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      The Guardian view on Trump v universities: essential institutions must defend themselves | Editorial

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      Enfeebling universities or seizing control is an early chapter in the authoritarian playbook, studied eagerly by the likes of Viktor Orbán in Hungary. “Would-be authoritarians and one-party states centrally target universities with the aim of restricting dissent,” Jason Stanley, a scholar of fascism at Yale, wrote in the Guardian in September. Last month, he announced that he was leaving the US for Canada because of the political climate and particularly the battle over higher education.It is not merely that universities are often bastions of liberal attitudes and hotbeds for protest. They also constitute one of the critical institutions of civil society; they are a bulwark of democracy. The Trump administration is taking on judges, lawyers, NGOs and the media: it would be astonishing if universities were not on the list. They embody the importance of knowledge, rationality and independent thought.In a typically brazen reversal, Donald Trump has accused his administration’s top target – Harvard – of being the “threat to democracy”. The administration is attacking diversity, equity and inclusion efforts and says it is tackling the failure of universities to root out antisemitism – a claim widely challenged. Most Trump supporters are unlikely to take issue with cutting billions of dollars of public spending on wealthy elite institutions. A pragmatic counter-argument would be that much of that money goes to scientific and medical research that will enrich the US as a nation and benefit vast numbers of people who have never ventured near an Ivy League university.The administration’s outrageous demands of Harvard include federal oversight of admissions, the dismantling of diversity programmes, an end to recruitment of international students “hostile to American values”, and the compelled hiring of “viewpoint diverse” staff.Harvard has commendably chosen to fight back. “The University will not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights,” wrote its president, Alan Garber. It is suing the government over the freeze on $2.2bn in federal funding, part of a threat to withhold $9bn. That is encouraging others to speak out. Over 150 university presidents have signed a joint letter denouncing “unprecedented government overreach and political interference”.Many have pointed out that the world’s richest university can afford to stand firm thanks to its unrivalled $53bn endowment and sympathetic billionaire alumni. But its the same prestige and power that have surely made it the primary target: force it to fold, and weaker institutions will follow. It’s worth noting that Harvard toughened its position after faculty, students and alumni pushed hard for it to do so, warning that concessions would only encourage the administration. Columbia acquiesced to an extraordinary list of demands but $400m of withheld funding has yet to be restored, and the administration is reportedly seeking to extend control over the university.Whatever comes of Harvard’s suit, this is an administration that has already chosen to ignore court rulings. It may step up its assault, by revoking charitable status and clamping down on international students. (Many may already be concluding that studying in the US, however eminent the institution, may not be worth the hostile immigration environment.) But Harvard is fighting back not just because it can, but because it must. In doing so, it is defending not only academic freedom, but democracy more broadly – and inspiring others to do so.Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. More

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      US federal agency texts Barnard College employees to ask if they’re Jewish

