Trump Plans Final Death Knell for Harvard Funding

Donald Trump is escalating his war against Harvard University and trying to cut all remaining federal ties with the institution.

The New York Timesreports that the president is seeking to end all government contracts with Harvard, which total about $100 million, according to a letter prepared by the General Services Administration, the government’s purchasing arm. The GSA instructs all federal agencies to respond by June 6 with the contracts they have canceled with Harvard, with any critical contracts transitioned to other vendors.

“Going forward, we also encourage your agency to seek alternative vendors for future services where you had previously considered Harvard,” the letter states.

According to the Times, some contracts that could be canceled could be a $25,800 Department of Homeland Security contract for senior executive training and a National Institutes of Health contract of $49,858 on the effects of drinking coffee. The Trump administration has already made several rounds of cuts to the university’s federal grands, totaling millions of dollars, including $60 million in cuts coming one week ago.

Earlier this month, Trump signaled plans to have the university’s tax-exempt status revoked, and on Thursday, Trump’s DHS tried to ban Harvard’s ability to enroll international students. But the university immediately sued, and a judge temporarily blocked the administration’s move.

The loss of millions of dollars in federal grants and contracts isn’t so easily remedied, though, even by one of the country’s wealthiest universities. Trump has plenty of support from his conservative base for his attacks on Harvard and other major universities. Many on the right accuse these institutions of stoking antisemitism by allowing protests against Israel’s war in Gaza over the past year.

It’s all part of a long-standing right-wing agenda to take over America’s elite institutions to push a conservative cultural and political agenda. Will Harvard, and the other ivory towers of academia, be able to withstand these attacks?