Bill for Lake County Council to review Little Calumet River Basin Development Commission moves to House
Sen. Dan Dernulc, R-Highland, and Sen. Randy Niemeyer, R-Lowell, authored Senate Bill 40 which would require the commission to submit an annual budget before Sept. 1 of each year for a nonbinding review.
The bill would also require the commission to submit an annual expenditure and activity report to the council before Nov. 1 of each year. The bill would go into effect July 1 if signed into law.
The Senate Committee on Local Government amended the bill to change language stating the council should approve the commission's budget to nonbinding review of the budget. The bill was then reassigned to the Senate Committee on Tax and Fiscal Policy, which also approved the bill.
Dernulc said Tuesday that in Lake County many entities, like libraries and townships, present their budgets for review by the council. Dernulc said he was appointed to the board by Gov. Mitch Daniels and the whole commission is appointed.
'We do have money coming in, and I do think an elected board should review that,' Dernulc said.
Niemeyer said the commission oversees a $6 million budget. While the current commissioners have done a good job allocating the funds, Niemeyer said a future makeup of the commission may not be as fiscally responsible.
'They're not going to be there forever, so as time goes on, all it is is a nonbinding review,' Niemeyer said.
Sen. Randolph, D-East Chicago, who co-authored the bill, said it will give the county authority to oversee the commission's budget.
'They're not going to reject or bid anything of that nature, it's just a check and balance,' Randolph said.
Dan Repay, the executive director of the Little Calumet River Basin Development Commission, previously said the commission understands 'that people want to see what's going on and we don't have an issue with doing that.'
The Little Calumet River Basin Development Commission manages a flood control project and works with the communities along the watershed to make sure the water stays and moves where it is supposed to, Repay said.
The commission has been transparent, Repay said, with meeting videos posted to its website. Repay said the commission will track the bill as it moves through the legislature, and if it becomes law the commission will follow it.
'We're watching it, but we're still remaining focused on what we have to do here. It's not going to change what we do on a daily basis,' Repay said.
The bill passed out of the Senate in a 49-0 vote. It will move forward for consideration by the House. State Rep. Julie Olthoff, R-Crown Point, and State Rep. Mike Andrade, D-Munster, will sponsor the bill in the House.
akukulka@post-trib.com
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
CNN
12 minutes ago
- CNN
These college leaders are keeping the heat on in battle with Trump administration – despite settlements by prominent schools
College is the place where many students entering adulthood find their voice. But when it comes to addressing the White House's ongoing battle with elite higher education, many institutional leaders seem to have lost theirs. 'I don't know how many calls you have to make to get one (university) president to call you back,' President Michael S. Roth of Wesleyan University told CNN. 'The fact that I can, you know, name the people and count them on my hand, it's clearly an effort to keep one's head down and hope that your school will not suffer.' Roth is one of relatively few top university leaders who still openly criticizes the Trump administration for its monthslong campaign to pull funding from schools that don't toe its line on a host of issues, from diversity programs to transgender athletes and pro-Palestinian protests. While most students and professors were away from campus over the summer, the administration spent the season racking up wins against many of its top targets, with settlements from major universities that have promised a combination of fines, donations and policy commitments in line with Trump priorities. 'It's so much worse, I think, than I anticipated,' said Danielle Holley, president of Mount Holyoke College and another outspoken Trump critic who began warning about threats from the administration before Inauguration Day. Only Harvard University has taken on the White House directly in court, although the school has quietly pursued settlement possibilities on the side, a source familiar with the discussions told CNN. For those who have stayed on offense publicly, it's an increasingly lonely fight. 'There's no doubt about it that the severe tactics being used by our federal government are being highly effective,' acknowledged Holley, a civil rights attorney who became the leader of Mount Holyoke, the small central Massachusetts liberal arts college, in 2023. President Trump has made dismantling diversity, equity and inclusion programs – known as DEI – a top priority in his second term, focusing especially on transgender athletes in sports. 