Cambridge, MA – May 29: Law school graduates raise gavels during Harvard University’s 374th Commencement on May 29, 2025.
Craig F. Walker | Boston Globe | Getty Images
A federal judge on Wednesday ruled that the Trump administration’s freeze of $2.2 billion in grant funds for Harvard University over concerns about antisemitism on campus and other issues was illegal, calling it “a targeted, ideologically-motivated assault on this country’s premier universities.”
Judge Allison Burroughs agreed with Harvard’s arguments that the administration imposed the funding freeze in retaliation for the Ivy League university’s refusal to capitulate to demands for reforms that violated First Amendment protections under the Constitution.
Burroughs’ ruling in U.S. District Court in Massachusetts vacates freezing orders affecting Harvard and bars anyone in the Trump administration from enforcing those orders.
The White House said it would appeal the decision.
The Trump administration froze the grants to Harvard on April 14, hours after the university flatly rejected demands that it end its diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, and begin screening international students for ideological biases, including antisemitism.
Burroughs said that the fact that the administration swiftly terminated Harvard’s funding “was made before they learned anything about antisemitism on campus or what was being done in response, leads the Court to conclude that the sudden focus on antisemitism was, at best … arbitrary and, at worst, pretextual.”
She also noted that the administration, in a letter in April, “specifically conditioned funding on agreeing to its ten terms, only one of which related to antisemitism.”
Six other terms, she noted, “related to ideological and pedagogical concerns, including who may lead and teach at Harvard, who may be admitted, and what may be taught.”
“A review of the administrative record makes it difficult to conclude anything other than that Defendants used antisemitism as a smokescreen for a targeted, ideologically-motivated assault on this country’s premier universities, and did so in a way that runs afoul of the APA [Administrative Procedure Act], the First Amendment and Title VI.”
As a result of the freeze, work was ordered stopped “on a vast number of research projects across fields that are critical both nationally and worldwide,” Burroughs wrote.
The projects affected by the freeze include research on tuberculosis, NASA astronauts’ radiation exposure, Lou Gehrig’s disease, and a “predictive model to help [Veterans Administration] emergency room physicians decide whether suicidal veterans should be hospitalized,” the judge wrote.
“It is clear, even based solely on Harvard’s own admissions, that Harvard has been plagued by antisemitism in recent years and could (and should) have done a better job of dealing with the issue,” Burroughts wrote.
“That said, there is, in reality, little connection between the research affected by the grant terminations and antisemitism,” she wrote.
Harvard President Alan Garber, in a statement to the university community on the ruling, said that it “affirms Harvard’s First Amendment and procedural rights, and validates our arguments in defense of the University’s academic freedom, critical scientific research, and the core principles of American higher education.”
“Even as we acknowledge the important principles affirmed in today’s ruling, we will continue to assess the implications of the opinion, monitor further legal developments, and be mindful of the changing landscape in which we seek to fulfill our mission,” Garber said.
Harvard President Alan Garber, at the time of the funding freeze, said in a note to the university community, “No government — regardless of which party is in power — should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue.”
White House spokeswoman Liz Huston, in a statement, said, “Just as President Trump correctly predicted on the day of the hearing, this activist Obama-appointed judge was always going to rule in Harvard’s favor, regardless of the facts.”
“To any fair-minded observer, it is clear that Harvard University failed to protect their students from harassment and allowed discrimination to plague their campus for years,” Huston said. “Harvard does not have a constitutional right to taxpayer dollars and remains ineligible for grants in the future. We will immediately move to appeal this egregious decision, and we are confident we will ultimately prevail in our efforts to hold Harvard accountable.”
— CNBC’s Kevin Breuninger contributed to this story.
