Latest news with #MayMailman
New York Times
11-08-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
The Harvard-Trained Lawyer Behind Trump's Fight Against Top Universities
When President Trump wants to rattle academia, he turns to his deputy chief of staff, Stephen Miller. And then Mr. Miller turns to May Mailman. Ms. Mailman, a 37-year-old Harvard-trained lawyer, is the most important, least-known person behind the administration's relentless pursuit of the nation's premier universities. The extraordinary effort has found seemingly endless ways to pressure schools into submission, including federal funding, student visas and civil rights investigations. Her hand in deploying these levers of power was evident from the beginning of Mr. Trump's second term. As his ambitions around reshaping higher education expanded, so did her remit. She is credited as an animating force behind a strategy that has intimidated independent institutions and undercut years of medical and scientific research. The policies Ms. Mailman helped devise — and is now leveraging as she leads the White House's negotiations with colleges — have sent shock waves through higher education, dividing faculty and alarming some students who see an effort to silence dissent. The aggressive tactics could have far-reaching implications for the future of academic freedom, the admissions practices at the most competitive colleges and the global reputations for some of the crown jewels of the nation's university system. So far, only Harvard has been willing to fight back in court, a sign of the strength of the federal government's negotiating position. 'There are a lot of good ideas floating around this building, but somebody has to capture those ideas, make sure that the right people are involved and that there is a process to put them into action,' Ms. Mailman said in a recent interview at the White House. 'So I'm the catcher of floating ideas.' Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Hindustan Times
02-08-2025
- Politics
- Hindustan Times
The Conservative Women Who Are ‘Having It All'
According to the gospel of TikTok, conservative women are a mix of trad wives, pro-natalists and wide-eyed aspirants to the 'princess treatment.' But a very different ideal looks more like May Mailman, an over-full-time working mother whom others on the right speak about with awe. PREMIUM The Conservative Women Who Are 'Having It All' At 37, Mailman is the deputy assistant to Donald Trump and senior policy strategist at the White House. Pregnant with her third child, she flies home to Houston on Friday nights to spend the weekend with her family. Once, she gave a major interview one week postpartum, terrified she'd leak on camera. Her first child, not yet 3, has already been on 14 flights. 'People say to me, 'When you're home, I hope you can really connect with your kids' and I'm like, 'You're crazy. When I'm home, I'm constantly attached to my phone,'' Mailman said in an interview. May Mailman, deputy assistant to the president and senior policy strategist, at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building in DC in July. During the week, her nanny and her husband David, who owns a tree-moving company, get the kids out of bed, change their diapers, bathe and feed them and put them to bed, while making sure to run the dishwasher. Yes, Mailman is missing out on much of her kids' early years, but she doesn't second guess or feel guilty about her choices. She feels lucky. 'I don't have a victimhood mentality,' she said. 'You have to exert a certain locus of control and focus on the things you can handle without obsessing over what you can't.' 'In theory, I would love to be a trad wife,' Mailman said. 'When I wrote down qualities I wanted in a husband, one was to make more money than me because I wanted the freedom to stay home so that I wouldn't feel trapped. And that's who I married. Maybe conservative women don't feel as conflicted as progressive women because we structured our lives from the get-go so we could potentially do both.' The much-heralded (and oft-disputed) idea that women can 'have it all' is often seen as a liberal ideal, while being a housewife—or as it's now known, a stay-at-home mother—is upheld as a conservative one. But while opinions about how 'the other side' thinks can veer toward caricature on both ends of the political spectrum, real life is more complicated. According to a Pew Research Center report on parenting in America today, nearly as many Republican mothers (67%) work outside the home as Democratic mothers (70%). And majorities of both Democratic and Republican parents (86% and 88%, respectively) say that being a parent is either one of the most important or the most important aspect of their identity. For most women, whatever their politics, housewifery is a nonstarter; outside a wealthy elite, the two-income household is just economic reality. But another reality is that many women, conservatives and liberals alike, genuinely want a career—whether for their sense of self, their desire to contribute financially or as a way to pursue their passion. Conservative women just tend to see their lives in a different light. In interviews with over a dozen high-powered conservative women, they said that the trad-wife lifestyle was never a choice they seriously considered for themselves. All said that they always knew they wanted children and that they also wanted a meaningful career. As for what makes this juggle work for them, they credited a combination of grit, religious faith, familial and community support and a laserlike focus on planning and priorities. The past decade has seen the rise of many conservative women in high-profile jobs in government, the media and corporate America. There's Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett, 53, former South Carolina Governor and Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley, 53, and Sen. Katie Britt of Alabama, 43. All have held high-pressure jobs while raising a family, despite having financial resources that gave them the option not to work. Last year, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt returned to work just four days after giving birth when Trump announced his candidacy. 