Latest news with #LeeBollinger
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Negotiate or fight? Trump has colleges right where he wants them.
President Donald Trump's campaign against two of the planet's best-known universities is laying bare just how unprepared academia was to confront a hostile White House. Schools never imagined facing an administration so willing to exercise government power so quickly — targeting the research funding, tax-exempt status, foreign student enrollment and financial aid eligibility schools need to function. That's left them right where the president wants them. Even as Ivy League schools, research institutions, and college trade associations try to resist Trump's attacks in court, campus leaders are starting to accept they face only difficult choices: negotiate with the government, mount a painful legal and political fight — or simply try to stay out of sight. Groundbreaking scientific research, financial aid for lower-income students and soft power as an economic engine once shielded schools' access to federal funds. Trump has now transformed those financial lifelines into leverage. And the diversity and independence of U.S. colleges and universities — something they've seen as a source of strength and competition — is straining efforts to form a singular response to the president. 'Perhaps it's a failure of imagination on the part of universities,' said Lee Bollinger, the former president of Columbia University. 'It feels now like there has been a naïveté on the part of universities. There's been no planning for this kind of thing.' Schools are accustomed to tension with their faculty, governing boards, legislatures and governors. But punishments for resisting the Trump administration plumbed untested levels of severity this week when the president issued an executive order to bar foreign students from entering the country to study at Harvard University as his administration threatened Columbia's academic accreditation. Even though Project 2025 — The Heritage Foundation's roadmap for a second Trump administration — previewed some of the tactics the administration would use, many school leaders may have underestimated the president's determination. 'It just seemed inconceivable that we would be in this position of having massive amounts of federal funding withheld, threats to have legislation that attacks your tax status, and now these new issues with international students,' Bollinger said. A federal judge issued a temporary restraining order Thursday night that blocked Trump's directive to restrict Harvard's access to international students. But the administration is brandishing its response to Harvard's resistance as a warning to other schools who might resist, as federal officials pressure schools to negotiate the terms of a truce over the administration's complaints about campus antisemitism, foreign government influence and its opposition to diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives. "We've held back funding from Columbia, we've also done the same thing with Harvard,' Education Secretary Linda McMahon told House lawmakers this past week. 'We are asking, as Columbia has done, to come to the table for negotiations," she said, just hours before telling the school's accreditor it was violating federal anti-discrimination laws. "We've also asked Harvard. Their answer was a lawsuit.' A Harvard spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment. 'What we've seen so far when it comes to Harvard is the playbook for holding these radical schools accountable is way deeper than anyone anticipated or expected,' a senior White House official told POLITICO. 'You're starting to get to the bone, so to speak, of holding these people accountable,' said the official, who was granted anonymity to freely discuss White House strategy. 'Harvard knows they cannot endure this for long, they just can't. They're going to have to come to the table, and we'll always be there to meet them. But this was a test case of what to do.' The university described Trump's latest foreign student order this week as 'yet another illegal retaliatory step.' A federal judge in May blocked a separate administration attempt to prevent Harvard from enrolling international students. Harvard is still locked in a legal fight over more than $2 billion in federal grants the White House blocked after the school refused to comply with demands to overhaul its admissions and disciplinary policies. Trump announced plans to cancel Harvard's tax-exempt status in early May, then later floated redistributing billions of dollars in university grants to trade schools. 'It is not our desire to bring these schools to their knees. The president reveres our higher educational facilities. He's a product of one,' the White House official said. 'But in order to hold these people accountable, we will be unrelenting in our enforcement of the law and hitting them where it hurts, which is their pocketbook.' Many institutions have chosen a more muted response following months of conflict, including major public institutions in states that have also grown reliant on the full-freight tuition paid by international students. 'Universities don't have as many degrees of freedom, at least in the public sector, as you might think they do,' said Teresa Sullivan, the former president of the University of Virginia. 'One reason they seem to be relatively slow to act is there's a certain disbelief — can this really be happening?' 'We seem to be in uncharted territory, at least in my experience,' Sullivan said. 'All of a sudden, the rules don't seem to apply. I think that's disconcerting. It shakes the ground beneath you, and you don't necessarily know what to do next.' Still, some higher education leaders are trying to confront the government. More than 650 campus officials have so far signed onto a joint statement that opposes 'the unprecedented government overreach and political interference now endangering American higher education.' Sullivan and a group of other former presidents used an op-ed in The Washington Post to argue the Trump administration's offensive 'won't be confined to Harvard University.' Trade associations including the American Council on Education, Association of American Universities, and Association of Public and Land-grant Universities have joined schools in a lawsuit to block some of Trump's research funding cuts. The Presidents' Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration, a collective of school leaders, has also sued to challenge the Trump administration's attempts to target the legal status of thousands of foreign students. 'Your first obligation as president is you don't want to hurt the institution you represent,' Sullivan said of the relative silence coming from non-Ivy League institutions. 'These days it's hard to tell what hurts and what doesn't. I think that's the motive. The motive is not cowardice.' Schools still face a choice between negotiating with the government — and risk compromising on their principles — or inviting Trump's rage by putting up a fight. 'Every school has had an option to correct course and work with the administration, or stand firm in their violations of the law,' the administration official said. 'They have an option, they know very well what to do.' The real question, according to Bollinger, the former Columbia president, is how far the White House will go and how much resistance the schools are willing to put up. 'The power of government is so immense that if they want to destroy institutions, they can,' he said. 'What you do in that kind of environment is you stand on principle."
