Trump administration finds Harvard failed to protect Jewish students, threatens to cut all funding

WASHINGTON AP Harvard University failed to protect Jewish students from harassment the Trump administration concluded after an scrutiny threatening to cut all federal funding from the Ivy League school if it fails to take action A federal task force sent a letter to Harvard on Monday finding the university violated civil rights laws requiring colleges to protect students from discrimination based on race or national origin It says investigators detected Harvard was at times a willful participant in anti-Semitic harassment of Jewish students faculty and staff and that campus leaders allowed antisemitism to fester on the campus in Cambridge Massachusetts Failure to institute adequate changes this instant will effect in the loss of all federal financial support and continue to affect Harvard s relationship with the federal regime administrators commented in the letter which was obtained by The Associated Press and first broadcasted by The Wall Street Journal Harvard did not straightaway comment It s the latest intensification in the White House s battle with Harvard which lost more than billion in federal research grants after rejecting a list of federal demands calling for sweeping changes to campus governance hiring and admissions The Trump administration for months has accused Harvard of tolerating antisemitism on its campus but a formal finding paves the way for a negotiated agreement or if one isn t reached an attempt to cut the school off from federal dollars Much of the analysis s evidence focuses on campus protests over the Israel-Hamas war It says the campus was overrun by an impermissible multiweek encampment that left Jewish and Israeli students fearful and disrupted their studies It accuses Harvard of imposing lax and inconsistent discipline against students who participated in the encampment noting that none was suspended Harvard President Alan Garber has acknowledged problems with antisemitism and anti-Muslim bias on campus but he says Harvard has made strides to fight prejudice He communicated new initiatives in April after Harvard circulated internal reports finding evidence of antisemitism and Islamophobia on campus Harvard cannot and will not abide bigotry Garber wrote in releasing the reports The Monday letter finds that Harvard violated Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of Such findings have almost dependably been resolved through voluntary resolutions between schools and the federal ruling body The Trump administration has taken a much sharper edge than its predecessors however It has been decades since an administration even attempted to fully strip a school or college of its federal funding over civil rights violations