'I would reject that you can't be a good mom and be good at your job,' Leavitt said on a recent podcast. 'It's not for everybody. And it takes a lot of work and will and faith and prayer, and it's hard. But it can be done.' In interviews, several conservatives pointed to others leading the way, like Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, 42, who feels honored to be considered a role model. 'I love what I do. I love being a parent. And I want other moms to know that they can do both these things,' Sanders told me. 'At the end of the day, being a mom is really hard—and being a mom and working brings a whole other set of difficulties and challenges,' said Sanders, who has three children. 'But in the conservative world, one of the most common things that you hear is that the value of the family and the value of our faith is incredibly important, and that gives us a level of support and purpose and takes away from the anxiety. I know that I'm not doing this on my own.' Mission Driven In 2021, when Katie Britt was considering whether to run for Senate, both her kids were heading into middle school. She relished braiding her daughter's hair in the morning and attending all her kids' games. Before making the decision, she and her husband prayed for guidance about what it would mean for her to spend so much time in Washington. 'Just missing those moments and not being present for everything,' Britt recalled in an interview. 'I really wrestled with it. The world is full of voices saying this can't work.' But her daughter, then 10, approached her one day and said, 'Mom, you have to do this.' 'I don't think you understand what a hard thing this is,' Britt recalled saying, to which her daughter replied: 'But Mom, doesn't God call on you to do hard things?' When U.S. Sen. Katie Britt was considering a run for Senate, she worried about how she would manage the juggle. Her daughter was encouraging: 'Mom, doesn't God call on you to do hard things?' Pictured with her son on Capitol Hill in July. That's when Britt says she knew to push ahead—and to push hard. In high school, she'd been both cheer captain and valedictorian, while holding down an after-school job. At the University of Alabama, she'd been president of her sorority and of the student government. 'My husband and I both have this attitude of rolling up our sleeves and getting to work,' she said, even if that means missing out on some big moments in their kids' lives and watching their games via livestream. There are plenty of good reasons why the 'it's impossible being a woman' narrative is so resonant. Despite increased workplace flexibility, most employees still feel like they are on duty all the time, quality child care is expensive and hard to find, and women still put in more hours than men on the domestic front. Not surprisingly, books, TV and movies frequently depict mothers on the brink, teetering between resentment and entrapment on one end—and sanity and self-fulfillment on the other. Stories about 'maternal rage' reflect those frustrations. In the novel and movie 'Nightbitch,' a beleaguered mother turns into a dog. In Miranda July's novel 'All Fours,' a perimenopausal woman flees the constraints of an unsupportive society. 'Motherhood is not fun. This is awful. Kids will ruin your life. That's what you read in their magazines and newspapers and what they hear from their friends,' said political commentator Megyn Kelly, the mother of three kids between the ages of 11 and 15, characterizing what she sees as the liberal take. To her mind, liberals are self-involved to their own detriment, obsessing over whether to have children, obsessing over their kids once they have them and obsessing about everything they're giving up in the process. 'Whereas in the conservative world, especially among people of faith, you hear all about the rewards of motherhood and that gets reinforced,' said Kelly. 'For us, having a family is a no-brainer. It's part of your life plan and you know that from an early age. It's a question of when and how and not whether.' 'The world is full of voices saying this can't work,' said Sen. Britt, pictured, of being a working mom. 'The public message you hear in the culture is 'Your life is over if you have a baby and you'll never accomplish anything,'' said Emily Zanotti 43, a copywriter and full-time working mother of four in Nashville and a self-described 'hardcore Catholic.' 'But what I always heard from fellow conservatives was to pursue a vocation and have a family, because that's one of the greatest things you can do to contribute to the future.' Sex Matters Conservative women are firm in their belief that childbearing is a big part of womanhood. To their mind, feminists, progressives and contemporary gender theorists have de-emphasized—even denied—sex differences in ways that don't reflect their lives or worldview. According to Carrie Lukas, president of the Independent Women's Forum, a conservative think tank, and a mother of five, conservative women don't tend to wring their hands over how their roles differ from those of men. In lieu of the gender-neutral 'parent,' they reflexively use the words 'mother' and 'father.' They believe that the maternal impulse fundamentally shapes women's priorities. 