Yahoo
24-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
A New McCarthyism
Two years ago, I moved to the United States to found a think tank devoted to defending global free expression. What better place to launch than America, which is, according to the law professor and First Amendment expert Lee Bollinger, 'the most speech protective of any nation on Earth, now or throughout history'? Despite being Danish, I've always found America's civil-libertarian free speech tradition more appealing than the Old World's model, with its vague terms and conditions. For much of my career, I've been evangelizing a First Amendment approach to free speech to skeptical Europeans and doubtful Americans, who are often tempted by laws banning 'hate speech,' 'extremism,' and 'disinformation.' That appreciation for the First Amendment is something I share with many foreigners—Germans, Iranians, Russians—who now call America home. For some of us, that tradition has become a kind of secular article of faith—the realization of which not only offers a sense of identity, but also a rite of passage into American ideals. Indeed, many of us noncitizens nodded in agreement in February when Vice President J.D. Vance said that European speech restrictions are 'shocking to American ears.' But the very ideal that so many of us noncitizens cherish as America's 'first freedom' is now being curtailed. The administration is invoking a clause of the Immigration Nationality Act of 1952 that allows the secretary of state unfettered discretion to deport aliens, including anyone he believes 'would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.' This new scheme has begun with the detaining of foreign students—including visa and green card holders—for allegedly antisemitic speech. Combating antisemitism is an important and legitimate government interest, and both Americans and noncitizens are safer when bigotry is confronted. But for six decades America has prohibited censorship and relied on counterspeech as the main bulwark against hatred, not least because leading Jewish and black civil rights groups have long recognized the danger of giving the government power over speech. Had the administration focused on noncitizens engaged in illegal or seriously disruptive conduct targeting Jewish students—which clearly occurred on some campuses after the October 7 terrorist Hamas attacks—few could have objected. But it's now clear that the government is targeting noncitizens for ideas and speech protected by the First Amendment. The most worrying example (so far) is a Turkish student at Tufts University, apparently targeted for co-authoring a student op-ed calling for, among other things, Tufts to divest from companies with ties to Israel. One report estimates that nearly 300 students from universities across the country have had their visas revoked so far. Instead of correcting this overreach, the government has doubled down. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) recently announced that it would begin screening the social media posts of aliens 'whose posts indicate support for antisemitic terrorism, antisemitic terrorist organizations, or other antisemitic activity.' Shortly after, the X account of USCIS posted about a 'robust social media vetting program' and warned: 'EVERYONE should be on notice. If you're a guest in our country—act like it.' And four days later, White House homeland security adviser Stephen Miller promised to deport 'anyone who preaches hate for America.' What that means is anybody's guess—and seems to depend entirely on subjective assessments. This has created a wave of self-censorship among the millions of noncitizens who live, study, and work in the U.S. Conversations among expats now center on how many have stopped posting political content or canceled travel abroad, fearing they won't be let back in. Noncitizens in think tanks and public policy roles I have spoken to are using burner phones and keeping immigration lawyers on speed dial. Universities are advising foreign students and faculty not to publicly criticize the U.S. government or officials. Students are complying, even going so far as to ask to have their bylines removed from articles, refraining from peaceful protests and scrubbing their social media accounts. Even more surreal: People, including me, are receiving constant pleas from friends and family to come home, fearing what might happen if we stay. After all, this is America, not Russia. As a green card holder, I understand why so many foreign students, faculty members, and other legal residents who live in and love this country might prefer to stay silent—after all, they came here for a reason, whether to study, work, or start a life with loved ones. But silence would be a betrayal of the very values that brought many of us here in the first place. In fact, I can think of few things more un-American than having to self-censor out of fear of being targeted by the government. This isn't the first time America has targeted foreign dissenters. In 1798, President John Adams signed the Alien Act, giving himself sweeping power to deport any noncitizen from a friendly nation deemed 'dangerous to the peace and safety of the United States,' or merely 'suspected' of treason or 'secret machinations against the government.' In response, James Madison warned the law's vague language 'can never be mistaken for legal rules or certain definitions' and 'subvert[ed] the general principles of free government.' Thomas Jefferson