It took Harvard University less than 72 hours to reject a series of demands put forth by the Trump administration, setting up a high-stakes showdown between the US’s wealthiest and oldest university and the White House.
The swift rebuke on Monday came after weeks of mounting pressure from Harvard faculty, students, alumni, and the city of Cambridge, all urging the university to defend itself, and higher education as a whole, against what they saw as an unprecedented attack from Washington.
Harvard was one of the first universities to face national scrutiny following 7 October 2023 and the ensuing campus protests over Israel’s war in Gaza, as critics accused the school and its leaders of failing to adequately combat antisemitism on its campus.
And this February, just weeks into Trump’s presidency, the administration’s new Federal Task Force to Combat antisemitism announced that it would be visiting 10 universities, including Harvard, in an effort to “eradicate antisemitic harassment” in schools.
Soon after, the White House went after Columbia University, first launching a review of its federal funding, and then revoking $400m in federal funds from the school, citing the college’s failure to protect students from antisemitic harassment amid the campus protests against the war in Gaza.
Students protest against the war in Gaza at Harvard University on 25 April 2024. Photograph: Ben Curtis/AP
In response, groups of Harvard faculty, alumni, students and Cambridge community members began calling on their own university leaders – through protests, letters, op-eds and resolutions – to publicly oppose the administration’s actions and to resist any future demands and pressure from the White House.
On 6 March, the day before Columbia’s funding was cut, Harvard professors Ryan Enos and Steven Levitsky penned an op-ed in the Crimson, Harvard’s student newspaper, criticizing the university’s silence, and urging Harvard leaders to set an example by making “a firm public defense of democracy”.
Days later, immigration authorities arrested Palestinian activist and recent Columbia graduate Mahmoud Khalil, and Trump officials warned 60 universities of potential penalties tied to antiseminism investigations.
That week, nearly 200 Harvard affiliates gathered on campus and protested Khalil’s detention, and urged the university to condemn the administration’s actions.
Enos and Levitsky followed with another op-ed, this time titled: “First they came for Columbia.”
“So far, America’s leading universities have remained virtually silent in the face of this authoritarian assault on institutions of higher education,” they wrote. “That must change. Harvard must stand up, speak out, and lead a public defense of our freedom to speak and study freely.”
The piece resonated widely within the Harvard community, Enos said, even reportedly reaching Harvard’s board of overseers (one of the school’s two governing bodies).
Enos decided to write to several members of the board of overseers, sharing arguments from his recent op-eds. He had heard that some board members were sympathetic to their view.
In mid-March, universities watched Columbia yield to a series of sweeping demands made by the Trump administration in an effort to restore the halted funding. (The funding remains withheld, and reports now suggest that a possible consent decree is on the table.)
Enos and others feared that when the time came, Harvard might follow suit. At this point, Enos said, Harvard’s leadership had shown “no indication” that they were willing to put up a public fight in defense of Harvard or public education more generally.
In the weeks prior, the university appeared to be taking preemptive steps to get ahead to of the administration’s potential crackdown and funding cuts. They announced a university-wide hiring freeze, and made several decisions that critics viewed as aligning with the administration’s priorities.
The university adopted a controversial definition of antisemitism in a legal settlement over complaints brought by Jewish students, ousted two leaders of its Center for Middle Eastern Studies, suspended a public health partnership with Birzeit University in the West Bank and a “religion, conflict and peace initiative” at the Harvard Divinity School amid accusations that it focused “entirely on the Palestinians”, and banned the Undergraduate Palestine Solidarity Committee from hosting events on campus.
These actions caused concern for some who worried that Harvard was compromising academic freedom to appease the government.
“Someone might reasonably think that these changes were in order to accommodate, to demonstrate to the federal government, look, we’re closing down programs that have been accused of imbalanced coverage,” said Kirsten Weld, a professor of History at Harvard, who heads Harvard’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP).
On 24 March, Enos and Levitsky, with help from several others, circulated a letter among faculty, urging Harvard’s two governing boards to publicly condemn the attacks on universities, legally contest and resist unlawful demands, and mount a coordinated opposition.
More than 800 faculty members signed, though some non-US citizens refrained due to fear, Enos said.
The letter was sent to governing board members ahead of their next scheduled meeting, which was coming up on 5 and 6 April.
Separately, in another letter, more than 1,000 Harvard alumni urged Harvard’s president, Alan Garber, to defend academic freedom and free speech, and to take a stronger stand.
“We cannot appease the Trump administration – it always asks for more,” the letter warned.
James Stodder, who drafted and circulated that letter, said that he and a group of other alumni were looking for ways they could make their voices heard.
Another alumni letter with more than 1,200 signatures called for courage over capitulation.
In late March, Harvard’s chapter of AAUP along with the National Chapter and other groups, sued the Trump administration, alleging it violated members’ first amendment rights by targeting pro-Palestinian speech by non-citizens.
Around this time, the Crimson was reporting that Garber had been privately discussing the administration’s pressure campaign with other university leaders.
Then, on 31 March, the Trump administration put Harvard directly in its crosshairs, announcing a review of Harvard’s $9bn in federal funding, citing alleged failures to address antisemitism on campus.
Garber’s response was seen by some as conceding to the administration’s narrative and suggestions.
On 3 April, Trump officials sent Harvard a letter, stating that its federal funding would be conditional on changes such as eliminating diversity and inclusion programs, reviewing its programs “to address bias”, cooperating with law enforcement and the Department of Homeland security, and installing leaders to implement the president’s demands, and more.
“We said to ourselves, OK, we’re now in the same position as Columbia,” Weld said. “This is kind of the first shot across the bow.”
