With Stakes High, White House Pushes Negotiations with Harvard

Yomiuri Shimbun

7 hours ago

The Trump administration is ramping up negotiations with Harvard University in an effort to reach an end to its months-long battle with the elite school, two senior White House officials have said, as Harvard has been racking up legal wins in court.
The administration expects a deal to land by the end of the month, one official said, and hopes the agreement would make a big enough splash to 'basically be a blueprint for the rest of higher education.' The White House officials spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private deliberations.
Harvard declined to comment.
The university has been a key target in the Trump administration's mounting attacks on higher education, which have focused on diversity efforts and allegations of antisemitism on campuses across the country. Harvard has drawn praise in academia for its efforts to push back on the White House's sweeping demands to limit student protests, submit to extensive government oversight, and revamp its admissions and hiring practices. The university has also amassed dozens of statements of support from organizations, universities and states in a lawsuit filed after the administration froze federal research funding.
A person close to the university, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the matter's sensitivity, said Tuesday that Harvard will not compromise its values or its First Amendment rights.
Harvard allies, free-speech advocates and others have feared that the Trump administration would use its attacks on Harvard to exert control over universities nationwide and dismantle academic freedom. Whatever the outcome, the case will create a significant precedent, said higher education attorney Sarah Hartley.
'This is the playbook to be used with other universities by the government going forward,' said Hartley, a partner at the Washington-based law firm BCLP. 'It, in many ways, is being used as a test of democracy and what the government can force on private institutions.'
Harvard has filed two lawsuits against the Trump administration in an effort to block its punitive actions, including freezing more than $3 billion in federal funding, which imperils scientific and medical research at the university.
Court filings in that case, submitted either in support of Harvard or the government, offer a window into the opposing camps that have been drawn into the battle and spotlight how the fight between the Trump administration and Harvard is being felt across America.
More than 40 parties in support of Harvard's case filed amicus briefs – legal statements submitted in court by parties who are affected by, but not directly involved in, the case. They included groups of 12,000 Harvard alumni, 24 research universities, 12 hospitals and 18 former U.S. officials.
In the briefs, the hospitals wrote that their ability to develop treatments and cures for diseases is at stake if the research funding is not reinstated. Universities said research projects like those that put humans on the moon and created cancer drugs are threatened. More than 20 states said more cuts to university research would devastate their economies. And free-speech advocates said the United States' bedrock ideals are at risk.
In response, a group of 16 Republican-led states filed a brief on Monday in support of the Trump administration and its cutoff of federal funding to Harvard. In the brief, conservative attorneys general echoed the government's claims that Harvard has discriminated against Jews in violation of federal law and that the federal government is not obligated to fund institutions that are antisemitic.
Harvard has asked a judge in this case, filed in U.S. District Court in Massachusetts, to make a ruling that would resolve the lawsuit without a trial, which is scheduled to begin July 21.
The government may have more motivation to come to a settlement outside of court than Harvard does, said higher education attorney Jodie Ferise, who believes Harvard has a stronger legal case.
'The White House has every incentive to want to reach some kind of compromise, because I don't think they'll win this case,' she said.
Harvard has accused the Trump administration of violating its First Amendment rights and of not following the proper federal procedures for revoking funding as laid out under a federal law known as Title VI.
The First Amendment claim has become one of the case's central questions: whether it's constitutional for the government to tell a university how to hire, make decisions or regulate campus speech. That issue drew the attention of many of the advocates who filed in support of Harvard.
'The government cannot attempt a hostile takeover of any private institution, much less a private college or university, in order to impose its preferred vision of ideological balance,' the American Civil Liberties Union wrote in a brief filed with seven other organizations, including the right-leaning Cato Institute and Rutherford Institute.
In their Monday filing, the administration's allies focused on concerns about alleged antisemitism on campus, pushing for the court to find that Harvard has violated federal antidiscrimination law and should face consequences.
'Universities that accept federal funding must live up to their obligations to protect Jewish students,' the attorneys general of Iowa and 15 other states wrote. '… Harvard's current, suffocating atmosphere of antisemitism is illegal. And that illegal conduct is not protected by the First Amendment.'
In a separate case on Friday, a federal judge in Massachusetts issued a preliminary injunction to prevent the Department of Homeland Security and the State Department from barring international students and scholars from entering the country to attend, conduct research or teach at Harvard.
The Trump administration issued a proclamation earlier this month after the same judge – U.S. District Judge Allison D. Burroughs – blocked the administration's attempt to revoke the university's certification to host international students. The proclamation claims the entry of foreign nationals heading to Harvard is 'detrimental to the interests of the United States because, in my judgment, Harvard's conduct has rendered it an unsuitable destination for foreign students and researchers.'
Harvard sued the administration in May after the government pulled its certification and said foreign students, who make up more than a quarter of Harvard's student body, must transfer or risk losing their visa status. Burroughs's latest ruling addresses what she called 'an end run' around her first order.
In a 44-page opinion issued Monday, Burroughs said, 'This case is about core constitutional rights that must be safeguarded: freedom of thought, freedom of expression, and freedom of speech, each of which is a pillar of a functioning democracy and an essential hedge against authoritarianism.'
She added: 'Here, the government's efforts to control a reputable academic institution and squelch diverse viewpoints, seemingly because they are, in some instances, opposed to this Administration's own views, threaten these rights. To make matters worse, the government attempts to accomplish this, at least in part, on the backs of international students.'