'The traditional leftist feminist is often aggrieved that women have this unique relationship with their children,' Lukas said, which she thinks makes them more troubled by career trade-offs or the 'motherhood wage gap.' As Lukas put it, 'Most conservative women, instead of resenting that they have to make a choice, feel grateful that they have choices to make.' Both Lukas and Danielle Crittenden, author of the 1999 book, 'What Our Mothers Didn't Tell Us: Why Happiness Eludes the Modern Woman,' emphasize that this debate is largely an elite discussion. 'It's still true that most women work as cashiers and men as truck drivers,' Crittenden told me. 'The women most likely to stay home are those who had a high-power career, then married high-power men, regardless of political affiliation. It's a luxury item, like owning thoroughbreds.' That said, Crittenden laments the inability of many women to talk openly about gender and sex differences. 'The maternal impulse to be self-sacrificing is often criticized as subverting your identity, but really, it's a superpower. We're not being taught to look at motherhood as an enriching and rewarding thing. Instead, it's looked at as a sacrifice.' It Takes a Village In the governor's office in Little Rock, Gov. Sanders recently implemented a 'Bring Your Baby to Work' program that allows mothers—and fathers—to bring their kids to the office during their first six months. The goal is to help ease the transition back to work so that employees don't feel like they have to constantly choose between work and parenthood. (State employees get 12 weeks of paid maternity leave.) 'I wanted to promote not just family values but family itself,' Sanders told me. Having babies around not only puts everyone in a good mood, she said. It also helps them focus on what she calls their larger mission: creating a better future for all families with policies that emphasize welfare-to-work, adoption and maternal health. One common complaint among many left-leaning women is the lack of public support in the U.S. for working mothers. Shouldn't the government be doing more in terms of providing child care and other resources? These conservative women take more of a bootstraps approach. They believe the onus is on them, their families and their communities, not on the state, to make family life work. 'I don't think about what excuses might be out there because I just know what I need to do, and I get the job done,' said Shannon Clark, a senior vice president at the security and intelligence firm Palantir. Clark, 44, who has two children under four, credits her parents, a teacher and construction worker who worked overtime to pay for her education. 'I learned that if there are things you want in life, you have to put in time and effort. It's not a free ride.' Shannon Clark and her children, Edith left, and George at home in Seattle, Wash. in July. Yet nearly all of these conservative women emphasized the crucial role played by their husbands. 'The best advice I've gotten so far is having a partner who is more than willing to be side by side,' said AshLee Strong, 40, who has two children under two with her husband, a rancher. 'We're on the same team.' After working as press secretary to then-Speaker of the House Paul Ryan in Washington, D.C. she moved back to Montana, where she runs a small business. 'I don't do this alone,' Strong explained. 'Not only my husband, but also my mom and my mother-in-law and my sisters-in-law help. Maybe that makes me more traditional, returning to the wider family dynamic.' Many echoed this Hillaryesque 'it takes a village' approach. For Britt, it's the friends reminding her that she needs to order new sports uniforms for her kids. For Clark, it's her mom, who moved across the street two weeks ago. Multiple women said the single best advice they got was 'Don't be afraid to ask for help.' And every woman interviewed was quick to acknowledge that none of this is easy. Of course, not every conservative woman is traditional in all senses. Some are on their second marriages. Some got married later in life, though almost all wished they'd found the right partner earlier. (On average, according to surveys, Republicans favor marrying and having children at a younger age than Democrats.) Shannon Clark's husband Sy Poggemeyer and son George in her home office in Seattle. Just like many women on the left, they revel in the flexible, remote work arrangements normalized by the pandemic. Many are enthusiastically free-range when it comes to child rearing. And like many Brooklyn parents, they refer to their husbands as partners. Despite the pronatalist rhetoric of JD Vance and others on the right, conservatives aren't having dramatically more children than liberals. On average, Democrats have 1.53 children, compared with 1.86 for Republicans. 'In this day and age, being a mom is harder than it's ever been before,' Sanders said. 'I'm going to sound more generous toward liberal women than you might expect, but I think all of us should be less judgmental. It would probably do all of us a lot of good to recognize that we're all, including me, just trying to make it through some days and keep our heads above water.' The Conservative Women Who Are 'Having It All' The Conservative Women Who Are 'Having It All' The Conservative Women Who Are 'Having It All' The Conservative Women Who Are 'Having It All'
Wall Street Journal
01-08-2025
- Politics
- Wall Street Journal
The Conservative Women Who Are ‘Having It All'
According to the gospel of TikTok, conservative women are a mix of trad wives, pro-natalists and wide-eyed aspirants to the 'princess treatment.' But a very different ideal looks more like May Mailman, an over-full-time working mother whom others on the right speak about with awe. At 37, Mailman is the deputy assistant to Donald Trump and senior policy strategist at the White House. Pregnant with her third child, she flies home to Houston on Friday nights to spend the weekend with her family. Once, she gave a major interview one week postpartum, terrified she'd leak on camera. Her first child, not yet 3, has already been on 14 flights.
