Obama Defends Harvard After Trump Freezes Billions in Funding

Barack Obama has once again shown where his true loyalties lie not with American taxpayers, Jewish students, or academic integrity, but with the radical institutions that have long abandoned all three.

On Monday, the former president lashed out at the Trump administration for freezing $2.2 billion in multi-year grants and $60 million in federal contracts to Harvard University. Why? Because Harvard refuses to rein in antisemitism and stop censoring conservative voices. Obama called the move “ham-handed,” despite the fact that his own administration excluded colleges like Hillsdale and Grove City from the 2015 College Scorecard simply because they refused federal funding and were thus not subject to government control.

Apparently, it was just fine when his White House imposed ideological conformity. But when the Trump administration takes a stand against taxpayer dollars funding woke indoctrination and the harassment of Jewish students, suddenly it's “authoritarian.”

Let’s be clear: this isn’t about academic freedom. It’s about elite universities believing they can take billions from American taxpayers while ignoring federal civil rights laws and harboring students and faculty who openly reject the Constitution and American values.

Here’s what the Trump administration is asking for by August 2025:

• End race-based hiring and admissions and return to merit-based selection.

• Deny entry to students who support terrorism or oppose the Constitution.

• Conduct a full audit of viewpoint diversity to ensure that conservative voices aren’t being systematically excluded.

Hardly radical. In fact, it’s exactly what should be expected from any institution receiving public funds.

Harvard President Alan Garber responded with predictable elitism, whining that the administration’s demands violated Harvard’s “First Amendment rights” and threatened the university’s “values.” What values are those? In 2023, the Supreme Court already ruled that Harvard’s admissions process discriminated against Asian-American students, calling its race-based policies a clear violation of the Equal Protection Clause.

Even the Department of Education couldn’t ignore the rot anymore. On Monday, it declared:

“The harassment of Jewish students is intolerable. It is time for elite universities to take the problem seriously and commit to meaningful change if they wish to continue receiving taxpayer support.”

Yet Obama, ever the apologist for leftist strongholds, praised Harvard’s defiance. He even claimed the university was “taking concrete steps” to foster an environment of mutual respect. That’s rich coming from the same institution where Jewish students have been openly harassed, conservatives silenced, and DEI bureaucracies run the show.

The reality is this: elite universities like Harvard have become ideological battlegrounds, where diversity of thought is crushed, and federal dollars are funneled into leftist activism. And instead of holding them accountable, Democrats like Obama rush to their defense because these universities serve as the intellectual arm of the progressive movement.

Thankfully, the Trump administration is drawing a line. No more blank checks. No more excuses. If you want the public’s money, you follow the law, protect all students, and respect all viewpoints.

And if Obama has a problem with that, maybe he should explain why he didn’t hold Harvard accountable when he had the chance.

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