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      Employees from Barnard College received text messages this week from the federally run Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) on their personal phones linking to a voluntary survey asking recipients if they are Jewish or Israeli and whether they have been subjected to harassment or antisemitism.The text, which was reviewed by the Guardian, states that the civil rights agency is “currently reviewing the employment practices at Barnard College” and invites current and former employees to complete the linked survey. It is not clear how many college employees received the survey, but it appears to have been sent to a sizable portion of the faculty and other staff.The survey, which appeared to be part of the Trump administration’s aggressive investigations into American colleges and universities over antisemitism allegations stemming from pro-Palestinian protests, sparked anxiety among some recipients.View image in fullscreen“Regardless of the stated intent, this survey in effect creates a list of Jewish faculty, staff and students at Barnard,” said Elizabeth Bauer, a Barnard professor and chair of the college’s biology department, who said she was alarmed by the message.“The government is also now requiring undocumented immigrants, including children, to register with DHS. I’ve seen this movie before and I’m horrified.”The survey asked whether the respondent currently works at Barnard or has ever been employed there and prompted respondents to select all that apply of the choices: “I am Jewish”, “I am Israeli”, “I have shared Jewish/Israeli ancestry”, “I practice Judaism” and “Other”.Another question asked: “While working at Barnard College, were you subjected to any of the following because you practice Judaism, have Jewish ancestry, are Israeli, and/or are associated with an individual(s) who is Jewish and/or Israeli?”Respondents could select from options including, “unwelcome comments, jokes or discussions”, “harassment, intimidation”, “pressure to abandon, change or adopt a practice or religious belief” and “antisemitic or anti-Israeli protests, gatherings or demonstrations that made you feel threatened, harassed or were otherwise disruptive to your working environment”.Other questions asked the respondents’ employment details, supervisor name, date of hire and more.Elizabeth Hutchinson, an associate professor of American Art History at Barnard, a women’s college affiliated with Columbia University, said when she received the message on her personal phone at 5.39pm ET on Monday, her initial reaction was: “This must be some kind of scam, because, how could the EEOC have my contact information.”The message addressed her by name and, initially, Hutchinson said, she didn’t open the links.“I was frightened, and wasn’t sure what it entailed,” she said.Celia Naylor, a professor in the Africana studies department at Barnard College, also received the message on Monday. She quickly discovered that “a lot of people I know – faculty and even some staff – also received it”.View image in fullscreenAs many faculty and staff tried to verify the message’s legitimacy in group chats on Monday evening, Barnard’s general counsel, Serena Longley, sent an email about the messages.Longley explained in the email, which was viewed by the Guardian, that the college had “received multiple reports that some employees have received text messages from the EEOC inviting them to complete a voluntary survey”. She also said Barnard, Longley “was not given advance notice of this outreach”.“Participation is entirely voluntary. If you choose to respond, please know that both federal law and Barnard policy strictly prohibit any form of retaliation,” she continued.Longley sent a follow-up email to Barnard employees on Wednesday, which was also reviewed by the Guardian, explaining that the EEOC launched an investigation last summer against Barnard “concerning whether or not the College discriminated against Jewish employees on the basis of their national origin, religion and/or race in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964”.“Barnard prides itself on being an inclusive and respectful workplace for all people, including our Jewish employees, and has been robustly defending the College against this EEOC inquiry,” Longley wrote, adding that the EEOC was “legally entitled to obtain the contact information of Barnard employees so that it could offer employees the option to voluntarily participate in their investigation”.“Barnard complied with this lawful request,” she said.The college heard from current and former employees in recent days who asked to be notified in advance before their contact information is shared, the email also noted.“Going forward,” she said, “if and when we are required to provide information about staff in connection with an investigation or litigation, we will provide you with advance notice unless we are subject to a court order that prohibits us from doing so.”Longley also emphasized that participation in the EEOC survey was voluntary.A spokesperson for the EEOC said: “Per federal law, we cannot comment on investigations, nor can we confirm or deny the existence of an investigation.” Barnard did not respond to a request for comment.After hearing others discuss its content, Hutchinson finally opened the survey on Wednesday and found it “utterly shocking”.“It’s very clearly a fishing expedition,” she said, before noting that the survey “is clearly presuming guilt and looking for very specific kinds of evidence for their case”.Hutchinson also said that while she was grateful for the information provided in Barnard’s emails this week, she felt that they did not “acknowledge the reality that the faculty are experiencing a heightened surveillance of our campus that is now intruding into our personal devices on our personal time”.To Hutchinson, the message on Monday was “unprecedented” has “really ramped up the unease on campus”, with faculty now feeling vulnerable both in their classrooms and now in their private spaces too.Naylor echoed that faculty, students and staff were concerned about how their personal information was being used by Barnard, and shared with federal agencies. They are unsure of what other personal details have been provided.Debbie Becher, a Barnard sociology professor who is Jewish, spoke to the New York Times this week about the text message and survey, saying that she found it “a bit terrifying” that the federal government “wants to know who the Jews are through some text message and Microsoft Office form”.Bauer said that not all of the Barnard faculty and staff received the message, adding that it was “unclear” why some did not receive it and others did.“It was obvious that the survey was a fishing expedition by the EEOC to find Title VII violations,” Bauer said.Colin Wayne Leach, a professor of psychology and Africana Studies at Barnard College, said that “as a dean focused on supporting our faculty”, he had been hearing from many colleagues this week who are upset about the messages.They were “surprised” that the EEOC “would choose this informal, unannounced, and intrusive way to ask employees to complete a survey on their experiences of such an important topic as anti-semitism at their place of work”.The Spectator, Columbia’s University paper, reported on Wednesday that several members of Columbia’s faculty also received the text message from EEOC.Rebecca Kobrin, co-director of the Institute for Israel and Jewish Studies (IIJS), told the Spectator that she and other members of IIJS received the message. 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      Trump signs orders cracking down on diversity and inclusion at US universities

