Harvard Has Decided To Lead the Charge. It Can’t Do It Alone.

Facing down a federal extortion racket, Harvard sent its clearest, most courageous message to date: Our values aren’t for sale.

In an email to affiliates, the University announced it will not give in to the Trump administration’s expanded demands. Mere hours later, in a blatant act of retaliation, the federal government froze $2.2 billion of our funding.

Harvard’s decision to stand in defense of the academic project against the Trump administration’s attacks is noble. As the White House attempts to decimate American higher education, we hope other universities will join ours in fortifying it.

When last week’s initial Trump letter arrived on Harvard’s doorstep, it was immediately clear that their demands — from calls to entirely eliminate diversity, equity, and inclusion programming to implementing “merit based admissions” — had nothing to do with genuinely fighting antisemitism and everything to do with stripping away Harvard’s autonomy.

The new Trump letter, debuted in Garber’s email to the community, somehow went even further.

On top of the original demands, the Trump administration brands whole academic units as potential bastions of antisemitism in need of supervision, including the entirety of Harvard Medical School, Harvard Divinity School, the Harvard School of Public Health and many others.

The letter goes on to demand “viewpoint diversity” at Harvard in admissions and faculty hiring, down to every “teaching unit.” Notwithstanding the infeasibility of gauging political opinions in a college application, is a room of math professors expected to be half liberal and half conservative? Are environmental research institutes expected to host climate change deniers?

That’s only scratching the surface of Trump’s list, which also included an apparent political litmus test for international applicants and comprehensive federal oversight of the University through at least 2028.

As University President Alan M. Garber ’76 made clear in his message to affiliates, ceding to these demands would do more than please our nation’s president. It would strip fundamental autonomy away from our country’s most storied institution and irrevocably alter the landscape of higher education.

Undeniably, the incoming funding cuts will bring serious, short-term pain for Harvard students, faculty, and staff, not to mention the advancement of human knowledge. But acquiescence to Trump’s demands would have had even graver, lasting consequences, not just for Harvard — but for higher education and American society as a whole.

The federal government is picking off democratic institutions at all levels of American life one by one. Harvard’s brave choice to stand by the academic project should be a blueprint for the rest of civil society to follow.

Time and time again, we have called for Harvard to find its voice and lead America’s universities. We’ve certainly critiqued administrators when — from the probation of the Harvard Undergraduate Palestine Solidarity Committee or paused ties with Birzeit University — they’ve fallen short.

Now, the institution has answered the call. The student reaction was overwhelming and immediate. At a school often derided for a lack of spirit, Harvard today experienced a moment of intense unity.

Higher education needed a champion, and we are proud Harvard has decided to rise to the occasion.

In the face of Trump’s assault on higher education, silence has spoken volumes — we’ve seen elite institutions buckling under the pressure of the federal government’s barrage of funding cuts and threats to academic freedom. All the while, calls to action have been plenty: students, faculty, legislators, governors, and even past University presidents have demanded that Harvard stand up to Trump. These stakeholders, too, understood the necessity of such resistance for the sake of both academic freedom at Harvard and our democracy at large.

As one of the most distinguished universities in the world — and the oldest in the United States — Harvard has a unique capacity and responsibility to lead the fight against Republicans attempting to infringe upon our independence. But Harvard cannot stand alone. The University’s decision to hold the banner must galvanize peer institutions to resist Trump’s attacks — a form of collective action we have called for before.

Harvard faced a difficult choice: Lose billions in federal funding or sacrifice its centuries-old soul. It chose right. Now here’s hoping our peers follow suit.

This staff editorial solely represents the majority view of The Crimson Editorial Board. It is the product of discussions at regular Editorial Board meetings. In order to ensure the impartiality of our journalism, Crimson editors who choose to opine and vote at these meetings are not involved in the reporting of articles on similar topics.

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