Columbia University ceded to President Donald Trump’s demands in exchange for the 400 million dollars in federal funding that his administration threatened to withhold—including rules that further restrict and criminalize protesting on campus, according to a memo from the school to the White House.
Earlier this month, Trump had pulled federal funding and contracts from Columbia over claims that the university didn’t protect Jewish students throughout the pro-Palestinian, anti-war demonstrations on campus last year. The administration presented Columbia with rules to follow if they wanted the money, and the university agreed to nearly all of them.
As the Wall Street Journal first reported, Columbia agreed to ban masks during protests on campus, hire 36 new campus police officers and empower them to “remove individuals from campus and/or arrest them when appropriate,” appoint a senior vice provost with broad authority to oversee the department of Middle East, South Asian, and African Studies as well as the Center for Palestine Studies, among other things.
“Columbia University has, throughout its storied history, faced many challenges and obstacles. We have worked hard to address the legitimate concerns raised both from within and without our Columbia community, including by our regulators, with respect to the discrimination, harassment, and antisemitic acts our Jewish community has faced in the wake of October 7, 2023,” the school wrote in the unsigned letter, adding that the new rules would “make our campus safer, more welcoming, and respectful of the rights of all.”
“At all times,” Katrina Armstrong, Columbia’s interim president, wrote in a statement, “we are guided by our values, putting academic freedom, free expression, open inquiry, and respect for all at the fore of every decision we make.”
Many in the Columbia community, including those who have faced direct consequences from the university’s crackdown on pro-Palestinian speech, were outraged at the agreement between Trump and Armstrong.
“Columbia has completely folded to every demand, showing us all what we already knew: admin is just doing everything it already wanted to do,” Grant Miner, one of the students who says he was expelled for his involvement with pro-Palestine organizing on campus, wrote on X.
“By giving in to the Trump administration’s demands, Columbia sets a dangerous precedent that normalizes government intrusion on academic freedom and student expression,” the New York Civil Liberties Union Executive Director Donna Lieberman said in a statement. “Instead of standing up for academic freedom, its core mission, and its faculty and students, Columbia has capitulated to the bullies. The law was on Columbia’s side, but the university hasn’t given the slightest public hint of resistance.”