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      Donald Trump signed executive orders on Wednesday targeting universities as his administration seeks to reshape higher-education institutions and continues to crack down on diversity and inclusion efforts.The actions address foreign gifts to universities, directing the federal government to “enforce laws on the books” related to the disclosure of large donations, and college accreditation, which the president has referred to as his “secret weapon” to upend US universities. While reading the orders to Trump, the White House staff secretary Will Scharf said that the third-party groups that accredit universities have relied on “woke ideology” rather than merit.Linda McMahon, the education secretary, added during the signing in the Oval Office: “We should be looking at those who have real merit to get in, and we have to look harder at those universities that aren’t enforcing that.”Trump’s administration has been engaged in an all-out attack on US universities since the president took office in January, seeking to dramatically alter institutions he has claimed have been taken over by “Marxist maniacs and lunatics”. The federal government has sought to cut billions in funding from universities unless they comply with administration demands; banned diversity initiatives; and detained international students in retaliation for their activism.This week, more than 150 US university presidents signed a statement condemning the Trump administration’s “unprecedented government overreach and political interference” in higher education. Meanwhile, Harvard University – which Scharf mentioned by name when introducing the order related to foreign gifts – has sued the government in response to the threatened funding cuts.The president has referred to accreditation as a “secret weapon” in his fight against universities.“I will fire the radical-left accreditors that have allowed our colleges to become dominated by Marxist maniacs and lunatics,” he said last summer. “We will then accept applications for new accreditors who will impose real standards on colleges once again and once for all.”According to a statement from the White House, the order directs McMahon to hold accreditors accountable with “denial, monitoring, suspension, or termination of accreditation recognition, for accreditors’ poor performance or violations of federal civil rights law”. It also orders administration officials to investigate “unlawful discrimination” in higher education.The White House alleges accreditors have imposed “discriminatory diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI)-based standards”, which it describes as a violation of federal law and an abuse of their authority.While signing orders on Wednesday that Scharf said would direct schools out of the “whole sort of diversity, equity and inclusion cult”, the president said that the US was “getting out of that … after being in that jungle for a long time”.Despite his condemnation of diversity and inclusion efforts, Trump also signed an order establishing a White House initiative on historically black colleges and universities to promote “excellence and innovation”. The order facilitates the creation of a presidential advisory board on HBCUs and seeks to address funding barriers and increase affordability and retention rates.The president also signed orders related to workforce development and artificial intelligence education to ensure the future workforce is “adequately trained in AI tools”, Scharf said. More

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      ‘National disgrace’: US lawmakers decry student detentions on visit to Ice jails