'Institutions of higher education have adopted and actively use dangerous, demeaning, and immoral race- and sex-based preferences under the guise of so-called 'diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI),'' stated an executive order President Trump signed on his second day in office. In a speech to a joint session of Congress, Trump called DEI 'tyranny.' The administration's first major college settlement this year was with the University of Pennsylvania, whose swimming program became a lightning rod after Lia Thomas, a transgender athlete who had previously competed on the men's team, set several women's records in 2022 on her way to dominating the Ivy League championship. 'We acknowledge that some student-athletes were disadvantaged by these rules,' UPenn President Larry Jameson said in a statement on July 1 announcing the agreement. 'We recognize this and will apologize to those who experienced a competitive disadvantage or experienced anxiety because of the policies in effect at the time.' That apology was worth $175 million to the university, as the White House released federal funding frozen three months earlier. While many universities have reconfigured, renamed, or scrubbed entirely any DEI references from their materials, Mount Holyoke – with just over 2,000 students – still has a dedicated DEI page on its website. 'Diversity, equity and inclusion efforts extend beyond specific departments and are embedded in all areas of the College,' the page states. Holley says continuing to speak out against the government's efforts to curtail DEI is not a matter of obstinance – but is critical to the mission of the 188-year-old college, one of the historic 'Seven Sisters,' and the first of that group to accept transgender students. 'At Mount Holyoke, we are a women's college, and because of that, we are built on diversity, equity and inclusion,' said Holley. Since the University of Pennsylvania's settlement, the deals between universities and the government have gotten more costly and the institutions more prominent. Columbia University signed a landmark $221 million settlement agreement with the administration last month to regain access to its federal grants. Acting President Claire Shipman acknowledged the pressure they faced at the loss of so much money but bristled at the idea that Columbia was surrendering to government intimidation. 'I actually think that the narrative that paints this as a kind of binary situation – courage versus capitulation – is just wrong. It's too simplistic,' Shipman told CNN Kate Bolduan on July 24. 'This was a really, really complex problem.' 'We could have faced the loss of any future relationship in the coming years with the federal government,' added Shipman, 'and that would have effectively meant an end to the research mission we conduct as we know it.' The Columbia deal includes an 'independent monitor' to resolve any ongoing disputes with the government over admissions and hiring, an idea that distresses Holley at Mount Holyoke. 'The idea that an American university would have a government monitor, not related to what they have been found to be in violation of, but related to their academic departments and the way that they hire people,' said Holley, 'I think everyone in the United States should be deeply concerned with the idea that our federal government is attempting to run private universities and attempting to tell those universities who to hire; what they should be teaching in their classrooms.' One week after the administration's deal with Columbia, Brown University, another elite Ivy League school, signed its own settlement with the government that included a ban on 'unlawful DEI goals' and banned transgender women from women's housing. The university also pledged $50 million to workforce development groups in Rhode Island, where Brown is located. 'The Trump Administration is successfully reversing the decades-long woke-capture of our nation's higher education institutions,' Education Secretary Linda McMahon said in a statement announcing the deal. 'Woke is officially DEAD at Brown,' President Trump crowed on social media. As the flurry of legal agreements in the past month has made clear, institutions of higher education are not going to hang together in a unified defense against the government's demands. While he continues to speak strongly against the administration, Roth says he understands why other college leaders would cut their own deals. 'The fear I think many schools have is that the federal government is willing to not obey the laws as anyone has understood them before, and so the lawless federal government is very frightening,' said Roth. 'If someone pays a ransom to get their kid back from a kidnapper, I don't criticize the parents for making a deal,' he added. 'It's the kidnappers that deserve our criticism.' The Trump administration has been fighting a two-pronged civil rights battle against colleges and universities – demanding an end to DEI programs that the government says are discriminatory while also accusing several institutions of antisemitism in their handling of pro-Palestinian protests on campus in 2024. In court filings involving Harvard, one of the last major holdouts, the Department of Education has pointed to the university's own report on antisemitism to claim the school ignored rampant discrimination against Jewish students and faculty members. 