Trump administration cuts off all future federal funding to Harvard
The ongoing war between the Trump administration and Harvard University has taken a new twist, with the government sending Harvard a letter that, amid what appears to be a stream-of-consciousness culture war rant, announces that the university will not be receiving any further research grants. The letter potentially suggests that Harvard could see funding restored by “complying with long-settled Federal Law,” but earlier demands from the administration included conditions that went well beyond those required by law.
The letter, sent by Secretary of Education Linda McMahon, makes it somewhat difficult to tell exactly what the government wants, because most of the text is a borderline deranged rant written in florid MAGA-ese. You don’t have to go beyond the first paragraph to get a sense that this is less a setting of funding conditions than an airing of grievances:
Instead of using these funds to advance the education of its students, Harvard is engaging in a systemic pattern of violating federal law. Where do many of these “students” come from, who are they, how do they get into Harvard, or even into our country—and why is there so much HATE? These are questions that must be answered, among many more, but the biggest question of all is, why will Harvard not give straightforward answers to the American public?
Does Harvard have to answer these questions to get funding restored? It’s unclear.
From there, the letter changes topic so often that it gets difficult to remember that billions of dollars of funding to some of the world’s most prominent researchers is at stake. On the first page alone, the letter complains that a math class Harvard set up to handle COVID-driven gaps in incoming students’ math skills is a remedial course that shouldn’t be needed, given the university’s supposedly high standards. The resignation of Harvard’s former president, as well as its faculty hires, also make appearances. (Said hires being compared to “Hiring the captain of the Titanic to teach navigation.”)
