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WASHINGTON — Education Secretary Linda McMahon said Thursday she’s “hoping” that Harvard University will get wise and drop a lawsuit against the Trump administration for stripping $2.6 billion in funds away over concerns about campus antisemitism.
McMahon urged the Ivy League to think carefully after Columbia University caved and agreed to pay the administration $200 million in a historic settlement.
“We’ve had continuing negotiations and conversations with Harvard, even though there is a pending lawsuit that I think is going to, will play out, but we’re hoping that Harvard will come to the table,” McMahon told NewsNation’s “Morning in America.”
“We’re already seeing other universities that are taking these measures before investigation or before our coming in to talk to them,” she added. “That’s why the monitors are in place and the Department of Justice — so that we can have a long-reaching legacy for universities to follow.”
Some members of the Columbia community were less certain, with Jewish alumni like Ari Shrage doubting the concessions were enough or would spur Harvard either way.
“What they had on Columbia — they don’t have on Harvard — is that Columbia’s liquidity is very, very weak,” Shrage said, noting its immense endowment and the fact that its the largest private landowner and building owner in the Big Apple.
“Harvard has a much more liquid portfolio, and they can wait out Trump, so they could just keep it in court and they could fund it. Columbia could not,” he added.
“And because of that, the Trump administration had the opportunity to force additional reforms. They just completely dropped the ball. Now the hard work begins and we look forward to being part of the process.”
Shrage added: “I think this is a good first step, but there’s a lot more to do to rebuild trust with the Jewish community.”
The education secretary in her interview noted that Harvard had already made concessions by ousting members of its Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Cemal Kafadar and Rosie Bsheer, who sat on a panel that the university’s former president, Larry Summers, said “very likely” spewed antisemitic rhetoric.
Harvard had also announced the closure of its diversity office on Wednesday, according to the Harvard Crimson.
But the federal judge overseeing Trump’s court battle with Harvard in a recent hearing expressed skepticism that the administration could make sweeping, “ad hoc” decisions about withholding federal funds to leverage changes in university policies.
On Thursday, Summers posted on X that Columbia’s agreement with the Trump administration was “an excellent template” for other universities and colleges.
“First, academic freedom is preserved as the University maintains academic autonomy,” he explained.
“Second, ongoing reform with respect to anti Semitism, maintenance of order, promoting merit-based admissions and hiring, and strengthening the commitment to intellectual excellence is reinforced and a framework for further reform is established,” he continued.
“Third, normality is restored with a return to normal funding patterns, availability of visas for foreign students and removal of legal overhangs.”
The former Ivy League president concluded that the settlement “may be the best day higher education has had in the last year.”
In addition to the settlement sum, Columbia will also be paying more than $20 million to its Jewish employees who were discriminated against amid antisemitic demonstrations that engulfed the Morningside Heights campus following Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, massacre.
“Numerous other Higher Education Institutions that have hurt so many, and been so unfair and unjust, and have wrongly spent federal money, much of it from our government, are upcoming,” Trump posted Wednesday on his Truth Social.
“I look forward to watching them [Columbia] have a great future in our Country, maybe greater than ever before!”
The elite university will now submit to independent monitoring and mandatory reporting to the federal government to uproot antisemitism and ensure it is complying with merit-based hiring and admissions requirements.
“The settlement was carefully crafted to protect the values that define us and allow our essential research partnership with the federal government to get back on track,” said Columbia acting president Claire Shipman. “Importantly, it safeguards our independence, a critical condition for academic excellence and scholarly exploration, work that is vital to the public interest.”
To address safety concerns for students, Columbia agreed to also maintain a trained security force to stop protests from invading academic spaces and work closer with the NYPD to prevent another repeat of the anti-Israel mob that took over Hamilton Hall in the spring 2024.
Demonstrators won’t be able to wear masks, though facial coverings will still be allowed for medical and religious reasons.
“This announcement is an important recognition of what Jewish students and their families have expressed with increasing urgency: antisemitism at Columbia is real, and it has had a tangible impact on Jewish students’ sense of safety and belonging and, in turn, their civil rights,” said Brian Cohen, the executive director of Columbia and Barnard’s Hillel chapter.
“Acknowledging this fact is essential, and along with the new path laid out by the President and Trustees, I am hopeful that today’s agreement marks the beginning of real, sustained change,” he added. “This is not the end of the process, however it is a major step forward.”
Shrage also said, “I’m thrilled that the researchers got their funding back. They are doing lifesaving work. I only wish the university didn’t drag this out so long and they could have gotten it sooner.”
Critics of the agreement have pointed to the differences between demands made by the Trump administration in April and the final product, including the loosened rules on the mask ban as well as the failure to punish more of the anti-Israel protesters who descended on campus in 2024.
The Trump administration had also previously asked for the University Judicial Board, which failed to discipline those students, to be abolished, but backed off in the final agreement.
Others were dissatisfied that the university expressed no guilt for the state of affairs or that the Middle Eastern, South Asian and African Studies department wasn’t placed under an academic receivership and will instead be put under review by a senior vice provost.
McMahon said Thursday that the administration got “the bulk of what we negotiated for.”
“Our students must feel safe when they go to campus, and they should feel safe,” she affirmed. “The parents who are sending them there need to have assurance that their students will be protected, and we’re not going to have these violent protests that we’ve seen.”
The White House and Department of Education did not immediately return requests for comment.
