Later last week, Harvard officials were trying to decipher what the Trump administration wanted to do to combat anti-Semitism.
The government has made several simple requests, including requesting schools to ban masks.
However, the other demands seemed vague.
Later on Friday night, the federal government sent Harvard a five-page new request to reshape school operations, admissions, employment, faculty and student life.
It took Harvard less than 72 hours to say no.
The decision is the most obvious rebellion by the university since President Trump began putting pressure on higher education to follow his political priorities.
It came after Harvard University leaders decided that the government's proposals represented a deep threat to the independence and mission of the university in 388 during a heated debate over the weekend.
Harvard has extraordinary financial and political firepower due to its clash with Washington. And university leaders looked at Columbia University's reels as the Trump administration made more demands, even after the school surrendered.
Harvard will fight. The alternative looked much worse.
“No matter which party holds power, we should not decide what private universities can teach, who can be recognized and hired, or which fields we can pursue,” Harvard President Alan M. Gerber wrote in an open letter Monday.
The account is based on communications between Harvard University and the government, official statements, and interviews with Trump administration officials, Harvard University people and university relatives. Harvard refused to make Dr. Gerber available for interviews.
In response to his announcement, the government quickly retaliated with a freeze of more than $2.2 billion in federal funding. Nearly another $7 billion remains at risk, including money sent to Harvard affiliated hospitals. And on Tuesday, Trump, who chose an elite university, was accused of leaning left by conservatives, and was long accused of being a special target, threatening Harvard's tax-free status.
Even the world's wealthiest universities, which donate roughly $53 billion, enduring freezes are deeply reduced to labs, departments, and even classrooms. But Harvard officials chose to praise its reputation, independence and heritage, betting that the agency could last Trump's crusades for a long time.
“This is what Joe McCarthy was about to expand 10 or 100 times,” added Lawrence H. Summers, former Harvard president, “is directly contrary to the role of universities in a free society.”
“The university will not surrender.”
The first sentence in the Trump administration letter on Friday was a citizen, but it was frustrating. Three federal officials wrote that Harvard “failed to deal with both intellectual and civil rights that justify federal investment.”
Officials told Dr. Gerber that one of the Department of Education, one of the Department of Health and Human Services and an official from the Department of General Services Administration “welcome” the “collaboration in restoring the university to its promise.” If Harvard agrees to their terms, authorities wrote, they can begin work on a “more thorough binding settlement agreement.”
The letter arrived after Harvard University asked for an explanation of an equal anonymous list of proposals the government shared eight days ago. What landed in Cambridge on Friday night was far beyond explanation.
The polite opening paragraph has been widespread and widespread in the way that surprised Harvard leaders who had been wanting to align with the government until recently.
The government said it wanted Harvard faculty power to decline and demanded Harvard accept “metre-based” admission and employment policies. The Trump administration wanted to audit university data and called for changes to “international student recruitment, screening and admission.”
The administration also insisted that Harvard University conducts a review of “diversity of perspectives.” The government wanted Harvard to “quickly shutter” programs related to diversity, equity and inclusion, bring outsiders, and investigate “programs and sectors that reflect most anti-Semitic harassment and ideological capture.” And the government wanted to report that “at least until the end of 2028” – by the time Trump leaves the White House – Harvard University was complying with the administration's demands.
The ultimatum appeared to be directly related to the ambitions the Trump administration stated to erase anti-Semitism on campus. Kenneth L. Marcus, civil rights chief of the Department of Education during Trump's first term, said the government's proposal “is far beyond anti-Semitism and reflects much broader cultural concerns in the conservative movement about corruption in higher education.”
Marcus, who is based on the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Centre law, said the request was an attack on “the left leaning that Harvard believes to exemplify.”
Dr. Gerber did not frame Harvard's response as a left or right issue. In his letter rejecting the administration, he used 12 words to summarise Harvard's attitude: “The university will not waive independence or waive its constitutional rights.”
His announcement drew Harvard into one of the most significant conflicts in its history.
“It is hard to imagine that the university president actually stipulates the beliefs of the faculty and the beliefs of hospitalized students, so it is hard to imagine that he could agree to that list of requests,” said Stephen Pinker, a professor of psychology and co-president of Harvard's academic freedom council. However, he still marveled at the speed of Harvard's reaction.
