Will Harvard Continue to Lead the Charge? - Part 26

From the NY Times: ...Unlike many other powerful institutions that have struck bargains with Mr. Trump, Harvard, the nation’s oldest and richest university, spent much of this spring as the vanguard of resistance to the White House, credited by academic leaders, alumni and pro-democracy activists for fighting the administration and serving as a formidable barrier against authoritarianism. Despite a series of legal wins against the administration, though, Harvard officials concluded in recent weeks that those victories alone might be insufficient to protect the university.

...Lawrence H. Summers, a former Harvard president who has been critical of the university’s culture, suggested in an interview on Monday that a deal, in and of itself, should not be seen as a surrender. A carefully crafted settlement, he said, could help repair some of the university’s problems while preserving its independence and rigor. If there were no conceivable changes for the university to make that would satisfy the administration, he said, there might be no value in negotiations. But, Dr. Summers said, “I don’t hear anyone at Harvard saying Harvard doesn’t need to work at diversity of perspective.” ...

Other universities are watching closely. Columbia is in talks with the federal government as it seeks to restore hundreds of millions of dollars in federal grants and contracts. And the Trump administration has used an ad hoc process to cut research funds from a handful of other elite schools, including the Ivy League’s Brown, Princeton and University of Pennsylvania. Harvard, though, is the only school that has taken the administration to court to challenge its targeting...

Full story at https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/24/us/politics/harvard-debate-settlement-trump.html.