'Protestors followed and verbally harassed some Jewish students, vandalized Harvard's campus, and posted swastika stickers near Harvard Hillel's Rosovsky Hall,' a government brief says, citing Harvard's investigation. The university also released a report on discrimination against Palestinians and Muslims on campus – an issue not mentioned in the Department of Education's complaints. The Trump administration says Harvard has been talking to them behind the scenes about finding a way out of their legal standoff, which includes a second lawsuit in response to the administration's attempt to cancel Harvard's international student program, a move a court indefinitely put on hold in June. 'We're still in negotiations,' McMahon told Fox News last week. 'We are closer than we were. We are not there yet.' But Harvard President Alan Garber has told faculty that retaining its academic freedom without government-monitored 'intellectual diversity' – a major sticking point in early dealings with the administration – remains nonnegotiable, according to the student-run Harvard Crimson newspaper. 'Neither Harvard nor any other private university can allow itself to be taken over by the federal government,' Garber wrote in April when the school first filed suit against the government over more than $2 billion in frozen research funding. The fight continues to be costly for Harvard. A federal judge has not yet decided whether to order the government to turn the money spigot back on, causing budgetary pressure that prompted Garber to take a voluntary 25% pay cut. The administration's intense pressure on higher education programs and students has not been met with complete silence. An open letter signed by more than 600 college presidents in April called Trump's actions 'unprecedented government overreach.' 'We are open to constructive reform and do not oppose legitimate government oversight,' said the letter. 'However, we must oppose undue government intrusion in the lives of those who learn, live, and work on our campuses.' But Roth, one of the presidents who signed the letter, doesn't believe putting out one statement is enough. 'I was glad that they did, but I don't see many people sounding the alarm that this is an assault on the integrity of one of the most successful systems in America, the higher education system,' Roth said. Although not as prominent as Harvard or Columbia, Mount Holyoke is classified by the Carnegie Foundation as a research institution with a billion-dollar endowment, and Holley says its focus on women's issues has been a double whammy for its funding. 'If you are a researcher in this country, doing work on women's health, or doing work on women in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math), doing work on women in leadership, any research that has to do with women is being caught up in those government searches and is being canceled,' she said. 'When one of our research grants was cut, the wording from the federal government was that this kind of work related to gender is not beneficial and not scientific.' But the cuts have not only come from the Trump administration, according to Holley. She said some private funding sources are also stepping back and cutting grants because they are afraid to associate themselves with a school that might run afoul of the president. 'I would say that the estimate is about $2 million (in lost research funding), and that's both cancelations from the federal government directly and cancelations from private funders who fear what the federal government might do,' Holley said. At Wesleyan University – an institution in Middletown, Connecticut, with about 3,000 students – responding to the administration's policies and executive orders has meant reconfiguring some DEI programs. A summer camp program aimed at middle school girls in Middletown who were interested in STEM studies is now open to boys, as well. 'The fact is that girls weren't signing up for STEM as much as boys, so that's why we had that program,' said Roth. 'But it seemed to some boys – big boys, I guess – to be reverse discrimination.' With many other schools eliminating DEI programs or making them all but invisible, Holley believes that the quick moves to roll back those commitments, even without an immediate and direct legal threat, says as much about the schools as it does about the government. 'I think it is a representation of the fact that many organizations maybe did not believe in these principles as strongly as they said that they did, and the government has provided them with an out,' she said. After encountering limited pushback from its Ivy League targets, the Trump administration is moving on to public institutions, starting with freezing hundreds of millions of dollars in funding to the University of California, Los Angeles. UCLA is now actively negotiating with the Trump administration over a possible settlement. A government draft proposal would have the university pay $1 billion dollars, CNN has learned. 'There is a possibility that this administration, once they are done kind of dealing with Harvard and some of the larger institutions that they may begin to turn to the small liberal arts colleges,' said Holley. Despite the millions of dollars at stake in a fight with an administration flush with recent victories, Holley insists her criticism won't be muted. 'My mom was raised in the Jim Crow South, you know, both of my parents survived the Jim Crow era in this country, and I'm a student of the civil rights movement,' Holley said. 'In these moments, I would never think of not speaking up.'
