Trump ramps up conflict against defiant Harvard, threatens tax-exempt status

Harvard stands out for defying Donald Trump, in contrast to several other universities and a string of powerful law firms that have folded under intense pressure from the White House in its crackdown on American institutions

By AFP

Published: Apr 16, 2025 10:33:47 AM IST

People gather around the John Harvard Statue on the Harvard University campus in Cambridge, Massachussetts, on April 15, 2025. Elite US university Harvard was hit with a $2.2 billion federal funding freeze on April 14 after rejecting a list of sweeping demands that the White House said was intended to crack down on campus anti-Semitism. Image: Joseph Prezioso / AFP

President Donald Trump escalated his war against elite US universities Tuesday with a threat to strip Harvard's tax-exempt status if the country's most famous educational establishment refuses to submit to wide-ranging government oversight.

Harvard stands out for defying Trump, in contrast to several other universities and a string of powerful law firms that have folded under intense pressure from the White House in its crackdown on American institutions.

Its president, Alan Garber, said the school would not "negotiate over its independence or its constitutional rights."

Tuesday's threat of a major tax bill comes a day after the freezing of $2.2 billion in federal funding.

The impacts are already being felt on a campus that has produced 162 Nobel prize winners and whose alumni range from Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg to eight US presidents.

The university said one faculty member had just been told to halt her tuberculosis research because of "the broader funding freeze."

But the mood was defiant.

"I love it. I think it's amazing. I think more schools across the country need to. It shows that you're not going to bow down, you're not going to let free speech be taken," student Darious Hanson told AFP.

Anti-Semitism

Trump posted on social media that non-profit Harvard "should lose its Tax Exempt Status and be Taxed as a Political Entity" if it does not submit to his demands for the university to change the way it runs itself, including selection of students and authority for professors.

Trump and his White House team have justified their pressure campaign on universities as a reaction to what they say is uncontrolled anti-Semitism and support for the Palestinian militant group Hamas.

Trump "wants to see Harvard apologize. And Harvard should apologize," Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told journalists.

The anti-Semitism allegations are based on controversy at protests against Israel's war in Gaza that swept across campuses last year.

Columbia University in New York—an epicenter of the protests -- stood down last month and agreed to oversight of its Middle Eastern department after being threatened with a loss of $400 million in federal funds.

The White House has also strong-armed dozens of universities and colleges with threats to remove federal funding over their policies meant to encourage racial diversity among students and staff.

The White House has cited similarly ideological goals in its unprecedented crackdown on law firms, pressuring them to volunteer hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of legal work to support issues that Trump supports.

Also read: Trump administration freezes $2.2 billion in Harvard funds for defiance

Harvard defiant

Harvard, the oldest and wealthiest university in the United States, is now the most prominent institution to resist Trump's ever-growing bid for control.

The Trump administration is demanding that a wide range of Harvard departments come under outside supervision for potential anti-Semitism. It also seeks to require "viewpoint diversity" in student admissions and choice of professors.

Garber's insistence that Harvard cannot "allow itself to be taken over by the federal government" sets up a likely long-running, high-profile fight.

Hard-line presidential advisors such as Stephen Miller depict universities as bastions of anti-conservative forces that need to be brought to heel—a message that resonates strongly with Trump's hard-right anti-elite base.

For Trump's opponents, the Harvard refusal to bend marks a chance to draw a line in the sand against an authoritarian takeover.

"Harvard has set an example for other higher-ed institutions—rejecting an unlawful and ham-handed attempt to stifle academic freedom," former president Barack Obama wrote on X. "Let's hope other institutions follow suit."

Dozens of universities and other stakeholders are separately battling the Trump administration in court over broad research funding cuts that have led to staff layoffs and created deep uncertainty among US academics.