Yahoo
31-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Universities quietly negotiating with White House aide to try to avoid Harvard's fate, source says
College and university leaders have been privately negotiating with a deputy to top Trump aide Stephen Miller in hopes of avoiding the same aggressive targeting of Harvard University, a person familiar with the matter said, as the administration looks to escalate its attacks on the Ivy League institution and other schools. The higher education leaders, who have had granular conversations with senior White House policy strategist May Mailman in recent weeks, are asking what signals they need to send to stay out of the administration's crosshairs, the person said. Mailman works closely with Miller – an architect of the administration's strategy to target colleges over concerns they are not sufficiently policing alleged antisemitism on their campuses. In turn, a White House official said the administration is relaying to the leaders that 'the money simply cannot and will not flow unabated as it has been – and that the universities are incubators of discrimination and the taxpayer cannot support that.' These conversations come as the administration is investigating dozens of other schools, and as some school leadership comes to Washington. The White House is looking to strike a deal with a high-profile school, said the first source, who is involved in the higher education response. 'They want a name-brand university to make a deal like the law firms made a deal that covers not just antisemitism and protests, but DEI and intellectual diversity,' this person said. 'They want Trump to be able to stand up and say he made a deal with so-and-so – an Ivy League school, some sort of name-brand school that gives them cover so they can say, 'We don't want to destroy higher education.'' Asked if any of the schools are inclined to make such a deal, the source said, 'Nobody wants to be the first, but the financial pressures are getting real.' Many schools have already experienced significant federal funding cuts, and there is mounting uncertainty about the future of visas for international students, who are more likely to pay full tuition compared to their American counterparts. The conversations, the source said, are continuing. 'The President is always willing to make a deal that benefits America, and this has been true for any higher education institution willing to embrace common sense, stop violating the law, and commit to restoring civil rights and order on their campuses,' the White House official said. They added, 'The administration is only willing to work with entities that operate in good faith and are not merely paying lip service without tangible actions. Many schools want to make a deal, and the President is willing to work with them.' Officials at some other schools are waiting for the White House to turn its attention away from Harvard. A board member at a major university targeted by the task force, who was granted anonymity to speak freely, described communications as 'irregular,' but said there have been repeated efforts by the task force to get the school's leadership to come to Washington for a meeting. 'There is very little enthusiasm for that,' the board member said. 'We do not have any interest in being their 'model school' or whatever.' They added, 'At this point, we feel very comfortable with the steps we've taken, and we don't have any need to fight the administration, per se – unless they decide to mess with our core values. When it comes, we will be ready to fight them. But that doesn't mean we need to provoke them.' Some universities across the country have hired political consultants and experts to respond to some of the administration's demands, while Harvard has launched an aggressive legal strategy and is organizing its alumni networks. Efforts to target Harvard began even before President Donald Trump returned to office, with Trump allies arguing they're cracking down on antisemitism on campus amid the Israel-Hamas war. But the administration's actions extend to a broader agenda – setting up a major clash over academic freedom, federal funding and campus oversight – and a belief inside the White House that it's a winning political issue for Trump. The crackdown is led by the Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism, an interagency group that meets at least weekly, the White House official said, and is in regular communication about where to train its focus. At the helm is former Fox News personality and civil rights lawyer-turned-senior Justice Department official Leo Terrell. Miller and Mailman are also driving forces behind decision making, sources said. The administration has been happy with steps taken by some schools, praising some of its initial targets for complying with demands, including efforts to dismantle diversity, equity, and inclusion programs and crack down on campus protests. And which schools the administration could go after next appears to be a moving target. But Terrell suggested this week that 'massive lawsuits' are coming and would take aim at the University of California system, among others. 'Expect massive lawsuits against UC system. … On the East Coast, on the West Coast, in the Midwest, expect hate crime charges filed by the federal government. Expect Title VII lawsuits against those individuals who are not being protected simply because they're Jewish,' he told Fox News. Asked for comment on Terrell's threats, Rachel Zaentz, a spokesperson for the University of California, said that the school system is cooperating with the Trump administration. 