What a freeze on federal funding means for Harvard University

President Trump is threatening to go after Harvard University's tax status, one day after he froze more than $2 billion in grants to the university. This comes after Harvard refused to comply with a list of government demands, from cutting diversity, equity and inclusion programs to eliminating student groups.

Harvard psychology professor and president of Harvard's Council on Academic Freedom Steven Pinker said Trump's demands on the university go "way too far to surrendering."

"We're just in uncharted territory," Pinker said. "There has never been a set of government demands on a private university of this magnitude with an aggressive presidential administration that wants to make points, that is not committed to a good faith negotiation, just to assert its own control and its insistence on pushing back against what it perceives to be a great left-wing conspiracy. It's just hard to predict what the outcome will be."

How are you feeling today?

“I'm the president of the Council on Academic Freedom at Harvard, which is a voluntary volunteer organization, doesn't represent the entire faculty. The sentiment among our members, about 200 faculty, is overwhelmingly supportive of the [university] president's decision, not unanimous, but the sentiment is that this, this set of demands goes way too far to surrendering."

What is the potential impact of Trump's move to freeze additional funding and repeal tax status?

"It's potentially catastrophic and indeed existential for many of the units of the university. I don't know the answer. One possibility is to repurpose endowment funds, though technically 80% of the endowment is earmarked for specific purposes like athletic scholarships, endowed chairs. Last week, our former president, Larry Summers, said in a New York Times op-ed that a president can find ways around those restrictions. So dipping into its $50 billion endowment is one option, and I suspect, I don't know, that fighting it in the courts is another.

"It could affect research in the medical school, school of public health research on Alzheimer's, on infectious diseases, on pandemics, on Parkinson's, on neurological damage and strokes, on pulmonary diseases, you name it. It's just about every aspect of human knowledge would be set back if assuming that these threats apply not just to Harvard but to the other major research universities.”

Kalyani Saxena produced and edited this interview for broadcast with Michael Scotto. Raphelson also adapted it for the web with Grace Griffin.