Trump hit with major blow in 'onslaught' on Harvard
A federal court ruled on Wednesday that the Trump administration violated Harvard University's First Amendment rights by withholding federal grant funding over its campus antisemitism policies.
In April, the Trump administration froze more than $2.2 billion in grant funding for Harvard because of the pro-Palestine protests that occurred on its campus. Judge Allison D. Burroughs of the District Court of Massachusetts found that this decision violated Harvard's rights and was made in retaliation because the university refused to bow to Trump's demands to end pro-Palestinian protests.
Burroughs' opinion cites numerous public statements from government officials about the decision to withhold funding for Harvard. She said those statements were "flatly inconsistent" with what Trump's lawyers argued in court.
"These public statements corroborate that the government-initiated onslaught against Harvard was much more about promoting a governmental orthodoxy in violation of the First Amendment than about anything else, including fighting antisemitism," the 84-page opinion reads in part.
Burroughs also dismantled the Trump administration's argument that the funding was withheld after a careful vetting process.
"Defendants had announced a funding review consistent with the goals of combating antisemitism; the record, however, does not reflect that Defendants engaged in such a review, weighed the value of any grant, gathered any data regarding antisemitism at Harvard, or considered if and how terminating certain grants would improve the situation for Jewish students at Harvard," she wrote.
"Rather, all that Defendants learned between March 31 and April 14, 2025, was that Harvard would not capitulate to government demands that it audit, censor, or dictate the viewpoints of staff and students," the opinion continued.
"The fact that Defendants’ swift and sudden decision to terminate funding, ostensibly motivated by antisemitism, was made before they learned anything about antisemitism on campus or what was being done in response, leads the Court to conclude that the sudden focus on antisemitism was, at best (and as discussed infra), arbitrary and, at worst, pretextual," it added.