'The University of California abhors antisemitism and is diligently working to address, counter and eradicate it in all its forms across the system. We have been, and plan to continue, cooperating with the Administration. Antisemitism has no place at UC or anywhere else in society. The University remains entirely focused on strengthening our programs and policies to root out antisemitism and all forms of discrimination,' Zaentz said. The White House official told CNN last month that the task force was having discussions with Harvard and Columbia, as well as Northwestern University, Cornell University and the University of Michigan. A February Justice Department news release also identified George Washington University; Johns Hopkins University; New York University; the University of California, Berkeley; the University of Minnesota; and the University of Southern California as 'campuses that have experienced antisemitic incidents since October 2023' that the task force planned to visit. University leaders have been coming to DC to meet with administration officials, so no campus visits have been necessary, according to a senior administration official. CNN has reached out to each of the schools named by the Trump administration for comment. Statements from the University of Southern California and the University of Minnesota both denounced antisemitism and said the schools would engage with the task force on efforts to combat it. Pressed on how the task force is making determinations about funding for Harvard and other schools, the White House official said that their investigations often begin with complaints. 'The relevant agency or department will conduct an investigation into violations to federal law, whether Title IV and Title IX, Title VI, Title XI, Title XII, and, based on those investigations, there can be immediate action to pause funding and wait for a resolution to the investigation, or, in more egregious examples, like Harvard, there could just be a blanket removal of all federal funds because of their lack of cooperation in an investigation or their blatant disregard for their violations to federal law and their unwillingness to change policy,' the official said. And the senior administration official indicated this week that any school with an open Title VI investigation could be subject to government action. Title VI is part of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibiting discrimination based on race, color or national origin in programs or activities receiving federal funding. There are more than 70 colleges and universities currently under active Title VI investigations as of Wednesday, according to a CNN analysis of data provided by the Department of Education. (A vast majority of those investigations were launched during the Biden administration.) And even as it looks at other schools, the administration hasn't taken its eye off Harvard, with which it's engaged in multiple legal battles. The administration has also launched an investigation into its foreign funding sources through a provision of the Higher Education Act requiring reporting of foreign gifts and contracts called Section 117. A prior Section 117 investigation into Harvard was recently closed. 'As standard practice, Harvard has filed Section 117 reports for decades as part of its ongoing compliance with the law. As is required, Harvard's reports include information on gifts and contracts from foreign sources exceeding $250K annually. This includes contracts to provide executive education, other training, and academic publications,' Jason Newton, a spokesperson for Harvard University, said in a statement, noting that Harvard's filings reflect 'diverse sources' of support for the school. And a tax provision in Trump's 'one big, beautiful bill,' which passed the House of Representatives last week but still has to get through the Senate, could have significant impact on Harvard and other institutions with large endowments. In its current form, it would implement a new 'tiered system' of taxes on private colleges and universities' investment income. The endowment tax is currently a flat 1.4% rate but could become as high as 21% for schools like Harvard with large endowments. The administration believes there's political support for that provision, with Education Secretary Linda McMahon telling Fox News on Wednesday, 'That's something that the American public could wrap its head around.' Trump administration messengers have offered mixed signals about how the process moves forward. The source familiar with the higher education response questioned the appetite to proceed at an aggressive pace. 'If you go after Harvard, how hard can you keep going? The universities are being played like a yo-yo for weeks and weeks and weeks. My guess is, at some point, the White House will lose interest in that. Once you've taken down Harvard, where are you going to go – Emory? They're just as conscious of the brands as anybody else,' the source said. Ultimately, the source added, the market rules: 'What's going to happen to Harvard or Columbia? Record applicants, record yield. I would bet you that if you talked to MAGA voters at Charlotte Country Day School or The Westminster Schools – they may have voted for Trump, but are they turning away from the Ivy League? Hell no. The schools are having record demand.' Meanwhile, McMahon has suggested there is still hope for negotiations with Harvard, with whom the senior administration official said the administration is not currently in talks. 'We really hope that we will be back at the table, negotiating, talking about the things that are good for Harvard and for the students that are on campus,' McMahon said. Terrell has struck a different tone. 'We are going to go after them where it hurts them financially, and there's numerous ways – I hope you can read between the lines – there's numerous ways to hurt them financially,' he warned on Fox News. Asked when it would end, Terrell said, 'We can't speculate. We have to bring these universities to their knees.'