Politico
19 minutes ago
- Politico
The mysteries of megabill 2.0
IN TODAY'S EDITION:— A Senate buzzkill for megabill 2.0— California Dems prep new congressional map— Murphy looks to revive doctor pay revamp Republicans are going through the motions on the road to megabill 2.0. But a growing number of GOP lawmakers are skeptical about what's to come. Despite Speaker Mike Johnson's push for second and third budget reconciliation bills, it's becoming clear that Senate Republicans aren't so sure what the party can deliver after a grueling battle over the 'big, beautiful' tax and spending plan that became law last month. Mia, Jordain Carney and Cassandra Dumay are out this morning with a look at the big reasons why GOP skepticism abounds. No direction — A White House official tells Mia that President Donald Trump really does want Congress to craft another domestic policy bill using the party-line budget reconciliation process. But Republicans say they're still waiting for the administration to provide specific instructions about what they should consider. Among those in the dark are committee leaders including Budget Chair Lindsey Graham and Armed Services Chair Roger Wicker. Commerce Chair Ted Cruz says he doesn't even know what the administration's broader legislative priorities are heading into the fall. 'You have to have a reason to do it,' Sen. Mike Rounds says. 'It's not easy to do, so you have to have a purpose for doing it in the first place.' Some Senate Republicans are working to fill in the gaps. Sen. Ron Johnson, a deficit hawk, is looking to cut spending. Senate Finance Chair Mike Crapo says he'll sort through roughly 200 tax proposals that were left out of the first reconciliation bill. No deadlines — Even if the White House floats some policy asks, it's not likely Republicans will feel as much pressure to advance a bill. With megabill 1.0, they had to avert a year-end expiration of Trump's 2017 tax cuts and head off a debt ceiling crisis. 'Without the pressure, I don't see how you get it done,' says one Republican senator granted anonymity. 'I don't think I see what the pressure is here.' GOOD MONDAY MORNING. Mia's out for the week. Email us: crazor@ and bguggenheim@ THE LEADERSHIP SUITE The latest on redistricting Democratic state lawmakers in California are expected to unveil a new congressional map this week. One draft that's circulating would give Democrats five new seats, potentially offsetting a GOP redistricting effort underway in Texas. Gov. Gavin Newsom wants to put the redistricting effort on the ballot in November. 'We discovered that we indeed could, consistent with the Voting Rights Act, put five Republican seats in play,' Rep. Zoe Lofgren, chair of the California Democratic congressional delegation, told CNN Sunday. 'We're unanimous in wanting to move forward.' As the White House ramps up pressure on red states to pursue redistricting, Vice President JD Vance said in a Fox News interview that he told Indiana state officials last week 'we want a unified Republican team.' Vance also said a new census sought by Trump could add 10 GOP seats and lead to 9 fewer Democratic seats. POLICY RUNDOWN COURT AFFIRMS CONGRESS' POWER OF THE PURSE — The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals is giving the Trump administration until Friday to put back online a public database that tracks federal spending, Kyle Cheney and Josh Gerstein report. The three-judge panel's unanimous decision over the weekend comes after the administration decided in March to shut the database down, claiming it threatened Trump's ability to manage federal spending. The judges declared that action was an affront to Congress' authority over government spending. MURPHY PREPS DOC PAY REVAMP — Rep. Greg Murphy, a House Ways and Means member and co-chair of the GOP Doctors Caucus, is looking to revive legislation aimed at shielding doctors from recurring cuts to their Medicare payments. It's a potential menu item for a year-end health care deal that lawmakers are beginning to sketch out. Doctors have seen declines in their Medicare payments for decades even as the cost of health care has steadily increased. The tax law that Trump enacted last month included a 2.5 percent bump for 2026, after Senate Republicans scrapped a House-backed provision that would have permanently tied the doctor fee scale to an index that tracks rising medical costs. Murphy wants a second shot. 'I cannot overemphasize how much damage these persistent cuts to the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule have done,' Murphy tells Benjamin. Best of POLITICO Pro and E&E: THE BEST OF THE REST Affairs, fraud and attack ads: The dirty fight for the Texas Senate, from Benedict Smith at The Telegraph Bernie Sanders thinks Democrats have turned on their base. Now it's time to fight back, from Veronica Stracqualursi at CNN THE CARRYOUT Welcome back to your Inside Congress hosts' favorite recess activity: sharing lawmakers' Capitol Hill food recommendations. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen said her go-to is a ham and swiss sandwich on rye from Capitol Hill Supermarket. What's your regular order in the neighborhood? Email crazor@ CAMPAIGN STOP CHIP ROY FOR AG? — Rep. Chip Roy is eyeing a bid for Texas attorney general as current AG Ken Paxton campaigns to oust Sen. John Cornyn, reports Mychael Schnell in The Hill. IOWA WATCH — Arizona Sen. Ruben Gallego attended the Iowa State Fair over the weekend. Asked by a reporter about a potential 2028 bid for president, the Arizona Democrat said he's 'focused on 2026' for now. TUNNEL TALK NEW EATERIES ON CAMPUS — The renovated Rayburn Cafeteria is scheduled to open this morning. It features the new CHA Street Food, which is available today, and Java House, which is expected to open Tuesday. Also opening today is the Starbucks Kiosk and Longworth Convenience Store, as well as the Common Grounds coffee shop in the Cannon basement. The Longworth and Ford cafeterias are closed for renovations. HAPPY BIRTHDAY Former Rep. Dan Kildee … former Sen. Tim Hutchinson … Billy Long (7-0) … NYT's David Brooks and Lyndsey Layton … Charles Blow … POLITICO's Toby Eckert, Michael Roberts and Danielle Bello … Lauren Maddox of Holland & Knight … Jesse Barba of Cengage Group … Kedrin Simms Brachman … former USTR Charlene Barshefsky … Marissa Secreto … Colin Cunliff … Thad Huguley … Greg Michaelidis … Ilana Drimmer … Sam Myers Jr. … National Journal's Emily Akhtarzandi TRIVIA FRIDAY'S ANSWER: Jim Wholey correctly answered that Theodore Roosevelt was the first president to receive the Nobel Peace Prize. TODAY'S QUESTION, from Calen: Name the current senators who have cast more than 10,000 votes. The first person to correctly guess gets a mention in the next edition of Inside Congress. Send your answers to insidecongress@
CNN
35 minutes ago
- CNN
These college leaders are keeping the heat on in battle with Trump administration – despite settlements by prominent schools
College is the place where many students entering adulthood find their voice. But when it comes to addressing the White House's ongoing battle with elite higher education, many institutional leaders seem to have lost theirs. 'I don't know how many calls you have to make to get one (university) president to call you back,' President Michael S. Roth of Wesleyan University told CNN. 'The fact that I can, you know, name the people and count them on my hand, it's clearly an effort to keep one's head down and hope that your school will not suffer.' Roth is one of relatively few top university leaders who still openly criticizes the Trump administration for its monthslong campaign to pull funding from schools that don't toe its line on a host of issues, from diversity programs to transgender athletes and pro-Palestinian protests. While most students and professors were away from campus over the summer, the administration spent the season racking up wins against many of its top targets, with settlements from major universities that have promised a combination of fines, donations and policy commitments in line with Trump priorities. 'It's so much worse, I think, than I anticipated,' said Danielle Holley, president of Mount Holyoke College and another outspoken Trump critic who began warning about threats from the administration before Inauguration Day. Only Harvard University has taken on the White House directly in court, although the school has quietly pursued settlement possibilities on the side, a source familiar with the discussions told CNN. For those who have stayed on offense publicly, it's an increasingly lonely fight. 'There's no doubt about it that the severe tactics being used by our federal government are being highly effective,' acknowledged Holley, a civil rights attorney who became the leader of Mount Holyoke, the small central Massachusetts liberal arts college, in 2023. President Trump has made dismantling diversity, equity and inclusion programs – known as DEI – a top priority in his second term, focusing especially on transgender athletes in sports. 'Institutions of higher education have adopted and actively use dangerous, demeaning, and immoral race- and sex-based preferences under the guise of so-called 'diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI),'' stated an executive order President Trump signed on his second day in office. In a speech to a joint session of Congress, Trump called DEI 'tyranny.' The administration's first major college settlement this year was with the University of Pennsylvania, whose swimming program became a lightning rod after Lia Thomas, a transgender athlete who had previously competed on the men's team, set several women's records in 2022 on her way to dominating the Ivy League championship. 'We acknowledge that some student-athletes were disadvantaged by these rules,' UPenn President Larry Jameson said in a statement on July 1 announcing the agreement. 