Washington (AP) – More than a billion dollars in federal funding for Cornell University and around $ 790 million for the Northwestern University have been frozen while the government is investigating alleged civil rights violations in schools, the White House said.
This is part of a larger pressure to use government funding to bring major university institutions to comply with the president Donald Trump Political agenda. The White House confirmed the financing breaks at the end of Tuesday evening, but did not offer any other details on what they involve or the subsidies to the schools concerned.
The movements intervene as Trump’s republican administration has increasingly started using government funding for subsidies as a tap to try to influence campus policy, which reduces money to schools, especially Columbia University and the University of Pennsylvania. This has left universities across the country that find it difficult to sail Subsidy cut for research institutions.
In a statement, Cornell said that he had received more than 75 stops on Tuesday from the Ministry of Defense linked to research “deeply significant for US national defense, cybersecurity and health”, but that it had otherwise received any information confirming $ 1 billion in frozen grants.
“We are actively looking for information from federal officials to find out more on the basis of these decisions,” said Michael I. Kotlikoff, University President, and other senior school officials.
Northwestern spokesperson Jon Yates said on Tuesday evening that the school had not received any advice from the federal government. Yates said that the school has entirely cooperated in the investigations of the Department of Education and Congress.
“The federal funds that Northwestern receives stimulate innovative and vital research, such as the recent development by northwest researchers of the smallest cardiac stimulator in the world, and research feeding the fight against Alzheimer’s disease,” said Yates. “This type of research is now in Jeopardy.”
Last month, the Department of Education Letters sent At more than 60 universities, including Cornell, based in Ithaca, New York and Northwestern, based in Evanston, Illinois, warning “potential implementing measures if they do not fulfill their obligations” under federal law to “protect Jewish students on campus, including uninterrupted access to campus and educational opportunities”.
The Trump administration has threatened to reduce federal funding for universities allowing alleged anti -Semitism not to be controlled during campus demonstrations last year against the War of Israel with Hamas in Gaza – the accusations that universities have denied.
The funding gels have compromised science and research without advancing the objective of creating campuses without anti -Semitism, said Ted Mitchell, president of American Council on Education.
“It was false last week, it’s bad this week, and it will be bad next week,” he said.
A spokesperson for the Department of Education did not respond to a request for comments.
The officials have already distinguished the Columbia University, by making an example with threats to retain $ 400 million in federal funds.
The administration accused Columbia of not having stopped anti -Semitism during demonstrations against Israel which began at New York University last spring and quickly spread to other campuses, a characterization disputed by the people involved in the demonstrations.
As a prior condition for the restoration of this money – as well as billions of dollars more in future subsidies – the Trump administration required unprecedented changes in university policy.
Columbia’s decision to bow to these requests, partly to Distribute current research projects In its laboratory and its medical center, was criticized by certain teachers and freedom of expression groups as capitulating an intrusion into academic freedom.
The Trump administration has since published similar requests Harvard University As a condition for receiving nearly $ 9 billion in grants and contracts. He also interrupted $ 510 million in federal subsidies and contracts for Brown and dozens of research subsidies at Princeton.
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Mumphrey reported to Phoenix. Haigh reported to Hartford, Conn.
