President Donald Trump said Friday that Harvard University would lose its tax-exempt status, ramping up his fight with the Ivy League institution to a new level.
Trump’s comments come amid a funding fight with the university as his administration has frozen more than $2 billion in federal funds to Harvard over its pushback on his administration’s efforts to target diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives and handling of anti-Israel protests. Last week, Trump called Harvard a “far left institution” and “a threat to Democracy.”
“We are going to be taking away Harvard’s Tax Exempt Status. It’s what they deserve!” Trump posted on his social media platform Friday morning.
The announcement comes after repeated pressure from Trump for Harvard to comply with his executive orders on education or face the consequences. Last month, the Washington Post reported that the Treasury Department had asked the IRS to revoke Harvard’s tax-exempt status.
“Perhaps Harvard should lose its Tax Exempt Status and be Taxed as a Political Entity if it keeps pushing political, ideological, and terrorist inspired/supporting ‘Sickness?’ Remember, Tax Exempt Status is totally contingent on acting in the PUBLIC INTEREST!” Trump posted on Truth Social on April 15.
At the time, White House spokesman Harrison Fields said that any probes into entities over their tax-exempt status had begun before that social media post.
“Any forthcoming actions by the IRS will be conducted independently of the president, and investigations into any institution’s violations of its tax status were initiated prior to the president’s TRUTH,” he said.
Trump took another shot at Harvard on Thursday night during his commencement speech at the University of Alabama.
“The next chapter of the American story will not be written by the Harvard Crimson. It will be written by you, the Crimson Tide,” Trump said, saying that Harvard’s billions of dollars in federal funding wouldn’t be “so forthcoming” now.
Harvard rebranded its DEI office this week, renaming it the “Community and Campus Life” and changing its focus to “expanding cross-cultural engagement programs, supporting first-generation and low-income students, and creating more opportunities for dialogue across differences,” according to The Harvard Crimson. The university has also changed its chief diversity officer position, which has been renamed and will now be called the Chief Community and Campus Life Officer.
On Monday, the Trump administration announced that it would investigate Harvard and the student-run Harvard Law Journal over its treatment of white contributors.
The Trump administration specifically cited reports that a Harvard Law Review editor said it was “concerning” that four out of five individuals who wanted to reply to an article on police reform were “white men.” The administration provided another example of an editor saying “that a piece should be subject to expedited review because the author was a minority.”