called it 'a most detestable thing … worthy of the 8th or 9th century.' Their concerns were vindicated when Americans handed Adams' Federalists a catastrophic defeat in the 1800 election, and the Alien Act expired under Jefferson. During the Red Scares of the 20th century, waves of government paranoia led to the surveillance, detention, and deportation of 'subversive' noncitizens. McCarthyism has been roundly criticized in the decades since, and few have likely imagined that a McCarthy-era statute would not only survive but be revived and aggressively expanded in the 21st century. The late British-American journalist Christopher Hitchens is a more recent testament to the long tolerance of America toward foreign dissent. Before becoming a U.S. citizen in 2007, Hitchens spent decades as a legal resident—and as one of America's most acerbic public intellectuals. He accused Ronald Reagan of being 'a liar and trickster,' called Israel America's 'chosen surrogate' for 'dirty work' and 'terrorism,' lambasted Bill Clinton as 'almost psychopathically deceitful,' and accused the George W. Bush administration of torture and illegal surveillance. If a student can be deported for writing a campus op-ed critical of Israel, any of Hitchens' views could have been used to justify deporting him. Those applauding the recent crackdowns should remember how quickly the target can change. An overzealous administration focused on countering 'Islamophobia' rather than antisemitism might have barred Ayaan Hirsi Ali or Salman Rushdie before they became citizens. The next might decide Douglas Murray crosses the line. Surely Secretary of State Marco Rubio knows this. In a recent interview, he warned that if Americans are denied entry to or face consequences in Europe for their online speech, it would undermine 'one of the pillars of our shared values'—freedom of expression. Yet his own department now targets foreign nationals in the U.S. for the same online speech he was ostensibly protecting. Had America been known for deporting, rather than welcoming, dissent, I would never have made it my home. That might not have been much of a loss. But consider this: 35 percent of U.S.-affiliated academic Nobel laureates are immigrants, and nearly half of all American unicorn startups have founders born outside the country. How many of these brilliant minds would have chosen the United States if they risked exile for crossing the speech red lines of the moment? As a European who owes my freedom in life thus far to the America that fought Nazism and defeated communism, I feel a responsibility to speak out when this country strays from its founding ideals. I came to America for its freedom, not just to enjoy it, but to defend it—even if that puts me at risk.
The Guardian
20-03-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
US universities face choice to surrender or fight back against Trump's takeover
The Trump administration's unprecedented pressure campaign on American higher education – which is forcing major universities to bow to its demands or risk investigations and the loss of millions of dollars in federal money – is so far facing little pushback from the schools affected. That campaign escalated earlier this month, when the US government cancelled $400m in federal contracts and grants to Columbia University. In a subsequent letter, representatives of three federal agencies said they would reconsider that freeze only if Columbia agreed to conditions including more aggressively disciplining students who engage in pro-Palestinian disruptions, planning 'comprehensive' reform of the school's admissions policies, and placing one of school's area studies departments under 'academic receivership' – meaning under the control of an outside chair. Other colleges and universities across the US have been watching to see how Columbia reacts to the letter, which is widely viewed as a test case for academic freedom. In an interview with the Chronicle of Higher Education, Lee Bollinger, Columbia's former president, described the situation as 'an authoritarian takeover'. Yet ahead of a Thursday deadline for compliance, the Wall Street Journal has reported that Columbia appears to be poised to yield to the Trump administration's demands. The government's confrontation with Columbia, which critics describe as ideological blackmail and possibly illegal, is only one of a number of shots that the administration has fired in recent days across the bow of American elite higher education – and so far, opposition has been surprisingly minimal, as colleges and universities weigh whether to surrender, negotiate or fight back. Many of the demands that the Trump administration is making are not lawful, Jameel Jaffer told the Guardian. Jaffer, who said that he did not speak for the university, is the executive director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia. 