(Reuters) -US President Donald Trump threatens to reduce another billion dollars of funding for Harvard University, this time by targeting health research, the Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday, while the row of the administration with elite schools had intensified.
The Trump administration has retained the funding of the government of Harvard, Columbia and other universities in response to their tolerance to pro-Palestinian demonstrations in what the administration has qualified the failure to control anti-Semitism on the campus.
Harvard postponed last week, rejecting the requests for control of his student body, his teachers and his study program, saying that this would give in government control to the government.
In the hours following Harvard's position, the administration announced that it was frozen $ 2.3 billion in school and the next day threatened to strip Harvard of its tax exemption status.
The journal, citing people familiar with the issue, reported that the plans to draw an additional $ 1 billion of research funds occurred after the administration officials thought that a long list of requests they sent on April 11 were a confidential starting point for negotiations, and the officials were surprised when Harvard published the letter to the public.
Trump officials had planned to treat Harvard more indulgent than Columbia but now wanted to increase the pressure on Harvard, the newspaper reported.
The White House and Harvard did not immediately respond to a request for comments from Reuters on Sunday.
Since its inauguration of January, Trump has repressed American universities, saying that they have poorly managed the pro-Palestinian demonstrations from last year and allowed anti-Semitism to intensify on the campus. The demonstrators, including certain Jewish groups, say that their criticism of the actions of Israel in Gaza is wrongly confused with anti -Semitism.
The administration had previously sent a list of requests on April 3 to Harvard so that Ivy League University continues to receive federal funding. These included a mask ban, the abolition of diversity, equity and inclusion programs, and more cooperation with the police.
The letter of April 11, signed by managers of the Department of Education, the Department of Health and Social Services and the General Services Administration, has expanded this list. He told Harvard to stop recognizing certain pro-Palestinian groups and asked him to report to the federal authorities of foreign students violating university policies, among other requests.
(Report by Daniel Trotta; edition by Himani Sarkar)
