny from Washington.
And while the Trump administration acknowledged the moves as an “expression of commitment” to addressing antisemitism on campus, it was not enough to halt the $9 billion funding review or curb the flow of new demands.
Harvard’s stance marks a sharp break from the precedent set by Columbia University, which conceded to federal demands days after a $400 million cut to federal funding. Despite its compliance, the White House has yet to reinstate Columbia’s funding — a risk that Harvard seems to be ready to confront head-on rather than yield to.
Of the six Ivy League universities that have had their federal funding cut or challenged, Harvard is the only to outwardly reject the Trump administration’s demands — a move that some affiliates said was only fitting for the nation’s oldest and wealthiest university.
Just minutes after Garber’s email landed, Harvard launched a full-scale media blitz: a dedicated webpage outlining the impact of potential funding cuts, a flurry of posts on X, and a message on Instagram — all aimed at broadcasting its defiance.
Garber’s move was met with quick approval from students, faculty, and some of Harvard’s most prominent affiliates.
Former Harvard President Lawrence H. Summers — who has often criticized Harvard’s response to pro-Palestine protests on campus – applauded Garber’s decision in a rare praise for Harvard’s current administration.
“Very glad to see President Garber leading Harvard — and I hope all universities — in resisting extralegal and unreasonable demands from the federal government,” he wrote in a post on X.