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      Congressional lawmakers denounced the treatment of Mahmoud Khalil and Rümeysa Öztürk, the students being detained by US immigration authorities for their pro-Palestinian activism, as a “national disgrace” during a visit to the two facilities in Louisiana where each are being held.“We stand firm with them in support of free speech,” the Louisiana congressman Troy Carter, who led the delegation, said during a press conference after the visits on Tuesday. “They are frightened, they’re concerned, they want to go home.”Öztürk, a Tufts University PhD student, and Khalil, a graduate of Columbia, have been detained for more than a month since US immigration authorities took them into custody. Neither have been accused of criminal conduct and are being held in violation of their constitutional rights, members of the delegation said.The delegation included representatives Carter, Bennie Thompson, Ayanna Pressley, Jim McGovern, Senator Ed Markey, and Alanah Odoms, the executive director of the ACLU of Louisiana. They visited the South Louisiana Ice processing center in Basile, where Öztürk is being held, and traveled to the Central Louisiana Ice processing center in Jena to see Khalil.They met with Öztürk and Khalil and others in Ice custody to conduct “real-time oversight” of a “rogue and lawless” administration, Pressley said.Their detention comes as the Trump administration has staged an extraordinary crackdown on immigrants, illegally removing people from the country and seeking to detain and deport people for constitutionally protected free speech that it considers adverse to US foreign policy.“It’s a national disgrace what is taking place,” Markey said. “We stand right now at a turning point in American history. The constitution is being eroded by the Trump administration. We saw today here in these detention centers in Louisiana examples of how far [it] is willing to go.”McGovern described those being held as political prisoners. He said: “This is not about enforcing the law. This is moving us toward an authoritarian state.”Late last month, officials detained Öztürk, who co-wrote a piece in a Tufts student newspaper that was critical of the university’s response to Israel’s attacks Palestinians. The 30-year old has said she has been held in “unsanitary, unsafe, and inhumane” conditions in a Louisiana facility and has had difficulty receiving medical treatment.Öztürk was disappeared when she was detained, Pressley said, adding that she was denied food, water and the opportunity to seek legal counsel. Khalil missed the birth of his first child, she said. She described Donald Trump as a dictator with a draconian vision for the US.“They are setting the foundational floor to violate the due process and free speech of every person who calls this country home, whatever your status is,” she said. “It could be you tomorrow for suffering a miscarriage. It could be you tomorrow for reading a banned book.”Those in custody are shaken and were visibly upset and afraid, the delegation said. They have said they are not receiving necessary healthcare and that the facilities are kept extremely cold.“We have to resist, we have to push back. We’re a much better country than this,” McGovern said.Earlier this month a judge ruled that Khalil, who helped lead demonstrations at Columbia last year and has been imprisoned for more than a month, is eligible to be deported from the US.The Trump administration has argued that Khalil, a lawful permanent resident of the US and child of Palestinian refugees, holds beliefs that are counter to the country’s foreign policy interests.On Monday, Senator Peter Welch of Vermont met with Mohsen Mahdawi, a Palestinian green-card holder and Columbia student who was detained while at a naturalization interview. More

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      Over 100 US university presidents sign letter decrying Trump administration

