WASHINGTON (AP) — In a significant legal move, the Justice Department initiated a lawsuit against Harvard University on Friday, alleging that the institution’s leadership has inadequately addressed antisemitism on its campus. This failure, according to the lawsuit, could potentially lead to the suspension of current federal grants and demands for the repayment of previously awarded funds.
The lawsuit, filed in a Massachusetts federal court, marks another chapter in the ongoing conflict between President Donald Trump’s administration and the prestigious university.
“The United States will neither accept nor overlook such inadequacies,” stated the Justice Department in its legal filing. The lawsuit urges the court to enforce Harvard’s adherence to federal civil rights laws and seeks to reclaim “billions of dollars in taxpayer funds granted to an institution that discriminates.”
Furthermore, the lawsuit requests that a judge mandates Harvard to involve law enforcement in dealing with protesters who obstruct campus activities. It also calls for the appointment of an independent monitor, sanctioned by the government, to ensure the university’s compliance with any court directives.
In response, Harvard issued a statement affirming its dedication to the well-being of its Jewish and Israeli community members, emphasizing its commitment to fostering an environment where they are respected and can thrive.
“Harvard has taken substantive, proactive steps to address the root causes of antisemitism and actively enforces anti-harassment and anti-discrimination rules and policies,” the statement read.
In a pair of lawsuits filed last year by the university, Harvard has said it’s being illegally penalized for refusing to adopt the administration’s views. A federal judge sided with Harvard in September, reversing the funding cuts and calling the antisemitism argument a “smokescreen.”
Trump’s year-long battle with Harvard
The government’s new lawsuit comes after negotiations appear to have bogged down in the year-long battle, which has tested the boundaries of the government’s authority over America’s universities. What began as an investigation into allegations of campus antisemitism escalated into an all-out feud. The Trump administration slashed more than $2.6 billion in Harvard’s research funding, ended federal contracts and attempted to block Harvard from hosting international students.
Ted Mitchell, president of the American Council on Education, a major association of colleges and universities, accused the administration of launching a “full scale, multi-pronged” attack on Harvard. Friday’s lawsuit, he said in an email, is just the latest attempt to pressure Harvard to agree to changes favored by the administration.
“When bullies pound on the table and don’t get what they want, they pound again,” Mitchell said.
The Trump administration’s aggressive tactics toward Harvard mark an extraordinary departure from how previous administrations have enforced civil rights law at American colleges. In the past, the government investigated allegations of civil rights violations, produced findings and typically reached an agreement with the college to bring it into compliance. Occasionally, the government levied fines and could threaten to pull federal funding. The process typically took months or years.
In contrast, Trump had been in office fewer than three months before he had frozen billions of dollars in grants to Harvard, including money for medical research. He has since tried to press the school to pay the government to end the standoff.
“The administration appears to have filed this new lawsuit to make an end run around its loss in the district courts and the pending appeal, and its failed settlement negotiations with Harvard,” said Anurima Bhargava, former chief of the Educational Opportunities Section at the U.S. Department of Justice and a senior adviser for the group Stand for Campus Freedom.
At issue: Civil rights and First Amendment rights
The Trump administration’s case has centered on allegations of discrimination against Harvard’s Jewish and Israeli students during and after pro-Palestinian demonstrations related to the Israel-Hamas war.
Officials concluded Harvard did not adequately address concerns about antisemitism that some students said kept them from going to class. During protests of the war, Trump officials said, Harvard permitted students to demonstrate against Israel’s actions in the school library and allowed a pro-Palestinian encampment to remain on campus for 20 days, “in violation of university policy.”
In its lawsuit Friday, the Justice Department also accused Harvard of failing to discipline staff or students who protested or tacitly endorsed the demonstrations by canceling class or dismissing students early.
“Harvard University has failed to protect its Jewish students from harassment and has allowed discrimination to wreak havoc on its campus,” White House press secretary Liz Huston said Friday on X.
Harvard, in turn, has said the government is violating its First Amendment rights, after it defied federal demands that it limit activism on campus and change some practices for hiring and enrollment.
“The tradeoff put to Harvard and other universities is clear: Allow the Government to micromanage your academic institution or jeopardize the institution’s ability to pursue medical breakthroughs, scientific discoveries, and innovative solutions,” attorneys for Harvard said in a lawsuit over the funding freeze.
Negotiations with Harvard have frayed
Despite their bitter dispute, Harvard and the Trump administration have held some negotiations, and the two sides have reportedly been close to reaching an agreement on multiple occasions. Last year, they were reportedly approaching a deal requiring Harvard to pay $500 million to regain access to federal funding and end the investigations. Several months later, Trump upped that figure to $1 billion, saying Harvard has been “behaving very badly.”
At the same time, the administration was taking steps in a civil rights investigation that could jeopardize all Harvard’s federal funding.
Last June, a federal task force said its investigation had found the university was a “willful participant” in antisemitic harassment of Jewish students and faculty. The task force threatened to refer the case to the Justice Department to file a civil rights lawsuit “as soon as possible,” unless Harvard came into compliance.
When colleges are found in violation of federal civil rights law, they almost always reach compliance through voluntary agreements. Friday’s lawsuit by the Justice Department points to an extraordinarily rare impasse.
Harvard has said it strongly disagrees with the government’s civil rights finding and is committed to fighting bias.
Harvard President Alan M. Garber says the school formed a task force to combat antisemitism. The university also hired a new provost and new deans and reformed its discipline policies to make them “more consistent, fair and effective,” Garber has said.
Since he took office, Trump has targeted elite universities he believes are overrun by left-wing ideology and antisemitism. His administration has frozen billions of dollars in research grants, which colleges have come to rely on for scientific and medical research.
Several universities have reached agreements with the White House to restore funding. Some deals have included direct payments to the government, including $200 million from Columbia University. Brown University agreed to pay $50 million toward state workforce development groups.
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AP Education Writer Collin Binkley contributed to this report.
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Editor’s note: Previous versions of this story had incorrect timing for a federal judge’s order that reversed the Trump administration’s funding cuts at Harvard. The judge ordered the cuts reversed in September, not December.
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