CNN
31-05-2025
- Politics
- CNN
Universities quietly negotiating with White House aide to try to avoid Harvard's fate, source says
College and university leaders have been privately negotiating with a deputy to top Trump aide Stephen Miller in hopes of avoiding the same aggressive targeting of Harvard University, a person familiar with the matter said, as the administration looks to escalate its attacks on the Ivy League institution and other schools. The higher education leaders, who have had granular conversations with senior White House policy strategist May Mailman in recent weeks, are asking what signals they need to send to stay out of the administration's crosshairs, the person said. Mailman works closely with Miller – an architect of the administration's strategy to target colleges over concerns they are not sufficiently policing alleged antisemitism on their campuses. In turn, a White House official said the administration is relaying to the leaders that 'the money simply cannot and will not flow unabated as it has been – and that the universities are incubators of discrimination and the taxpayer cannot support that.' These conversations come as the administration is investigating dozens of other schools, and as some school leadership comes to Washington. The White House is looking to strike a deal with a high-profile school, said the first source, who is involved in the higher education response. 'They want a name-brand university to make a deal like the law firms made a deal that covers not just antisemitism and protests, but DEI and intellectual diversity,' this person said. 'They want Trump to be able to stand up and say he made a deal with so-and-so – an Ivy League school, some sort of name-brand school that gives them cover so they can say, 'We don't want to destroy higher education.'' Asked if any of the schools are inclined to make such a deal, the source said, 'Nobody wants to be the first, but the financial pressures are getting real.' Many schools have already experienced significant federal funding cuts, and there is mounting uncertainty about the future of visas for international students, who are more likely to pay full tuition compared to their American counterparts. The conversations, the source said, are continuing. 'The President is always willing to make a deal that benefits America, and this has been true for any higher education institution willing to embrace common sense, stop violating the law, and commit to restoring civil rights and order on their campuses,' the White House official said. They added, 'The administration is only willing to work with entities that operate in good faith and are not merely paying lip service without tangible actions. Many schools want to make a deal, and the President is willing to work with them.' Officials at some other schools are waiting for the White House to turn its attention away from Harvard. A board member at a major university targeted by the task force, who was granted anonymity to speak freely, described communications as 'irregular,' but said there have been repeated efforts by the task force to get the school's leadership to come to Washington for a meeting. 'There is very little enthusiasm for that,' the board member said. 'We do not have any interest in being their 'model school' or whatever.' They added, 'At this point, we feel very comfortable with the steps we've taken, and we don't have any need to fight the administration, per se – unless they decide to mess with our core values. When it comes, we will be ready to fight them. But that doesn't mean we need to provoke them.' Some universities across the country have hired political consultants and experts to respond to some of the administration's demands, while Harvard has launched an aggressive legal strategy and is organizing its alumni networks. Efforts to target Harvard began even before President Donald Trump returned to office, with Trump allies arguing they're cracking down on antisemitism on campus amid the Israel-Hamas war. But the administration's actions extend to a broader agenda – setting up a major clash over academic freedom, federal funding and campus oversight – and a belief inside the White House that it's a winning political issue for Trump. The crackdown is led by the Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism, an interagency group that meets at least weekly, the White House official said, and is in regular communication about where to train its focus. At the helm is former Fox News personality and civil rights lawyer-turned-senior Justice Department official Leo Terrell. Miller and Mailman are also driving forces behind decision making, sources said. The administration has been happy with steps taken by some schools, praising some of its initial targets for complying with demands, including efforts to dismantle diversity, equity, and inclusion programs and crack down on campus protests. And which schools the administration could go after next appears to be a moving target. But Terrell suggested this week that 'massive lawsuits' are coming and would take aim at the University of California system, among others. 'Expect massive lawsuits against UC system. … On the East Coast, on the West Coast, in the Midwest, expect hate crime charges filed by the federal government. Expect Title VII lawsuits against those individuals who are not being protected simply because they're Jewish,' he told Fox News. Asked for comment on Terrell's threats, Rachel Zaentz, a spokesperson for the University of California, said that the school system is cooperating with the Trump administration. 