By The same people who were happy when Obama sued Hillsdale College in 2011 are livid now that it’s come for their own schools to be held to similar standards, especially when their school has helped them accrue power over the past few decades.
Harvard University has formally rejected demands from the Trump administration offer to comply with civil rights law. University officials have described the White House’s offer as unconstitutional, coercive, and incompatible with the principles of academic freedom and institutional autonomy.
By Monday night, the federal government retaliated by freezing $2.2 billion in active research grants and withholding an additional $60 million in federal contracts—an extraordinary financial sanction with sweeping implications for the university’s scientific and medical research ecosystem.
Harvard’s legal team maintains that the federal intervention violates First Amendment protections and exceeds the lawful scope of civil rights enforcement. They argue the administration is attempting to use financial leverage to compel ideological conformity and suppress dissenting scholarship, with particular implications for affiliated medical institutions and research labs that rely heavily on government funding but are independently governed.
Federal officials, however, have justified the intervention by citing Harvard’s alleged failure to combat antisemitism and ideological radicalism on campus. White House spokesperson Harrison Fields said the administration’s actions were necessary “to ensure that taxpayer dollars are not underwriting racially discriminatory practices or politically motivated violence,” adding that “President Trump is committed to restoring neutrality and patriotism in higher education.”
Harvard has consistently ranked near the bottom of free speech rankings. In 2023, for example, the elite university received the worst score ever in FIRE’s scoring system, receiving a 0.00 out of a possible 100.00, earning it “the notorious distinction of being the only school ranked this year with an “Abysmal” speech climate.” Throughout 2024, Harvard found itself doing little to protect Jewish students being harassed by pro-Palestine protestors.
The letter to Harvard outlines additional stipulations beyond DEI dismantlement, including federal review of hiring decisions, investigations into faculty for ideological bias or plagiarism, and the mandatory flagging of international students considered insufficiently aligned with “American values.” President Garber dismissed the package as an effort to “regulate the intellectual environment” of a private institution through executive fiat.
Harvard’s decision to reject the terms sets it apart from peer institutions, some of which have opted to negotiate. Columbia University, having lost over $400 million in federal support, has entered discussions with administration officials, though it has not agreed to the proposed reforms. Columbia’s faculty unions, however, have initiated litigation against the funding cuts, citing academic freedom and procedural overreach.
Whether Harvard’s defiance will catalyze a unified response among American universities or isolate it as a cautionary example remains unclear. But for now, Garber has drawn a firm line: “We will not forfeit our independence, nor will we abandon the constitutional protections that define the university’s mission.”
Former president Barack Obama rushed to defend his alma mater.
Harvard has set an example for other higher-ed institutions – rejecting an unlawful and ham-handed attempt to stifle academic freedom, while taking concrete steps to make sure all students at Harvard can benefit from an environment of intellectual inquiry, rigorous debate and… https://t.co/gAu9UUqgjF
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) April 15, 2025
While liberals, including Barack Obama, have rushed to defend the antisemitism and speech codes at Harvard, it should be worth remembering that the Obama administration once sued conservative-leaning Hillsdale College, despite the college receiving no federal funds.
The Wall Street Journal explained in 2023 that embedded in a civil lawsuit against Hillsdale College is an assault on the fabric of this small, private Christian school founded in 1844. The lawsuit, brought by two undergraduate women who allege that they were raped two years ago by male Hillsdale students of their acquaintance, alleges not only that the college was negligent in handling their complaints, but also that it failed to afford them the protection to which they were entitled under Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972.
In 2011 the Obama administration turned Title IX into a sword in the armory of federal civil-rights law. On pain of losing federal money, including student financial aid, the Education Department compelled schools to adopt rules that deprived those accused of sexual misconduct of basic due-process protections. The Trump administration undid those rules, and the Biden administration is working to reinstate them. The problem with invoking Title IX against Hillsdale, however, is that the college takes no money from the government. “Not a cent,” says its president, Larry P. Arnn, which means that Hillsdale isn’t bound by Title IX.
In their lawsuit, filed on Sept. 25 in federal court, the plaintiffs assert that Hillsdale “does not accept government funding in a misguided and ineffective attempt to avoid its obligations under Title IX.” Mr. Arnn calls that claim “insidious and baseless.” Robert Norton, Hillsdale’s general counsel, says the college’s process for investigating and resolving allegations of sexual assault are “stronger, quicker, and more confidential” than the Education Department’s Title IX standards. He also says the college found the two male students had engaged in “conduct unbecoming,” even though no criminal charges were brought after the accusers filed complaints with the local police.
The lawsuit seeks to impose Title IX’s strictures on Hillsdale, arguing that the college’s tax-exempt status under Section 501(c)(3) of the Tax Code “operates as a subsidy, which is a form of federal financial assistance.”
Harvard’s defiance has been cast by liberals as a noble stand for academic freedom, with former President Barack Obama rushing to its defense. Yet the irony is unmistakable. During his own presidency, Obama weaponized civil rights law in ways that anticipated the very abuses he now decries. His Department of Education rewrote Title IX enforcement to punish colleges that failed to adopt expansive definitions of sexual misconduct—stripping accused students of due process and threatening institutions with the loss of federal funding. Even Hillsdale College, which accepts no federal money, was targeted through litigation that sought to impose Title IX standards by redefining tax-exempt status as a form of federal subsidy.
It’s a reminder that liberals, regardless of the issue at hand, whether it’s spreading COVID-19, breaking into the Capitol, or even gas stoves, operate under two sets of rules: the ones for Democrats and the ones for the rest of us.
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