Against hope, Trump is still expanding his anti-HE toolbox

Might things be looking up for America’s vast network of colleges and universities?

With a declining economy in the United States, voter concerns over affordability and inflation, US President Donald Trump’s disastrous war of choice against Iran, falling poll numbers, plus intensifying efforts to degrade and manipulate the approaching mid-term elections, could Trump and his administration’s political attention be shifting away from attacking higher education?

America’s higher education community has found solace in a good track record thus far in battling Trump and his administration in the courts. And with no major universities signing onto the administration’s proposed ‘Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education’, which demands an array of concessions in return for favoured status in federal funding, there appears a growing resistance to unprecedented federal attempts to undermine the autonomy of American colleges and universities.

Fresh from a successful lobbying effort in Congress that avoided Trump’s plans to drastically cut science funding for fiscal year 2026, there is a sense of optimism voiced by some higher education leaders and in the media that perhaps the worst is over.

Hope springs eternal for greater room to navigate Trump’s current and future attacks on colleges and universities. Yet there are worrisome indicators that Trump’s agenda for higher education and science will not ebb.

Limits of lawsuits

The toolbox for eroding science and for pursuing further interventions in the affairs of universities is expanding, despite many legal wins by colleges and universities, their various higher education and science associations, as well as civil rights groups. In many cases, attorneys general in largely Democratic-majority states have led or joined many of these lawsuits.

It is important to note the limits of relying on the courts to protect universities. Legal remedies to Trump overreach are civil cases. They have not proven decisive in thwarting the aggression of the federal government. As noted by legal scholar Duncan Hosie, the “sheer number of brazenly unconstitutional actions by the Trump administration … has left the world dizzy”.

It is overwhelming for a legal system “built on the assumption that those in power have internalised its norms [and] can withstand a president who hasn’t”. When courts do rule with injunctions or outright rejections of the administration’s numerous lawsuits, there are no significant penalties.

As Hosie notes: “To prevail he has only to continue the contest”, via appeals and new versions of old lawsuits. This generates uncertainty, “extending the illusion of legality”, imposing costs on opponents, all part of a strategy of coercion. Universities represent just one front in this broader assault.

In the first 12 months of the new Trump administration, the federal government mounted an estimated 137 or more investigations of colleges and universities – including 50 for using “racial preferences and stereotypes” via diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programmes and initiatives, 60 for antisemitism and the rest for transgender policies, and probes into universities taking undisclosed foreign contracts and gifts.

Can a depleted Department of Justice (DOJ) keep up this level of effort while negotiating with dozens of universities and fighting lawsuits? The answer is probably yes. Four months into 2026, Trump officials are marshalling the considerable powers of the federal government in pursuit of the administration’s higher education agenda. One might speculate that Trump and his administration see the approaching mid-terms as a deadline to get as much done as possible, in the realm of higher education as well as other policy areas.

Even with robust efforts to interfere with the election now buttressed by a Supreme Court ruling allowing further gerrymandering of congressional districts, there remains the likely prospect of at least the House majority going to the Democrats. That would provide some roadblocks to Trump’s agenda and claims of unfettered executive power and possibly new impeachment hearings. There is also now a glimmer of hope that Democrats could take a majority in the Senate.

However, the reality is that Trump is exerting his power through executive orders often on convoluted claims of an emergency and not through legislation, even with Republican majorities in Congress. America is already in a constitutional crisis abetted by a largely compliant and extremely conservative Supreme Court. That approach, and the legal wrestling, cost and time it takes to challenge Trump’s edicts will likely remain part of the American story during the entirety of his presidency.

So, what might a dystopian scenario entail – keeping in mind that it may only partially come to pass? Some version of the following seems likely.

Demands for data

One strategy is ever-increasing demands for data on admissions, hiring and other forms of personal information from colleges and universities as a tactic for further investigations and pursuing fines and capitulation.

Trump officials can use this data to go on fishing expeditions for possible civil rights infractions as they choose to define them. They may also falsely interpret the data to fit their needs for additional legal action and the withholding of federal funds.

As part of this agenda, in the initial months of 2026 Trump’s DOJ has filed a new lawsuit against Harvard University demanding data related to its admissions policies – with the apparent goal of uncovering evidence of discrimination.

Trump officials have also initiated legal action against the University of Pennsylvania to compel the release of names, contact information and home addresses of Jewish students, faculty and staff, along with members of Jewish campus organisations. The university has resisted, calling the subpoena “extraordinary and unconstitutional”.

In addition, the DOJ has lawsuits pending demanding detailed admissions data over the past seven years from universities in 17 states, including information on race, Grade Point Average and test scores. In early April a federal judge ruled that the Trump administration is legally entitled to this data but delayed the deadline for universities to submit the data.

There remains the focus on disingenuous charges of systematic antisemitism as a vehicle to compromise the autonomy of colleges and universities. In February 2026, Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth announced his department will discontinue its longstanding academic ties with Harvard, including fellowships and graduate-level professional military education. Hegseth characterised Harvard as a centre for “hate-America activism” and “woke ideology”, stating it does not align with the military’s focus on lethality.

