Opinion
Trump’s Revenge on Harvard Is Even More Pathetic Than It Seems
Marin ScottenTue, April 15, 2025 at 6:02 PM GMT+2
3 min read
Trump is increasing his threats against Harvard University after the school refused to set up an admissions council to bring in MAGA personnel.
After Harvard announced Monday it would not comply with the Trump administration’s absurd demands in exchange for $9 billion in federal funding, the White House cut $2.2 billion in grants to the school along with a $60 million contract. As if that wasn’t enough, Trump then threatened to revoke the school’s tax exempt status the following day.
“Perhaps Harvard should lose its Tax Exempt Status and be Taxed as a Political Entity if it keeps pushing political, ideological, and terrorist inspired/supporting ‘Sickness?’” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social Tuesday. “Remember, Tax Exempt Status is totally contingent on acting in the PUBLIC INTEREST!”
Trump’s war on Harvard comes after an April 11 letter to the school from the General Services Administration and the Department of Education, listing a series of outrageous demands. It states Harvard should dismantle diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives, limit student protests, and reduce the admission of international students “to prevent admitting students hostile to the American values”—all on-par with what Trump has demanded from other institutions.
But buried deeper in the text of the three-page letter are even more fantastical demands that would give the White House complete control over the university’s operations and student body.
“Harvard must abolish all criteria, preferences, and practices, whether mandatory or optional, throughout its admissions and hiring practices, that function as ideological litmus tests,” the section on “Viewpoint Diversity in Admissions and Hiring” reads.
“Every department or field found to lack viewpoint diversity must be reformed by hiring a critical mass of new faculty within that department or field who will provide viewpoint diversity; every teaching unit found to lack viewpoint diversity must be reformed by admitting a critical mass of students who will provide viewpoint diversity.” In other words, bring in a new crop of far-right students and faculty to take over every department.
The letter also stated Harvard must “make organizational changes to ensure full transparency and cooperation with all federal regulators,” and submit an annual report detailing its compliance with the federal government. America’s oldest post-secondary institution would essentially become a state-run university.
Harvard is the first Ivy League university to stand up to Trump in his egregious assault on academic freedom after a number of other schools crumbled at his knees amidst mass funding cuts.
“The administration’s prescription goes beyond the power of the federal government,” Harvard University President Alan M. Garber said in a statement. “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 remains open to dialogue about what the university has done, and is planning to do, to improve the experience of every member of its community,” another letter to the Trump administration from Harvard’s lawyers reads. “But Harvard is not prepared to agree to demands that go beyond the lawful authority of this or any administration.”
So this is all about this fat racist fukk trying to have maga personnel at the admissions office..
You mean to tell me that if you stand up to bullies....
