Trump Administration Issues Demands to Columbia University to Restore Federal Funding
Washington (Quds News Network)- The Trump administration has issued a set of demands to Columbia University for “continued financial relationship” with the US government, according to a letter sent to the university’s interim president, Katrina Armstrong.
According to Thursday’s letter, the Trump administration has demanded the university adopt the controversial International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, which academics and members of the Jewish community criticised as conflating criticism of Israel with antisemitism.
The university was also told to begin the process of placing Columbia’s world-renowned Middle Eastern, South Asian and African Studies department under academic receivership. This process requires an outside chair, who could be appointed by the government, to run the department for five years.
Among the demands listed by the White House were a mask ban on campus, giving “full law enforcement authority” to campus security by allowing them to “arrest and remove agitators”, and reforming the admissions process for its undergraduate and postgraduate programmes.
The Columbia University was also ordered to enforce its existing disciplinary policies, abolish its University Judicial Board, which includes student and staff representatives, and centralise its powers under the university president.
NEW letter to Columbia from Trump admin lists demands for “continued financial relationship” with the US government”:
—Suspend or expel students for Hamilton Hall protest
—“Time, place, and manner rules”
—Mask ban
—Address “anti-Zionist” discrimination
—Reform admissions
—MORE pic.twitter.com/djCc31Vq2Q— Prem Thakker (@prem_thakker) March 14, 2025
The White House told Columbia University to meet these demands by 20 March so it can enter “formal negotiations” with the federal government or risk losing all federal funding.
“We expect your immediate compliance with these critical next steps, after which we hope to open a conversation about immediate and long-term structural reforms that will return Columbia to its original mission of innovative research and academic excellence,” the letter reads.
Also on Thursday, the University Judicial Board issued expulsions, multi-year suspensions and temporary degree revocations to students involved in the occupation of Hamilton Hall.
The board did not release the names of the students facing expulsion. One of the students expelled was Grant Miner, the president of Columbia’s student workers union and a PhD student at Columbia University.
According to the United Auto Workers union, Miner was expelled a day before contract negotiations with the university were set to begin.
On March 7, the Trump administration announced that it’s pulling $400 million from Columbia University, canceling grants and contracts because of what the government claims as the Ivy League school’s failure to squelch antisemitism on campus.
On Monday, a federal task force notified the Ivy League institution that it would conduct “a comprehensive review” of the university’s federal contracts and grants as part of its ongoing investigations under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act.
Four government agencies including the Department of Justice, Department of Health and Human Services, Department of Education, and the US General Services Administration make up the “Federal Task Force to Combat Antisemitism”.
The task force was set up in February following Trump’s executive order, “Additional Measures to Combat Anti-Semitism”, signed at the end of January. The Task Force announced last week it would visit ten university campuses which have experienced antisemitic incidents since October 2023 after Israel’s war on Gaza. In a joint press statement on Friday, the agencies said the funding cuts were due to “the school’s continued inaction in the face of persistent harassment of Jewish students”.
“Since October 7 [2023], Jewish students have faced relentless violence, intimidation, and anti-Semitic harassment on their campuses – only to be ignored by those who are supposed to protect them,” Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said in the press release.
The statement warned that the cancellations represent the first round of action and additional cancellations are expected to follow. Columbia University currently holds more than $5bn in federal grant commitments. The amount announced is almost eight times more than the amount the federal task force announced it was considering halting on Monday.
The Ivy League university has been accused of allowing antisemitism on its campuses after a series of protests and encampments erupted last year that were sparked by Israel’s war on Gaza. After Columbia students held an encampment, universities across the country followed suit.
Trump’s decision to cut millions of dollars worth of funding to Columbia University came days after federal immigration agents arrested Mahmoud Khalil, a graduate at Columbia, over his pro-Palestine activism.
On Friday, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) also announced the detention of a second Palestinian student, Leqaa Kordia, accusing her of overstaying her F-1 student visa. The ICE took her into custody for deportation.