'They can't require Columbia to take the steps that they're demanding Columbia take, and no university could take these kinds of steps without completely destroying its credibility as an independent institution of higher education, or take these steps consistent with the values that are common to universities in the United States.' A chill has descended on American academia, advocates for freedom of expression say, with professors, graduate students and researchers fearful that they'll lose jobs or funding – because of their political opinions, or merely because they work at an institution that has come under the Trump administration's Medusa gaze. The government also announced a task force on alleged antisemitism at 10 major universities; sent a letter to 60 schools warning that they are under investigation for discriminating against Jewish students; and arrested Mahmoud Khalil, a former Columbia student who led pro-Palestinian protests, under an obscure provision that gives the US secretary of state the power to deport foreign nationals whose presence in the US has 'potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States'. On Wednesday, the administration also announced that it was freezing $175m in federal funding to the University of Pennsylvania because of the university's policies allowing transgender women to compete in women's sports, which the administration has called 'demeaning, unfair, and dangerous to women and girls'. While the pushback from institutions themselves has been minimal, some college professors and university diversity officers sued last month in an effort to block a US Department of Education ultimatum calling for colleges and universities to cancel campus diversity initiatives or risk losing federal funding. 'There is extraordinary fear across university campuses at the very top level,' Veena Dubal, a law professor and the general counsel of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), told the Guardian. 'University administrators are terrified of losing millions and millions of dollars in funding,' she said, adding that 'there is a lot of self-censorship going on' as medical researchers and others who previously considered their work apolitical reconsider that assumption. Sign up to This Week in Trumpland A deep dive into the policies, controversies and oddities surrounding the Trump administration after newsletter promotion Political winds are already forcing drastic budget cuts at many universities. Last week, Johns Hopkins said that it was eliminating over 2,000 jobs due to funding cuts by the US Agency for International Development (USAID). Harvard has undertaken a hiring freeze. The president of Wesleyan, Michael Roth, has vehemently criticized the Trump administration's actions and what he calls universities' insufficient response. Although he disagrees with many pro-Palestinian protesters, he recently told Politico that universities are suffering from an 'infatuation with institutional neutrality' that makes 'cowardice into a policy'. Legal experts say that universities, such as Columbia, threatened with funding withdrawal have strong standing to sue, and expressed surprise and concern that they haven't. Although federal agencies can place conditions on money they give universities, Jaffer said, 'they have the authority to demand those things only at the end of a [legal process] that they haven't actually carried out.' In addition, 'the first amendment still guarantees universities the right to shape their own expressive communities, and many of the demands that the administration is making would intrude on that right.' Katrina Armstrong, the interim president of Columbia, said in a statement that this is 'a critical moment for higher education in this country. The freedom of universities is tied to the freedom of every other institution in a thriving democracy.' She did not indicate how that rhetoric will translate into action. Columbia did not respond to a Guardian request for comment. 'I don't think that it is wise for a university with a large endowment, that is the first university to be targeted in this way, to be taking this more conservative approach,' Dubal said of Columbia. 'I think that if anyone is well-situated to lead the charge to help save higher education, it would be a university like Columbia.' Others experts noted that many universities are probably calculating that resistance isn't worth the cost. 'I suspect we'll see litigation over this,' Tyler Coward, an attorney with the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (Fire), told the Guardian, but also 'see some universities capitulate and adopt the policies, including the speech-restrictive policies, that government is asking them to adopt'. Frederick Hess, the director of education policy studies at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, told Inside Higher Ed that he believed that there were real antisemitic incidents on Columbia's campus during anti-Israel protests, and that the university had mishandled them in a 'clear violation' of federal anti-discrimination law. But, he added, the federal government has 'not been transparent' about what it is doing and not done enough to 'convince me that these specific remedies are called for'. Some observers have wondered if universities – some of which have lost millions of dollars as pro-Israel donors, unhappy about radically pro-Palestinian sentiment on campuses, pulled funding – are secretly pleased with the Trump administration's actions, because it provides political cover to take decisions unpopular with students and faculty. 'I can only speculate,' Dubal said, 'but it would not be surprising to me if, in fact, the board of trustees is playing a role in the non-aggressive approach that Columbia seems to be taking.' Either way, she said, 'I think it's more clear to the public, to university faculty and students, that that they are not playing the kind of role that we expect them to play in defending not just the university's coffers, but all the values that higher education is built upon and, in fact, the laws of the nation.'