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      More than 100 presidents of US colleges and universities have signed a statement denouncing the Trump administration’s “unprecedented government overreach and political interference” with higher education – the strongest sign yet that US educational institutions are forming a unified front against the government’s extraordinary attack on their independence.The statement, published early on Tuesday by the American Association of Colleges and Universities, comes weeks into the administration’s mounting campaign against higher education, and hours after Harvard University became the first school to sue the government over threats to its funding. Harvard is one of several institutions hit in recent weeks with huge funding cuts and demands they relinquish significant institutional autonomy.The signatories come from large state schools, small liberal arts colleges and Ivy League institutions, including the presidents of Harvard, Princeton and Brown.In the statement, the university presidents, as well as the leaders of several scholarly societies say they speak with “one voice” and call for “constructive engagement” with the administration.“We are open to constructive reform and do not oppose legitimate government oversight,” they write. “However, we must oppose undue government intrusion in the lives of those who learn, live, and work on our campuses.”Harvard’s lawsuit comes after the administration announced it would freeze $2.3bn in federal funds, and Donald Trump threatened to revoke its tax-exempt status, over claims the university failed to protect Jewish students from pro-Palestinian protests. The suit and the statement, taken together, mark an increasingly muscular response from universities following what initially appeared to be a tepid approach.While some university leaders have in recent weeks criticised the administration and indicated they will not abide by its demands, the statement marks the first time presidents have spoken out collectively on the matter. The joint condemnation followed a convening of more than 100 university leaders called by the AAC&U and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences last week to “come together to speak out at this moment of enormity”, said Lynn Pasquarella, the president of the AAC&U.Pasquarella said that there was “widespread agreement” across a variety of academic institutions about the need to take a collective stand.“Much has been written about this flood-the-zone strategy that’s being used in the current attacks on higher education, and it’s a strategy designed to overwhelm campus leaders with a constant barrage of directives, executive orders, and policy announcements that make it impossible to respond to everything all at once,” she said, explaining why it has taken until now for a joint response. “Campus leaders have had a lot to deal with over the past few months, and I think that’s part of the reason, but it’s also the case that they are constrained by boards, by multiple constituencies who are often asking them to do things that are at odds with one another.”The Trump administration has issued a barrage of measures aimed at universities the right has described as “the enemy” – some under the guise of fighting alleged antisemitism on campuses and others in an explicit effort to eradicate diversity and inclusion initiatives. Billions in federal funds are under threat unless universities comply with extreme demands, such as removing academic departments from faculty control, “auditing” the viewpoints of students and faculty, and collaborating with federal authorities as they target international students for detention and deportation. Along with its actions against Harvard, it has threatened and in some cases withheld millions more from Cornell, Northwestern, Brown, Columbia, Princeton and the University of Pennsylvania.Columbia has largely accepted the administration’s requirements to restore funding, including placing an academic department under outside oversight. Its president did not sign the collective statement.The measures against the schools, which are already upending academic research, undermine longstanding partnerships between the federal government and universities, and are contributing to an atmosphere of repression, the statement’s signatories note.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“Our colleges and universities share a commitment to serve as centers of open inquiry where, in their pursuit of truth, faculty, students, and staff are free to exchange ideas and opinions across a full range of viewpoints without fear of retribution, censorship, or deportation,” they write.Last week, Harvard University issued the strongest rebuke yet of the administration’s demands, with president Alan Garber setting off a showdown with the White House by saying that the university would not “surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights”.While Harvard’s lawsuit was the first by a university, higher education associations and organisations representing faculty have filed other legal challenges over the cuts.Faculty at some universities are also organising to protect one another, with several members of the Big Ten Academic Alliance, a consortium of some of the country’s largest state universities, signing on to a resolution to establish a “mutual defence compact”.At a second convening by the AAC&U on Monday some 120 university leaders also discussed what steps they may take next, including efforts to engage their broader communities and the business world to defend academic freedom.The joint statement, Pasquarella added, was just the beginning, and intended “to signal to the public and to affirm to ourselves what’s at stake here, what’s at risk if this continual infringement on the academy is allowed to continue”. 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      Harvard sues Trump administration over efforts to ‘gain control of academic decision-making’

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      Harvard University has filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration, alleging it is trying to “gain control of academic decision-making at Harvard”.The university is fighting back against the administration’s threat to review about $9bn in federal funding after Harvard officials refused to comply with a list of demands that included appointing an outside overseer to ensure that the viewpoints being taught at the university were “diverse”. Harvard is specifically looking to halt a freeze on $2.2bn in grants.The lawsuit comes as the Trump administration has sought to force changes at multiple Ivy League institutions after months of student activism centered around the war in Gaza. The administration has painted the campus protests as anti-American, and the institutions as liberal and antisemitic, which Harvard’s president, Alan Garber, refuted.White House spokesperson Harrison Fields said in a statement that the “gravy train of federal assistance” to institutions like Harvard was coming to an end.“Taxpayer funds are a privilege, and Harvard fails to meet the basic conditions required to access that privilege,” Fields said.In a letter announcing the university’s decision to reject Trump’s demands, Garber wrote: “No government – regardless of which party is in power – should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue.”Garber, in a statement published on Monday, reiterated that the Trump administration had doubled down on its response to the university’s refusal to comply with the administration’s demands, despite claims that the letter indicating Harvard’s federal research funding was at risk was sent by mistake.“The government has, in addition to the initial freeze of $2.2bn in funding, considered taking steps to freeze an additional $1bn in grants, initiated numerous investigations of Harvard’s operations, threatened the education of international students, and announced that it is considering a revocation of Harvard’s 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status,” Garber wrote.“These actions have stark real-life consequences for patients, students, faculty, staff, researchers, and the standing of American higher education in the world.”Harvard is the first university to file a lawsuit in response to Trump’s crackdown on top US universities that is says mishandled last year’s pro-Palestinian protests and allowed antisemitism to fester on campuses. But protesters, including some Jewish groups, say their criticism of Israel’s military actions in Gaza is wrongly conflated with antisemitism.Earlier this month, the Trump administration had sent a letter to Harvard with the list of demands, which included changes to its admissions policies, removing recognition of some student clubs, and hiring some new faculty.Last Tuesday, Trump had called for Harvard, the US’s oldest and wealthiest university and one of the most prestigious in the world, to lose its tax-exempt status, CNN first reported.“Perhaps Harvard should lose its Tax Exempt Status and be Taxed as a Political Entity if it keeps pushing political, ideological, and terrorist inspired/supporting ‘Sickness?’ Remember, Tax Exempt Status is totally contingent on acting in the PUBLIC INTEREST!” the US president said in a post on his Truth Social platform. More

