Harvard University is preparing for steep budget cuts and program suspensions as the federal government continues to target the Ivy League school.
The Trump administration has now frozen close to $3 billion in federal funding to Harvard, with the latest round of cuts coming alongside stop work orders on some federally funded projects.
In a message to the campus community Wednesday afternoon, President Alan Garber revealed a wave of federal grant terminations that have hit Harvard since last week — halting “lifesaving research and, in some cases, losing years of important work.”
“Although these actions were specifically targeted at Harvard, they are part of a broader campaign to revoke scientific research funding,” Garber wrote, pointing to sweeping funding cuts at the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation.
To blunt the impact on campus, Garber announced the university will initially allocate $250 million in central funding to bolster school-based resources and sustain research disrupted by cancellations. Garber also plans to take a voluntary 25% pay cut, a spokesperson told The Crimson.
Still, Garber acknowledged “difficult decisions and sacrifices ahead,” but said “together, we will chart a path forward to sustain and advance Harvard’s vital research mission.”
Harvard leaders warned social science departments they could lose up to 20% of their budgets. In an email obtained by GBH News, interim Social Science Dean David Cutler and Administrative Dean Bev Beatty urged department heads to identify essential priorities and consider what “trade-offs might be possible in each unit.” The deans said they want to clearly understand each department’s “top mission priorities to ensure they aren’t compromised” as the university faces difficult decisions in the months ahead.
One history professor, who asked to remain anonymous out of fear of retaliation, described the current atmosphere and morale on campus as “close to free fall.”
Other professors speculated on Wednesday that the country’s oldest and wealthiest university seems to be planning how it could operate long-term without support from the federal government, but they said that would mean a much smaller, weaker Harvard.
“Destruction seems to be very fast,” said a social scientist scholar, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of losing their job. “Figuring out what a new version of stability will look like will take a long time.”
The freeze is already disrupting scientific research in Cambridge. On Tuesday, several Harvard physicists with federally funded projects received stop work orders from the Department of Defense. In a letter to the university, the Office of Naval Research said the secretary of defense had identified grants “not aligned with the Department’s priorities” and ordered their termination. The letter noted that the cancellations would proceed either unilaterally or by mutual agreement, in accordance with grant terms.
The White House escalated its fight with Harvard on Tuesday afternoon, announcing an additional $450 million in grant cuts — just one day after Harvard publicly challenged the administration’s claims that the university fosters liberal bias and antisemitism.
A federal antisemitism task force announced Tuesday that Harvard will also lose funding from eight different federal agencies, on top of the $2.2 billion already frozen. In a letter, the task force described Harvard as a “breeding ground for virtue signaling and discrimination” and accused its leaders of prioritizing “appeasement over accountability.”
“There is a dark problem on Harvard’s campus,” the letter claimed. “Institutional leaders have forfeited the school’s claim to taxpayer support.”
President Trump is also pushing the IRS to revoke Harvard’s tax-exempt status.
Harvard announced last month it is suing the federal government, calling the massive funding freeze unlawful and retaliatory. Garber has repeatedly denied the administration’s allegations and insisted the university is in full compliance with federal law, while acknowledging to alumni that there’s a “kernel of truth” to the idea Harvard has a viewpoint diversity problem.
In his message to the Harvard community Wednesday, Garber reiterated that the school will continue to fight the “unlawful freeze and termination of our federal grants.”
The administration’s actions come as Republicans in Washington seek to hike the endowment tax on schools like Harvard, MIT, Wellesley, Smith and other wealthy colleges — raising the current 1.4% tax on investment income to as high as 21%.
The Association of Independent Colleges and Universities of Massachusetts called the plan “punitive.” Association President and CEO Rob McCaron said the tax would eat up funds schools could otherwise spend on beneficial programs.
“Make no mistake, the proposed tax will only hurt students and families and will undermine institutions’ efforts to control costs, provide life-changing financial aid, drive research and innovation, and support public and community service,” McCaron said. “The negative impacts of this tax will be felt across the Massachusetts and New England economy.”
On Wednesday, the American Council on Education and dozens of other higher education organizations released a statement urging the federal government to reverse course.
“Higher education can and must improve to earn and maintain the public’s trust,” the groups wrote. “But political attacks against higher education only divide and weaken us all.”