'The University of California abhors antisemitism and is diligently working to address, counter and eradicate it in all its forms across the system. We have been, and plan to continue, cooperating with the Administration. Antisemitism has no place at UC or anywhere else in society. The University remains entirely focused on strengthening our programs and policies to root out antisemitism and all forms of discrimination,' Zaentz said. The White House official told CNN last month that the task force was having discussions with Harvard and Columbia, as well as Northwestern University, Cornell University and the University of Michigan. A February Justice Department news release also identified George Washington University; Johns Hopkins University; New York University; the University of California, Berkeley; the University of Minnesota; and the University of Southern California as 'campuses that have experienced antisemitic incidents since October 2023' that the task force planned to visit. University leaders have been coming to DC to meet with administration officials, so no campus visits have been necessary, according to a senior administration official. CNN has reached out to each of the schools named by the Trump administration for comment. Statements from the University of Southern California and the University of Minnesota both denounced antisemitism and said the schools would engage with the task force on efforts to combat it. Pressed on how the task force is making determinations about funding for Harvard and other schools, the White House official said that their investigations often begin with complaints. 'The relevant agency or department will conduct an investigation into violations to federal law, whether Title IV and Title IX, Title VI, Title XI, Title XII, and, based on those investigations, there can be immediate action to pause funding and wait for a resolution to the investigation, or, in more egregious examples, like Harvard, there could just be a blanket removal of all federal funds because of their lack of cooperation in an investigation or their blatant disregard for their violations to federal law and their unwillingness to change policy,' the official said. And the senior administration official indicated this week that any school with an open Title VI investigation could be subject to government action. Title VI is part of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibiting discrimination based on race, color or national origin in programs or activities receiving federal funding. There are more than 70 colleges and universities currently under active Title VI investigations as of Wednesday, according to a CNN analysis of data provided by the Department of Education. (A vast majority of those investigations were launched during the Biden administration.) And even as it looks at other schools, the administration hasn't taken its eye off Harvard, with which it's engaged in multiple legal battles. The administration has also launched an investigation into its foreign funding sources through a provision of the Higher Education Act requiring reporting of foreign gifts and contracts called Section 117. A prior Section 117 investigation into Harvard was recently closed. 'As standard practice, Harvard has filed Section 117 reports for decades as part of its ongoing compliance with the law. As is required, Harvard's reports include information on gifts and contracts from foreign sources exceeding $250K annually. This includes contracts to provide executive education, other training, and academic publications,' Jason Newton, a spokesperson for Harvard University, said in a statement, noting that Harvard's filings reflect 'diverse sources' of support for the school. And a tax provision in Trump's 'one big, beautiful bill,' which passed the House of Representatives last week but still has to get through the Senate, could have significant impact on Harvard and other institutions with large endowments. In its current form, it would implement a new 'tiered system' of taxes on private colleges and universities' investment income. The endowment tax is currently a flat 1.4% rate but could become as high as 21% for schools like Harvard with large endowments. The administration believes there's political support for that provision, with Education Secretary Linda McMahon telling Fox News on Wednesday, 'That's something that the American public could wrap its head around.' Trump administration messengers have offered mixed signals about how the process moves forward. The source familiar with the higher education response questioned the appetite to proceed at an aggressive pace. 'If you go after Harvard, how hard can you keep going? The universities are being played like a yo-yo for weeks and weeks and weeks. My guess is, at some point, the White House will lose interest in that. Once you've taken down Harvard, where are you going to go – Emory? They're just as conscious of the brands as anybody else,' the source said. Ultimately, the source added, the market rules: 'What's going to happen to Harvard or Columbia? Record applicants, record yield. I would bet you that if you talked to MAGA voters at Charlotte Country Day School or The Westminster Schools – they may have voted for Trump, but are they turning away from the Ivy League? Hell no. The schools are having record demand.' Meanwhile, McMahon has suggested there is still hope for negotiations with Harvard, with whom the senior administration official said the administration is not currently in talks. 'We really hope that we will be back at the table, negotiating, talking about the things that are good for Harvard and for the students that are on campus,' McMahon said. Terrell has struck a different tone. 'We are going to go after them where it hurts them financially, and there's numerous ways – I hope you can read between the lines – there's numerous ways to hurt them financially,' he warned on Fox News. Asked when it would end, Terrell said, 'We can't speculate. We have to bring these universities to their knees.'