On March 20, US Attorney General Pam Bondi – before she was fired by Trump – filed a complaint in Boston’s federal court, charging that Harvard remains deliberately indifferent to hostility on its campus and has intentionally refused to enforce its campus rules when victims are Jews or Israelis.

That same month, the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights issued letters to the 60 universities already under formal investigation. It warned them of potential enforcement actions if they do not fulfil their obligations under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act to protect Jewish students on campus, including uninterrupted access to campus facilities and educational opportunities.

Among the messages being sent to higher education institutions: whatever deals are made with universities, like Brown or Columbia, they are ephemeral. The rules and objectives are subject to change. Thus, a political milieu exists that should give pause to any university thinking of making a deal with the Trump administration which is, to say the least, an unreliable and vindictive opponent.

Science funding

Just as consequential are evolving plans to thwart funding for academic research. By April 2026, agencies like the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and National Science Foundation (NSF) had issued only a fraction of typical research grants. Russell Vought, director of the US Office of Management and Budget, continued to claim that while Congress has the power to legislate a budget for the federal government, the executive branch has the authority to spend as it sees fit.

It is one thing for universities, their researchers and associations like the Association of American Universities to sue the federal government for existing grants with contractual obligations, another to pursue legal recourse for grants never made.

In early April, Vought presented Trump’s fiscal year 2027 budget with a replay of the proposed huge cuts in science. Federal agencies related to scientific research, health and the environment would face US$73 billion or more in cuts. NSF funding would be reduced by 54%, including substantial cuts to programmes like AI, quantum computing and advanced manufacturing that are supposedly a priority for the administration.

At the same time, and amid the debacle of a war of choice with Iran, the White House wants to increase defence spending to US$1.5 trillion. That would be a 44% increase over the previous year’s budget. The proposed cuts to science will likely meet stiff opposition in Congress, which, under normal circumstances, would pass its own budget in late September to be sent to the president for his signature – before the mid-terms.

But it is a volatile moment: a weakening world economy, a possible US recession, an unpredictable Trump and a GOP (Republican Party) still in control of Congress all make this an abnormal time.

A dystopian projection of what is to come involves increased political interference in science funding as well as regulatory measures to attack specific universities and states – including blue states like California. For example, the Office of Management and Budget may simply not allocate the full funding approved by Congress, beyond its current slow-walking the distribution to federal agencies like the NSF and NIH.

But even if full funding is given to federal agencies, Trump’s August 2025 executive order grants his political appointees the power to vet and approve all grants including existing or future grants not deemed to align with the “national interest” or “agency priorities”.

These appointees have the power to stop funds for projects deemed to promote “anti-American values”, “gender diversity”, “racial equity initiatives” or “illegal immigration”. Trump’s executive order also gives preference to institutions with lower indirect cost rates and those that focus on “rigorous” research rather than reputation.

As a practical matter, vetting for political correctness some 60,000 annual grant applications to the NIH, the total in 2024, poses a formidable hurdle. As part of its purge of federal science agencies, in January 2026 the NIH director had purposefully failed to re-appoint or appoint new members to its 13 advisory councils that are charged with reviewing grant applications.

In addition, President Trump recently notified all 22 members of the National Science Board that they were being dismissed, effective immediately, and terminated over 100 advisory committees to federal science agencies.

Trump’s order allows his political appointees, including the directors of the NIH, NSF, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and other agencies, and their designees to develop a vetting process to disqualify grant proposals. The number of designees that each agency will employ is not yet clear. One likely and rudimentary practice will be to continue using keyword searches and AI to reject grants. This new reality causes researchers to self-censor proposals to improve their chances for approval.

Research areas such as climate change, mRNA vaccines, human foetal tissue and health disparities among racial groups will simply not be funded. It seems probable that the peer review process that has been the hallmark of American science will be severely compromised.

What is to stop Trump officials from targeting specific universities and states to radically reduce the approval of new grants to, for example, Harvard or to the University of California?

The allocation of research grants may be used to force capitulation to administration demands for intervention in the affairs of colleges and universities. It could also be part of the larger plan to damage the institutions and finances of Democratic-leaning states that include recently announced investigations and charges of fraud in state Medicaid spending.

Accreditation: The final frontier

The final part of Trump’s expanding toolbox is planned reforms to college and university accreditation that may align with a reboot of the campus compact effort. Accreditation reform to exert more influence over higher education was one of the policy goals outlined in Project 2025.

Again, accreditation by non-profit associations officially recognised by the Department of Education makes colleges and universities eligible for over US$120 billion in Title IV federal student financial aid, including Pell Grants, Federal Direct Loans, Federal Work-Study and Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grants.

Trump declared in May 2025 that accreditation reform was his “secret weapon” for overhauling American higher education.

