Trump administration still hopeful about a Harvard deal after Columbia reaches settlement

By Betsy Klein, CNN

(CNN) — The Trump administration is still optimistic about the possibility of reaching a deal with Harvard University after it announced a $200 million settlement with Columbia University on Wednesday.

“While there’s a lawsuit pending with Harvard, and I’m sure that lawsuit will play out, I do hope that Harvard will continue to come to the table with negotiations. Those talks are continuing, and we’d like to have a resolution there, outside of the courts,” Education Secretary Linda McMahon said in a phone interview with CNN on Thursday.

Harvard faced off with the Trump administration in court on Monday, arguing that the administration’s $2 billion freeze in federal funding for research was in violation of the school’s First Amendment rights. The case has become a flashpoint in a major clash over academic freedom, campus oversight and federal funding. The judge has not made a final ruling in the case, but Harvard has asked for a decision to be made no later than September 3, when it says some of the funding cuts could become more permanent.

A small circle of Trump administration officials and officials from Harvard have been engaged in talks toward a potential deal for months, but a source familiar with the discussions told CNN earlier this week those conversations have largely stalled.

On Thursday, McMahon pointed to some recent actions taken by Harvard as positive steps, including the departure of the heads of the Middle Eastern Studies center. She described the current state of talks with the university as “ongoing” but declined to provide additional details. She also declined to provide information about the scale of any settlement the administration hopes to achieve with Harvard, which has a larger endowment than Columbia.

In a statement shortly after the Columbia deal was announced, McMahon described the move as a “seismic shift” for higher education that could serve as a “roadmap” for other schools. She said that “other universities are already looking at” the template provided by the Columbia agreement.

“Colleges and universities are understanding at this particular point that they have some issues they need to address, and I think that they are coming to the table to do that,” she said.

McMahon added that there are “other investigations that are going on” and that the Trump administration has sent letters to some other universities “letting them know that we are investigating … but I would prefer that we will not go public with those right now.”

President Donald Trump indicated a deal with Harvard was within reach last month, saying in a social media post that the school had “acted extremely appropriately” and that a deal could be announced “over the next week or so.” But those talks appeared to subsequently derail.

The administration escalated its battle with the university days later, announcing that an investigation found the school in “violent violation” of the Civil Rights Act. The administration warned in a letter in late June that a failure to immediately institute change “will result in the loss of all federal financial resources and continue to affect Harvard’s relationship with the federal government.”

And days after that, the Department of Homeland Security sent the school administrative subpoenas regarding its Student Visitor and Exchange Program certification, seeking all relevant records, communications and other documents about Harvard’s enforcement of immigration laws.

On Wednesday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio escalated things further – announcing the administration was opening an investigation into Harvard’s “continued eligibility as a sponsor for the Exchange Visitor Program.”

Harvard has sent some signals it is willing to work with the Trump administration, including earlier this month when The Harvard Crimson reported that websites for Harvard College centers serving minority and LGBTQ students and women disappeared. The White House welcomed that development, viewing it as a goodwill gesture that one official described as “good news.”

This story has been updated with additional information.

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