Earlier this week, former President Barack Obama applauded Harvard University for standing up to the Trump administration. Unlike Columbia University, which has swiftly fallen in line and agreed to implement various policies demanded by President Donald Trump in exchange for the restoration of $400 million in federal grants, Harvard is prepared to fight back.
"We have informed the administration through our legal counsel that we will not accept their proposed agreement," said Harvard President Alan Garber. "The University will not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights."
The Trump administration had demanded changes to university curriculum, the elimination of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) provisions, the prevention of masked protesting, and other changes ostensibly aimed at countering antisemitism on campus. Opponents of these policies, civil libertarians and free speech groups among them, counter that the federal government's threat to withhold funding is a violation of Harvard's First Amendment rights.
"How Harvard governs its academic programs, and who should have a say in that governance, is up to Harvard, not the federal government," writes the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression. "The First Amendment and basic principles of academic freedom require no less."
FIRE also warns that this will likely not be the last time the federal government tries to extort a private institution and that "opposing the government's unconstitutional demands" is the only path forward. Similarly, Obama praised Harvard for setting "an example for other higher-ed institutions."
Harvard has set an example for other higher-ed institutions – rejecting an unlawful and ham-handed attempt to stifle academic freedom, while taking concrete steps to make sure all students at Harvard can benefit from an environment of intellectual inquiry, rigorous debate and… https://t.co/gAu9UUqgjF
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) April 15, 2025
Obama clearly believes the Trump administration's threat to deprive Harvard of billions in federal funding is wrong; he also seems to think that the federal government should not be in the business of harming the climate for free speech and academic freedom on campus. On both these fronts, he is engaged in profound hypocrisy.
As I explained previously, the Obama administration carried out the exact same policy against not just a small number of elite educational institutions, but virtually every college and university in the country. Under Obama, the Education Department's Office for Civil Rights compelled schools that receive federal funding to change their sexual misconduct policies in ways that undermined basic due process protections for accused students and professors; these new policies also harmed free speech and academic freedom, as several professors who spoke out against the policies were subsequently accused of violating them. This was the perverse logic of Obama's approach to Title IX, the federal statute that outlaws sex discrimination in education: His federal bureaucrats created such a morass that campus administrators felt obligated to investigate professors for criticizing the Education Department.
Moreover, the Obama-era policies were stridently opposed by Harvard's law faculty. In October 2014, 28 Harvard law professors signed an open letter condemning the federal government's meddling and encouraging the university to resist tyranny via Title IX.
"The university's sexual harassment policy departs dramatically from these legal principles, jettisoning balance and fairness in the rush to appease certain federal administrative officials," wrote the professors. "We recognize that large amounts of federal funding may ultimately be at stake. But Harvard University is positioned as well as any academic institution in the country to stand up for principle in the face of funding threats."
The signatories included Elizabeth Bartholet, a well-known professor of civil rights and family law, and Charles Ogletree, who has actually been described as a mentor to the Obamas when they were students at Harvard. In separate commentary, Bartholet described the government's position as "madness" and said that Harvard should be ashamed of itself for caving.
"I believe that history will demonstrate the federal government's position to be wrong, that our society will look back on this time as a moment of madness, and that Harvard University will be deeply shamed at the role it played in simply caving to the government's position," she told The Wall Street Journal.
It's a good thing that Harvard has found its spine, now that the president is Trump instead of Obama. But it's risible for Obama to complain at present about an "unlawful and ham-handed attempt to stifle academic freedom." He should look in the mirror.
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