That same day, Enos and Levitsky published a third op-ed: “Appeasing Trump Damages Harvard and America”, urging the university to resist and take a stand.
Enos said he heard from alumni who had begun threatening to withhold donations to the school if Harvard didn’t stand up against Trump.
After receiving initial demands from the administration, the Wall Street Journal reported that Harvard leaders were in contact with the administration in pursuit of an agreement. Federal officials reportedly believed that Harvard would eventually concede, as Columbia had. Harvard said that the demands were too vague and requested more details.
I would find it shocking if they ignored or at least didn’t consider that kind of outpouring of faculty support
Ryan Enos, Harvard professor
Harvard’s governing boards met as planned in early April. While no details from those meetings were released, Enos believes their faculty letter was likely discussed, noting that last year he was told that the governing bodies had found a similar letter he organized in support of former Harvard president Claudine Gay to be “very persuasive”.
“I would find it shocking if they ignored or at least didn’t consider that kind of outpouring of faculty support,” Enos said.
Following the weekend meeting, the Cambridge city council passed a unanimous resolution urging Harvard to reject Trump’s demands, and to “use all measures possible, including the University’s endowment funds, if necessary, to safeguard academic independence, the rule of law, and democracy.”
Councilmember Burhan Azeem, who co-sponsored the resolution, said he wanted Harvard to know that they had the support of the city behind them if they chose to stand up to the administration.
Azeem said it’s rare for the city council to get involved in internal Harvard affairs, but the stakes were high.
“We were trying to convey to Harvard that the city is not the most powerful institution, but we are an institution, we have lawyers and we are willing to take action and we are willing to stand by them,” Azeem said.
By this point, despite the Trump administration’s 3 April letter demanding “immediate cooperation”, Harvard had not yet publicly responded.
On 11 April, Harvard’s AAUP chapter filed a second lawsuit against the administration, this time challenging the federal review of the university’s federal funding.
The next day, hundreds of Harvard affiliates and Cambridge residents rallied in near-freezing temperatures at Cambridge Common, demanding once more that the university resist the federal pressure and also protect its international students and faculty.
Unbeknownst to the protesters, behind closed doors that weekend, Harvard leaders were parsing through a new five-page letter from the Trump administration that had been delivered late on Friday.
The letter included a list of sweeping demands – the shuttering of all diversity, equity and inclusion programs and initiatives, restrictions on the acceptance of international students who are “hostile to the American values and institutions”, and federal oversight of admissions, hiring and the ideology of students and staff and more.
Harvard officials were stunned by the demands in the letter, the Wall Street Journal reported, viewing them as more extreme than those sent to other schools. A Sunday board meeting ended in unanimous agreement on how to respond.
Then, on Monday 14 April, Harvard released its statement publicly rejecting the demands, and released the administration’s Friday letter.
“Although some of the demands outlined by the government are aimed at combating antisemitism,” the “majority represent direct governmental regulation of the ‘intellectual conditions’ at Harvard”, Harvard’s president wrote.
“The University will not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights. 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.”
It was then Harvard became the first major US university to openly defy the administration’s demands.
Garber’s office did not respond to a request for comment on how the decision came together. But, Enos believes that the pressure from faculty, alumni, students and others, mattered.
“I think we did manage to put a tremendous amount of pressure on Harvard to do the right thing,” Enos said. “It came from all circles.”
Weld said she was “very glad” when she read the announcement, adding that the demands from the Trump administration were “such an egregious overreach”. Accepting them, she said, would have been “disastrous”.
Harvard’s announcement drew support from Democrats, as well as Harvard faculty, alumni, and leaders of other universities.
People protest at Harvard on 12 April 2025. Photograph: Nicholas Pfosi/Reuters
The Crimson reported a surge in donations to Harvard after the announcement, with the school receiving an average of 88 online donations per hour. Between Monday when the announcement was made, and 9am Wednesday, nearly 4,000 gifts totaling $1.14m were made, according to giving update from by Harvard alumni affairs and development obtained by the Crimson.
But the battle has only just begun. The fight this week has already escalated.
Following Harvard’s announcement, federal officials froze over $2bn in grants to the university. Trump has threatened to strip Harvard of its tax-exempt status and its ability to enroll international students.
On Thursday, the Trump administration accused Harvard – in yet another letter to Garber – of failing to report large foreign donations to the federal government, as is required by law. They demanded that Harvard provide names of foreign donors, including records of communication with all of them from the beginning of 2020, and records pertaining to foreigners who spent time at Harvard; that latter group includes students Harvard expelled or those who had their credentials canceled, going back to 2016.
A Harvard spokesperson told the New York Times on Friday: “Harvard has filed Section 117 reports for decades as part of its ongoing compliance with the law.”
Layoffs have already been reported at the Harvard School of Public Health, with warnings at Harvard Medical School too.
Though Harvard’s endowment is sure to offer some financial cushion, the New York Times reports that about 80% of it is limited to specific purposes.
“It’s going to get more painful before it gets better,” Enos said.
Weld said that the AAUP will continue to proceed with their lawsuits against the administration and that concerns remain regarding Harvard’s decisions earlier this year to “shut down spaces of independent critical inquiry related to Palestine on our campus”.
Still, she said it was “vitally important” for the whole higher education sector that Harvard was fighting back.
“If Harvard had not stood up and rejected the Trump administration’s demands, it would have sent generational chill through higher education in this country,” she said.
“If Harvard, the richest university in human history, cannot stand up and fight back to unquestionably illegal demands, then what other institution is going to feel that it’s safe for them to do so?”
