Trump Administration Unveils New Attacks on Harvard
Now their big idea is to "debar" Harvard.
Yeah, again. They caused any hint of financial instability with Harvard and now they want to cudgel them with it.
Government tightens financial oversight of Harvard, threatens to pull student aid.
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9/26/25
On September 19—the same day that $46 million in government grants began flowing back to University researchers, as mandated by a court ruling from a U.S. district judge—the Trump administration tightened its financial scrutiny of Harvard and added new restrictions on the University’s ability to access federal funds. Citing “growing concerns” about the University’s financial stability, the government placed Harvard on heightened cash monitoring status. The designation requires that Harvard use its own funds to pay out federal aid to students before requesting reimbursement from the U.S. Department of Education (DOE); under normal circumstances, that aid money is disbursed to universities in advance by the government, not reimbursed later.
In addition, the DOE said it was requiring Harvard to provide a $36 million letter of credit, guaranteeing that it would fulfill its financial obligations to students and the government. (The New York Times reported that this amount is about 30 percent of the total federal student aid that Harvard has received during the past year. Overall, the large majority of Harvard’s financial aid funding is covered by the University itself, rather than by the federal government.)
In a letter to President Alan M. Garber, the DOE said that the heightened cash monitoring status was triggered by several factors, including recent layoffs and hiring and salary freezes at Harvard. The government also cited as a concern Harvard’s issuance of $1.2 billion in bonds earlier this year—money that was borrowed partly in response to government threats to slash billions in federal research funding. (As education news outlet Higher Ed Dive put it, the DOE “cited the Trump administration’s own actions against Harvard as driving forces destabilizing the university’s ability to meet its obligations.”)
In a separate letter to Harvard, also dated September 19, the DOE threatened to cut off all access to federal student aid over what it said was the University’s “continued refusal” to turn over admissions data. The letter gave Harvard 20 days to comply. In May, the Trump administration opened an investigation, alleging that Harvard uses race-based considerations in its admissions policies, a practice that the Supreme Court banned in a 2023 ruling. Although the DOE’s letter this month did not specify exactly what admissions documentation it is seeking from Harvard, in previous settlements with the government, other universities have agreed to turn over applicants’ grades and test scores and information about their racial backgrounds. This is not data universities typically share with the government.
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More at Harvard Magazine.
Well, Supreme Court, every single one of you has attended either Harvard or Yale. What do you have to say to the monster you created?
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