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      Massachusetts governor calls Trump’s attacks on Harvard ‘bad for science’

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      Massachusetts governor Maura Healey said on Sunday that Donald Trump’s attacks on Harvard University and other schools are having detrimental ripple effects, with the shutdown of research labs and cuts to hospitals linked to colleges.During an interview on CBS’s Face the Nation, the Democratic governor said that the effects on Harvard are damaging “American competitiveness”, since a number of researchers are leaving the US for opportunities in other countries. After decades of investment in science and innovation, she said: “intellectual assets are being given away.”In the past week, the US president cut off billions of dollars to Harvard in federal funds, after the university refused to concede to a number of the administration’s demands. Trump also called for its tax-exempt status to be revoked, a potentially illegal move, against the world-famous college in Cambridge, Massachusetts.Of the moves against colleges, Healey said: “It’s bad for patients, it’s bad for science, and it’s really bad for American competitiveness. There’s no way a state can make up for the cuts from federal funding.”She added: “I was in a hospital recently, Boston Children’s, where some of the sickest kids in the country receive care. Cuts to Boston Children’s and other hospitals are a direct result of Donald Trump’s actions, as these are part of a teaching hospital system.“These cuts to universities have significant ripple effects, resulting in layoffs of scientists and doctors, and clinical trials for cancer treatments have been shut down.“As governor, I want Massachusetts and America to soar. What Donald Trump is doing is essentially inviting other countries, like China, to take our scientists and researchers. This is terrible, especially considering what he has done to the economy. I am working hard every day to lower costs in my state, cut taxes, and build more housing, while Donald Trump is making life more expensive and harder for all of us.”Since Trump took office, his administration has deployed an “antisemitism taskforce” to demand various policy changes at different universities around the country.Columbia University, one of the first institutions targeted by the taskforce, quickly caved to the Trump administration’s demands to restore $400m in federal funding. Some of the measures that Columbia conceded to included banning face masks on campus, empowering security officers to arrest people, and placing control of the Middle Eastern department under a new senior vice-provost.Former Columbia University president Lee Bollinger said on Sunday that the Trump administration’s attacks on academic institutions represent a significant attack on first amendment rights.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“This is a kind of weaponization of the government’s power,” Bolinger said on CNN, adding that it “seems like a campaign of intimidation”.“This is a kind of weaponization of the government’s power,” he said.Earlier this month, the federal government sent Harvard two separate letters with specific demands. After the university publicly rejected those demands, the administration quickly froze nearly $2.3bn in federal funding.The conflict between the administration and the elite university took a strange turn on Friday, with the New York Times reporting that an 11 April letter from the administration with additional demands – which escalated the showdown – was “unauthorized”. The university disputed that the letter was “unauthorized,” claiming the federal government has “doubled down” on its offensive. More