What Trump’s legal and political clash with Harvard means for higher education

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• Geoff Bennett:

  A federal judge has blocked the Trump administration's move to prevent Harvard University from enrolling international students. The judge's decision came just hours after Harvard filed a lawsuit in response.

• Amna Nawaz:

  That initial move by the administration put about 6,800 students, or more than a quarter of the student body, at immediate risk of losing their international status. Harvard has been at the center of the administration's battle over higher education, which includes multiple investigations, canceling or freezing billions of dollars in grants and threatening the school's tax-exempt status.

  For more on what this legal and political clash can mean for higher learning, I'm joined by Laura Meckler of The Washington Post. It's all part of our Rethinking College series, which is focusing on the battles over higher education.

  Laura, welcome back to the "News Hour." Thanks for joining us.

• Laura Meckler, The Washington Post:

  Thanks for having me again.

• Amna Nawaz:

  So, for the moment, as we said, the administration is blocked from revoking Harvard's ability to enroll foreign students. But should it go into place, how big a threat is this to Harvard, both reputationally, but also economically?

• Laura Meckler:

  Well, it has several elements.

  First of all, if you're talking about theoretically such a large number of thousands of students not able to join them this fall, the question is, can you just replace those students so quickly? Harvard clearly has a lot of people who want to go there, but it's not entirely clear that you could completely replace those students if it came to that.

  So there's some implications when it comes to things like tuition and that sort of thing. But, really, I think there's a bigger issue about sort of how Harvard sees itself.

  It sees itself as a place that's really attracting the best and the brightest throughout the world and that the people who are there are learning from each other, learning from people who come from different places, from different cultures, and that, if those students weren't there, that would take away something from what — how the university is and what sort of a place it is to be and to study.

• Amna Nawaz:

  We know that international students often pay higher tuition in some places. Is that true at Harvard? I mean, does it make a difference for their bottom line?

• Laura Meckler:

  You know, in a lot of schools, it makes a big difference. There are many schools that will charge international students full freight, and whereas U.S. students will often get financial aid.

  As it happens, at Harvard, they actually do offer financial aid to international students as well. So it isn't the same sort of disproportionate hit that you would have at another university. But it doesn't mean they're not paying anything. That is still, of course, revenue to the school.

  But I think that this is less about the revenue and the tuition for the school. This is a big operation there with a lot of students and a large endowment and more about who's going to decide what sort of policies they can have, who's going to — essentially, can the Trump administration impose its philosophical and political agenda onto the university?

  And, obviously, Harvard has a lot at stake in trying to resist that.

• Amna Nawaz:

  Well, for its part, the White House has issued a statement saying, in part: "If only Harvard cared this much about ending the scourge of anti-American, antisemitic, pro-terrorist agitators on their campus, they wouldn't be in this situation to begin with."

  And we heard President Trump also weigh in on this today. This is what he said.

  Donald Trump, President of the United States: Billions of dollars has been paid to Harvard. How ridiculous is that? Billions. And they have $52 billion as an endowment. They have $52 billion. And this country is paying billions and billions of dollars and then gives student loans and they have to pay back the loans. So Harvard's going to have to change its ways.

• Amna Nawaz:

  Laura, why has Harvard in particular come into the president's sights in this way?

• Laura Meckler:

  Well, it depends who you ask. Some would say that it's because they have a real problem with antisemitism on campus. And many people would say that. Even Harvard has said that there are things that they need to do to better address issues of antisemitism on campus.

  And so the administration certainly would say that they're going to — they're there to try to fix the problem. They would also point to DEI programming around diversity, equity, and inclusion campus and say they believe that much of that is illegal.

  I think there's also something else here going on, though. Number one is that Harvard is almost synonymous with elite education in this country. So there is a certain symbolic heft that comes with getting into a fight with Harvard. It's also — this hasn't been — this has been escalating for several weeks now.

  This has been — it started out with threatening to pull money, with pulling money, with threatening to revoke their tax-exempt status. So there's been a variety of pieces that have built on itself. And then you have had Harvard, of course, filing suit to try to stop some of the earlier efforts by the Trump administration.

  So, really, this has been a slow boil or maybe a fast boil that has developed over — just in the short time since Donald Trump returned to office.

• Amna Nawaz:

  Meanwhile, in another statement, Harvard's president, Alan Garber, condemned the move, called it unlawful and unwarranted. He also said in part it — quote — "It serves as a warning to countless other colleges and universities throughout the country."

  Laura, is there a broader impact here beyond just Harvard?

• Laura Meckler:

  Absolutely.

  I mean, what this is really is a war, not just on Harvard, but on higher education more broadly. And it comes amid like a real — what used to be thought of sort of as a rift and now is a real rupture between the relationship between the Republican Party and conservatives and higher education, specifically elite higher education.

  Whereas colleges and universities were once thought of, sure, of universally as a crown jewel of this country, something we could all be proud of, something that the government was happy to invest that money into federal grants, because they were producing groundbreaking research in medicine, engineering, and other fields, and now it's viewed much differently. And that has implications for everyone.

  Today, it's viewed as a place where conservative thought is not welcomed, where they are elite and looking down their nose at everybody else in the country and that the Republican Party, especially Donald Trump, has tapped into that. And that's really what we're seeing play out.

  This is a fight with Harvard right now, but it is really a much bigger question about, how does this country view higher education? And will the Republican Party continue to its historic support for research and educational opportunity that these colleges and universities provide?

• Amna Nawaz:

  That is Laura Meckler of The Washington Post joining us tonight.

  Laura, thank you so much. Appreciate your time.

• Laura Meckler:

  Thanks for having me.