'We recognize this and will apologize to those who experienced a competitive disadvantage or experienced anxiety because of the policies in effect at the time.' That apology was worth $175 million to the university, as the White House released federal funding frozen three months earlier. While many universities have reconfigured, renamed, or scrubbed entirely any DEI references from their materials, Mount Holyoke – with just over 2,000 students – still has a dedicated DEI page on its website. 'Diversity, equity and inclusion efforts extend beyond specific departments and are embedded in all areas of the College,' the page states. Holley says continuing to speak out against the government's efforts to curtail DEI is not a matter of obstinance – but is critical to the mission of the 188-year-old college, one of the historic 'Seven Sisters,' and the first of that group to accept transgender students. 'At Mount Holyoke, we are a women's college, and because of that, we are built on diversity, equity and inclusion,' said Holley. Since the University of Pennsylvania's settlement, the deals between universities and the government have gotten more costly and the institutions more prominent. Columbia University signed a landmark $221 million settlement agreement with the administration last month to regain access to its federal grants. Acting President Claire Shipman acknowledged the pressure they faced at the loss of so much money but bristled at the idea that Columbia was surrendering to government intimidation. 'I actually think that the narrative that paints this as a kind of binary situation – courage versus capitulation – is just wrong. It's too simplistic,' Shipman told CNN Kate Bolduan on July 24. 'This was a really, really complex problem.' 'We could have faced the loss of any future relationship in the coming years with the federal government,' added Shipman, 'and that would have effectively meant an end to the research mission we conduct as we know it.' The Columbia deal includes an 'independent monitor' to resolve any ongoing disputes with the government over admissions and hiring, an idea that distresses Holley at Mount Holyoke. 'The idea that an American university would have a government monitor, not related to what they have been found to be in violation of, but related to their academic departments and the way that they hire people,' said Holley, 'I think everyone in the United States should be deeply concerned with the idea that our federal government is attempting to run private universities and attempting to tell those universities who to hire; what they should be teaching in their classrooms.' One week after the administration's deal with Columbia, Brown University, another elite Ivy League school, signed its own settlement with the government that included a ban on 'unlawful DEI goals' and banned transgender women from women's housing. The university also pledged $50 million to workforce development groups in Rhode Island, where Brown is located. 'The Trump Administration is successfully reversing the decades-long woke-capture of our nation's higher education institutions,' Education Secretary Linda McMahon said in a statement announcing the deal. 'Woke is officially DEAD at Brown,' President Trump crowed on social media. As the flurry of legal agreements in the past month has made clear, institutions of higher education are not going to hang together in a unified defense against the government's demands. While he continues to speak strongly against the administration, Roth says he understands why other college leaders would cut their own deals. 'The fear I think many schools have is that the federal government is willing to not obey the laws as anyone has understood them before, and so the lawless federal government is very frightening,' said Roth. 'If someone pays a ransom to get their kid back from a kidnapper, I don't criticize the parents for making a deal,' he added. 'It's the kidnappers that deserve our criticism.' The Trump administration has been fighting a two-pronged civil rights battle against colleges and universities – demanding an end to DEI programs that the government says are discriminatory while also accusing several institutions of antisemitism in their handling of pro-Palestinian protests on campus in 2024. In court filings involving Harvard, one of the last major holdouts, the Department of Education has pointed to the university's own report on antisemitism to claim the school ignored rampant discrimination against Jewish students and faculty members. 'Protestors followed and verbally harassed some Jewish students, vandalized Harvard's campus, and posted swastika stickers near Harvard Hillel's Rosovsky Hall,' a government brief says, citing Harvard's investigation. The university also released a report on discrimination against Palestinians and Muslims on campus – an issue not mentioned in the Department of Education's complaints. The Trump administration says Harvard has been talking to them behind the scenes about finding a way out of their legal standoff, which includes a second lawsuit in response to the administration's attempt to cancel Harvard's international student program, a move a court indefinitely put on hold in June. 