Harvard says government has ‘blacklisted’ university from grants, with new details on cuts in lawsuit filing

The Trump administration has effectively “blacklisted” Harvard University from getting federal funding as part of its ongoing battle over discrimination and ideology, the university says in a new court filing. “Defendants subjected Harvard to adverse action by freezing $2.2 billion in multiyear grants and $60 million in multiyear contracts previously awarded to Harvard,” says an amended complaint filed Monday. “And then the Government blacklisted Harvard from future awards of federal funding and subsequently terminated existing grants.” Over the course of the past week, the university received grant termination letters from seven different federal agencies – including the National Institutes of Health and the Department of Defense – announcing that previously promised grants are being terminated, according to the lawsuit. The letters have very similar wording, with all of them saying the grants “no longer effectuate agency priorities.” Harvard, the nation’s oldest university, has been at the center of running battle between the Trump administration and elite institutions of higher learning, with Columbia and Ohio State among the other schools that have seen funding pulled. The new court filing came on the same day that the administration’s Joint Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism announced another $450 million in grants to Harvard would be stopped. “Harvard’s campus, once a symbol of academic prestige, has become a breeding ground for virtue signaling and discrimination,” the task force said in a statement, citing antisemitism on campus and alleged racial discrimination in admissions and activities of the Harvard Law Review, which the administration is investigating. The task force did not provide details on which grants would be affected by the latest announcement. In its new filing, Harvard says work to address discrimination won’t be solved by letting research wither. “The Government has not identified – and cannot identify – any rational connection between antisemitism concerns and the medical, scientific, technological, and other research it has frozen or terminated that aims to save American lives, foster American success, preserve American security, and maintain America’s position as a global leader in innovation,” the lawsuit says. Harvard is covering the canceled grants out of its own funds – for now The new filing indicates that Harvard, the wealthiest university in the country with an endowment of $53.2 billion, is currently covering the lost federal funding itself, but says that can’t last long. “If Harvard continues to replace the frozen and terminated funding from its own resources, it will be forced to reduce the number of graduate students it admits and the number of faculty and research staff it pays to conduct research. It will be unable to continue procuring and maintaining cutting-edge supplies, equipment, and facilities for research,” the lawsuit says. “Without the federal funding at issue, Harvard would need to operate at a significantly reduced level.” Judge Allison Dale Burroughs, an Obama appointee to the federal bench, set oral arguments in the case for July. Since Harvard has not requested an immediate injunction against the government, the funding freeze is likely to remain in place at least through late summer. The university announced what it characterized as a “a temporary pause on staff and faculty hiring” in March – before the grant cuts were announced – saying it needed to “better understand how changes in federal policy will take shape and can assess the scale of their impact.” Harvard filed its lawsuit against the government shortly after the Trump administration announced the university would have $2.2 billion in grants frozen in response to the school’s refusal to agree to several conditions set by the government, including changes to the school’s governance and a “viewpoint diversity” audit of students and professors. “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,” Harvard President Alan Garber said in an April 14 statement announcing their decision. Standoff continues despite talk of negotiations Harvard says the government’s attempt to put extra conditions on their grants violates the university’s First Amendment guarantees of academic freedom. They also say that the Trump administration is violating the law by ignoring Harvard’s efforts to address antisemitism, including recommendations of a university task force. “Harvard rejects antisemitism and discrimination in all of its forms and is actively making structural reforms to eradicate antisemitism on campus,” the university says in its lawsuit. “But rather than engage with Harvard regarding those ongoing efforts, the Government announced a sweeping freeze of current and future funding for medical, scientific, technological, and other research that has nothing at all to do with antisemitism and (civil rights) compliance.” The funding cut letter from the National Institutes of Health acknowledges that it usually gives recipients of grants the opportunity to address concerns from the agency before pulling funding. But the agency says the university’s rejection of the administration’s demands shows that “no corrective action is possible here.” “NIH perceives these categorical rejections to manifest the University’s unwillingness to take corrective action or implement necessary reforms,” the agency wrote. Education Secretary Linda McMahon told CNBC last month that the demand letter the administration sent to Harvard was not necessarily final and “was intended to have both parties sit down again and continue their negotiations.” Suggesting there was potential for “common ground,” Garber said in a Monday letter to McMahon, “We hope that the partnership between higher education and the federal government will be vibrant and successful for generations to come.” But he added that they will not back down from their lawsuit as long as the money is cut off. “Harvard’s efforts to achieve these goals are undermined and threatened by the federal government’s overreach into the constitutional freedoms of private universities and its continuing disregard of Harvard’s compliance with the law,” Garber said.