Jessica Blake and Katherine Knott
Inside Higher Ed
Excerpt: President Donald Trump’s plans to reduce the federal workforce; crack down on diversity, equity and inclusion programs; and cut spending have faced swift pushback from higher education associations, students, legal advocacy organizations and colleges, and they’ve turned to the courts to seek relief.
So far, federal judges have temporarily prevented Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency team from accessing student financial aid data and blocked the National Institutes of Health from capping payments for costs indirectly related to research. Elsewhere, legal challenges blocked a freeze on federal grants and loans and stopped the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau from laying off employees.
Researchers Impacted by Federal Grant Terminations
Inside Higher Ed
Excerpt: Billions of dollars in federal scientific research grants have been rescinded or suspended since the start of the Trump administration.
Below, 16 researchers across nine different research areas who have had their federal grants terminated since the start of the Trump administration share just a few of the thousands of stories behind these cuts.
by Ed Yingling '70
Washington insiders believe it is very likely that a significant increase in the tax rate on university endowment income will be enacted this year. They cite the need for additional tax revenue to offset the Trump tax cut agenda and the antipathy of many Republicans to what has been happening on campuses for the last two years. They also focus on the fact that then-Senator JD Vance introduced a bill in the last Congress imposing a 35 percent tax on endowment income.
Michael I. Kotlikoff
New York Times
Excerpt: Cornell University recently hosted an event that any reputable P.R. firm would surely have advised against. On a calm campus, in a semester unroiled by protest, we chose to risk stirring the waters by organizing a panel discussion that brought together Israeli and Palestinian voices with an in-person audience open to all.
The week before, I extended a personal invitation to our student community, explaining that open inquiry “is the antidote to corrosive narratives” and is what enables us “to see and respect other views, work together across differences and conceive of solutions to intractable problems.”