'We're still in negotiations,' McMahon told Fox News last week. 'We are closer than we were. We are not there yet.' But Harvard President Alan Garber has told faculty that retaining its academic freedom without government-monitored 'intellectual diversity' – a major sticking point in early dealings with the administration – remains nonnegotiable, according to the student-run Harvard Crimson newspaper. 'Neither Harvard nor any other private university can allow itself to be taken over by the federal government,' Garber wrote in April when the school first filed suit against the government over more than $2 billion in frozen research funding. The fight continues to be costly for Harvard. A federal judge has not yet decided whether to order the government to turn the money spigot back on, causing budgetary pressure that prompted Garber to take a voluntary 25% pay cut. The administration's intense pressure on higher education programs and students has not been met with complete silence. An open letter signed by more than 600 college presidents in April called Trump's actions 'unprecedented government overreach.' 'We are open to constructive reform and do not oppose legitimate government oversight,' said the letter. 'However, we must oppose undue government intrusion in the lives of those who learn, live, and work on our campuses.' But Roth, one of the presidents who signed the letter, doesn't believe putting out one statement is enough. 'I was glad that they did, but I don't see many people sounding the alarm that this is an assault on the integrity of one of the most successful systems in America, the higher education system,' Roth said. Although not as prominent as Harvard or Columbia, Mount Holyoke is classified by the Carnegie Foundation as a research institution with a billion-dollar endowment, and Holley says its focus on women's issues has been a double whammy for its funding. 'If you are a researcher in this country, doing work on women's health, or doing work on women in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math), doing work on women in leadership, any research that has to do with women is being caught up in those government searches and is being canceled,' she said. 'When one of our research grants was cut, the wording from the federal government was that this kind of work related to gender is not beneficial and not scientific.' But the cuts have not only come from the Trump administration, according to Holley. She said some private funding sources are also stepping back and cutting grants because they are afraid to associate themselves with a school that might run afoul of the president. 'I would say that the estimate is about $2 million (in lost research funding), and that's both cancelations from the federal government directly and cancelations from private funders who fear what the federal government might do,' Holley said. At Wesleyan University – an institution in Middletown, Connecticut, with about 3,000 students – responding to the administration's policies and executive orders has meant reconfiguring some DEI programs. A summer camp program aimed at middle school girls in Middletown who were interested in STEM studies is now open to boys, as well. 'The fact is that girls weren't signing up for STEM as much as boys, so that's why we had that program,' said Roth. 'But it seemed to some boys – big boys, I guess – to be reverse discrimination.' With many other schools eliminating DEI programs or making them all but invisible, Holley believes that the quick moves to roll back those commitments, even without an immediate and direct legal threat, says as much about the schools as it does about the government. 'I think it is a representation of the fact that many organizations maybe did not believe in these principles as strongly as they said that they did, and the government has provided them with an out,' she said. After encountering limited pushback from its Ivy League targets, the Trump administration is moving on to public institutions, starting with freezing hundreds of millions of dollars in funding to the University of California, Los Angeles. UCLA is now actively negotiating with the Trump administration over a possible settlement. A government draft proposal would have the university pay $1 billion dollars, CNN has learned. 'There is a possibility that this administration, once they are done kind of dealing with Harvard and some of the larger institutions that they may begin to turn to the small liberal arts colleges,' said Holley. Despite the millions of dollars at stake in a fight with an administration flush with recent victories, Holley insists her criticism won't be muted. 'My mom was raised in the Jim Crow South, you know, both of my parents survived the Jim Crow era in this country, and I'm a student of the civil rights movement,' Holley said. 'In these moments, I would never think of not speaking up.'
