Harvard Alumni Group Calls on School to Resist Amid Trump Feud

A group of Harvard University alumni urged the school not to cave to the Trump administration’s demands as it restarts talks with the White House.

President Donald Trump on Friday said his administration had been holding talks with Harvard and may announce a “‘mindbogglingly’ HISTORIC” deal over the next week. Any detente must not come at the expense of Harvard’s academic freedom and institutional autonomy, said Crimson Courage, a grassroots campaign organized by alumni to rally goodwill and money for the university in its battle with Trump. 

“Standing strong is not merely an operational exercise: it is a moral imperative,” Crimson Courage said Monday in a letter to Harvard President Alan Garber and the board that oversees the university. “The world is watching and needs Harvard’s leadership and courage now.” 

Harvard’s commitment to values including freedom of speech and a learning environment that is “safe, nurturing and welcome to all cannot be negotiated away,” the group said. 

A deal between Harvard and the Trump administration, should one be reached, would mark a major turning point in a rapidly escalating standoff in which the White House has canceled more than $2.6 billion in research funding, threatened the school’s tax-exempt status and sought to prevent it from enrolling foreign students. Harvard has launched two lawsuits in response and last week secured a longer reprieve from the Trump administration’s attempted ban on foreign students. 

Trump didn’t offer specifics on the negotiations with Harvard or what any kind of agreement might entail. Demands by federal agencies in recent months have included everything from changes to its admissions and hiring practices to audits of academic coursework, as well as the submission of records and video footage of international students at protests. 

Despite Trump’s positive signaling, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem again called for revoking the university’s ability to enroll foreign students in a Washington Post op-ed published on Monday, citing a failure to protect Jewish students. 

A Harvard spokesperson didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

While some wealthy donors have criticized Harvard’s decision to fight the Trump administration’s demands, the oldest and richest US university has also won plaudits for becoming the face of institutional resistance to the White House’s campaign to remake higher education. Columbia University, by contrast, has faced heavy criticism from students, faculty and alumni for striking an agreement with Trump earlier this year in an effort to convince the administration to reinstate $400 million of federal funding. 

Garber, who is Jewish, has apologized for Harvard’s handling of antisemitism in the wake of the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks by Hamas against Israel and the Jewish state’s retaliatory response in Gaza. He has also acknowledged that he has experienced prejudice himself at the school. Still, Garber has said the extent of the government’s demands show that “the intention is not to work with us to address antisemitism.”

Garber received multiple standing ovations at the school’s commencement last month, a stark contrast to a year earlier when hundreds of students walked out of the ceremony to protest the university’s handling of a pro-Palestinian encampment on campus. Crimson Courage collected more than 12,000 alumni signatures for a legal brief in support of the school in the litigation over the research funding.

“The Harvard we all know and love can persevere in the face of federal intrusion the likes of which we have never seen in the history of the United States,” the group said in the letter. “We alumni will stand strong — alongside you — against any attempt to extort or deny our Constitutional rights or our integrity. We have your back and we trust that you have our backs as well.”

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