By AP News
Photos: YouTube Screenshots\Wikimedia Commons
On one side is Harvard, the nation’s oldest and wealthiest university. On the other side is the Trump administration. Both sides are digging in for a clash that could test the limits of the government’s power and the independence that has made U.S. universities a destination for scholars around the world. Read more.
Why this matters:
On Monday, Harvard became the first university to openly defy the Trump administration as it demands sweeping changes to limit activism on campus. The university frames the government’s demands as a threat not only to the Ivy League school but also to the autonomy that the Supreme Court has long granted American universities.
No university is better positioned to put up a fight than Harvard, whose $53 billion endowment is the largest in the nation. But like other major universities, Harvard also depends on the federal funding that fuels its scientific and medical research.
For the Trump administration, Harvard presents the first major hurdle in its attempt to force change at universities that Republicans say have become hotbeds of liberalism and antisemitism. Some conservatives have suggested that if Harvard wants independence, it should follow the example of colleges that forgo federal funding to be free of government influence.