Dr. Summers, a former Treasury Secretary who is more of a political battle than most of the academia, said he thought “the extremes of the demand letter would otherwise have made this a much easier decision.”
If government officials were corrupt for the fight, their tactics seem to have worked. However, as the Trump administration itself did not publicly release the bomb letter, Harvard had time to tweak the counterattack, including a glossy website outlining its contribution to society. This was a rare example of the unpredictability of universities that bolster the Trump administration's campaign.
Harvard University unleashed surprises across higher education as he barely felt bold in the face of Trump's attacks. Two people familiar with private discussions said that when dozens of university leaders took part in the conference call on Sunday, no mention of the government's new demands for Harvard or the school's upcoming response were made.
Preparing for the White House Clash
Over the past few months, Harvard has adopted a prominently low and accommodating profile. So many people on campus were openly worried, and the university was pursuing a Columbian-style reconciliation path.
In March, Columbia joined the Trump administration's roster on a quest to restore its $400 million federal grants and contracts. But the money wasn't starting to flow again. Instead, the government is currently weighing the possibility of a consent order with the school, allowing federal judges to monitor agreements with the university and potentially give White House leverage for years.
In preparation for Trump's inauguration, Harvard hired a lobbying company from a major power with close ties to the White House and the Department of Justice. The university also adopted a more stringent definition of anti-Semitism that disrupts many free speech advocates. Later, when the federal government dialed pressure on Colombia and its elite pia, Harvard ousted two leaders at the Middle East Studies Center, suspending its partnership with the University of Palestinian and agreeing to start one at schools in Israel.
Harvard was also not one of the best universities listed as plaintiffs on the court's challenges for developing research funding proposed by the Trump administration.
Still, the university was making subtle preparations for a clash with the White House. Part of this came long before the government announced on March 31 that it would review approximately $9 billion with Harvard funds.
The university imposed a job freeze in March, attempting to raise $1.2 billion in the bond market. Harvard also weighed adjustments to payments for $53 billion in donations, as they did during the pandemic.
Endgame
Harvard's financial interests are enormous. They also affect other parts of the country as the Trump administration appears to be determined to retreat from government-university ties that flourished throughout the United States since World War II.
The actual details are also vague.
The Trump administration has not explained to Harvard how it came up with the $2.2 billion that it intended to freeze. But officials believe the number is the total of about $650 million that the federal government provides university researchers each year, extending lifespans.
By Tuesday morning, Harvard was already feeling the fallout. The university's Chan School of Public Health confirmed that infectious disease expert Sarah Fortune has received a suspension work order. Dr. Fortune's tuberculosis research was supported through a $60 million National Institute of Health contract involving Harvard and other universities across the country.
Federal officials did not immediately respond to messages asking about communication with universities and researchers.
Harvard's donations may help you survive some of the financial fallout. However, university leaders are often at a severe disadvantage in leveraging these funds and are worried about reducing the funds they need in the future. At Harvard University, approximately 80% of donation funds are limited to specific purposes.
Still, in its latest financial report, Harvard said there are billions of dollars that can be tapped “in the event of unexpected disruptions.”
Columbia's experience over the last few weeks seems likely to lead to continued disruption, revealing that the Trump administration continues to treat Harvard's Ivy League colleges ongoing.
“Negotiations and settlements don't seem to have an acceptable end point,” said Lee C. Bollinger, Columbia's 21-year president, on Tuesday.
Dr. Pinker had the same feelings. He said he believes Harvard might have tried to negotiate the way Columbia did.
The Trump administration and some of the Capitol Hill allies defeated Harvard University's rebellion. For example, the Management Task Force, which handles the conflict with Harvard, said in a statement Monday night that the university's response “reflects the notion of endemic and troublesome qualifications at our country's most famous universities and universities.
But in many quarters, Harvard's new rubber has brought relief. They fear that billions of research funding could threaten employment, laboratories and long-standing projects. But they argue that it is essential that muscledness adheres to that principle as much as Harvard University.
Stephen Levitsky, a Harvard political scientist who urged the university to take a more severe position against Trump, reads Dr. Gerber's letter before the class on authoritarianism and democracy.
“It seems Harvard has decided it's time to fight,” he said as he began.
The room of about 100 students erupted in applause, he said.
Lulu Garcia-Navarro Miles J. Herszenhorn contributed the report.
