Washington — President Donald Trump is demanding $1 billion from Harvard University to end his alimony The long confrontation With the Ivy League campus, doubling the amount previously sought as both sides appear to be moving away from reaching an agreement.
The president raised the stakes on social media Monday night, saying Harvard was “behaving very poorly.” He said the university would have to pay the government directly as part of any deal — something Harvard opposed — and that his administration didn’t want “anything else to do” with Harvard in the future.
Trump’s comments on Truth Social came in response to a New York Times report saying the president dropped his request for a financial payment, lowering the deal’s ceiling. Trump denied retracting.
Harvard officials did not immediately comment.
Trump’s anger appears to leave both sides firmly entrenched in a conflict that Trump previously said was nearing its end.
Last June, Trump said that an agreement would be just days away, and that Harvard had acted “very appropriately” during the negotiations. He said later The agreement has been completed This would require Harvard to allocate $500 million to create a “chain of business schools” instead of paying the government.
It appears that this deal has completely collapsed. In his social media post, Trump said the trade school proposal had been rejected because it was “complicated” and “completely inappropriate.”
Harvard has long been Trump’s main target in his administration’s campaign to subjugate the nation’s most prestigious universities. His officials cut billions of dollars in federal funding for research at Harvard and tried to stop him Registration of foreign students After the campus rejected a series of government demands last April.
The White House said it is punishing Harvard University for tolerating anti-Jewish bias on campus.
In two lawsuits, Harvard said it was unfairly penalized for refusing to adopt the administration’s views. A federal judge agreed in December, Reverse funding cuts He called the anti-Semitism argument a “smokescreen.”
Trump’s latest escalation comes as other parts of his higher education campaign falter.
Last fall, the White House invited nine universities to join a “compact” that offered priority funding in exchange for embracing Trump’s agenda. None of the schools accepted. In January, management She left her legal defense From a Department of Education document threatening to cut school funding over diversity, equity and inclusion policies.
When he took office for his second term, Trump made it a priority to go after elite universities that he said were overrun by liberal thinking and anti-Jewish bias. Its officials froze huge amounts of research funding, which colleges had come to rely on for scientific and medical research.
Several universities have reached agreements with the White House to restore funding. Some deals included direct payments to the government, including $200 million from Columbia University. Brown University has agreed to pay $50 million to state workforce development groups.
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