In preparation for reshaping accreditation, in April 2025 Trump signed an executive order entitled “Reforming Accreditation to Strengthen Higher Education”. It directed the US Department of Education to overhaul college accreditation by eliminating DEI standards and promoting “merit-based” criteria largely focused on employment outcomes.

Trump’s order also directed Education Secretary Linda McMahon to ensure “institutions support and appropriately prioritise intellectual diversity amongst faculty in order to advance academic freedom, intellectual inquiry and student learning”.

For reasons not entirely clear, the accreditation agenda has sat largely on the backburner of the administration. But that has changed. In January 2026, the Department of Education (DoE) set up a committee to develop new rules that could integrate Trump’s priorities outlined in the compact into rules that existing or new accrediting agencies must follow.

New planned rules for accrediting bodies prioritise metrics intended to demonstrate whether programmes prepare students for specific jobs and improve career outcomes, and on cutting or modifying programmes that do not lead to “high-value employment”. That could mean, for example, that degrees in the arts or in fields related to teaching or social welfare and that generally have low salaries could be vulnerable.

“Rather than focusing on whether member institutions offer high-quality programmes that benefit students and the workforce, the current accreditation regime has become a protectionist system that shields existing players,” stated Education Under Secretary Nicholas Kent in the first month of 2026. It “fuels rising costs, drives credential inflation, adds administrative bloat . . . and promotes ideologically driven initiatives”.

Kent is the administration’s senior-most higher education official. By March 2026, Kent cited the Supreme Court’s 2023 ruling ending affirmative action and Trump’s previous executive order in demanding that two accrediting organisations strip all reference to DEI and requiring they each submit “monitoring reports” to show compliance.

The DoE has offered grants to attract and fast-track new, more Trump-friendly accreditors. The objective is also to cleanse the existing 19 federally recognised institutional accrediting organisations, and 63 programme-specific accreditors, of alleged “woke ideology” and to promote “balance” in college curricula. This includes a stated goal to promote and give credibility to creationism.

Among the 19 federally recognised institutional accreditors, there are the ‘Big Six’ that accredit most major colleges and universities with histories tied to their regional development.

Robert Shireman, who worked on accreditation issues in the Obama administration, sees Christian nationalism as a component of the drive to reshape accreditation: “Christian nationalists don’t want their own, separate, accrediting agency; they want to force the rest of higher education to accept their radical beliefs.”

There are barriers to the administration’s accreditation agenda. This includes existing legislation that requires an accreditor to operate for at least two years before being considered for federal recognition.

Like the legal defence mounted by many colleges and universities, existing accreditors could claim that the Trump administration is violating the First Amendment rights and established norms of the federal government regarding not imposing ideological standards on academic organisations.

America’s accrediting process originated with self-organised associations of colleges and universities formed to uphold academic standards and practices, dating back to the late 1800s. But indicators are that the DoE and other Trump officials will seek a path to invoke executive authority, including his April 2025 order, or find other means to quickly recognise new accreditors. To aid the administration’s effort, Republican lawmakers have stated their interest in changing federal laws if need be.

Like the multiple avenues for cutting federally funded academic research, the accreditation reform effort may evolve into a major weapon against specific universities and states not aligned with Trump’s agenda and worldview.

Using California as an example: the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC), the regional accrediting body for many western states, may be required to comply with compact-like requirements or be decertified. New WASC rules, or a new Trump administration-approved accreditor, could then offer a pathway for declaring non-compliance at, say, UCLA and UC Berkeley.

Brain drain

Trump’s ‘America First’ agenda also includes aggressively dismantling the transnational agreements and scientific partnerships that underpin global academic cooperation. The administration has withdrawn from the Paris Accords, terminated US membership in the World Health Organization and UNESCO, weakened NATO commitments, dissolved USAID and its portfolio of science-focused international collaborations, curtailed the Fulbright Program and shut down the state department office responsible for maintaining scientific cooperative agreements.

Erratic and punitive tariffs alongside imperialistic foreign policy postures towards Canada, Greenland, Panama, Ukraine and Iran have further alienated traditional allies. Trump’s open hostility was on display at the 2026 Davos World Economic Forum and in a cavalcade of social media and public speeches, too many to count. One result is a growing erosion of confidence and trust in the United States as a stable partner for scientific and academic collaboration.

The Trump administration’s combined domestic and international actions are producing a profound reshaping of global academic talent flows and scientific leadership. The administration has raised H-1B visa application fees from US$2,000-US$5,000 to US$100,000, revoked approximately 8,000 student visas in 2025 and implemented restrictive immigration policies that have driven a 17% decline in new international student enrolment.

The H-1B fee increase is being appealed. But the message from Trump – including his attempts to hinder the path to jobs and citizenship – is that America no longer welcomes foreign talent. The hostile political atmosphere towards universities and science compounds this, translating into a growing brain-drain problem. Student applications for visas from India are down some 57%.

As early as March 2025, and before the full brunt of Trump’s policies was felt, a poll of scientists, both native and foreign born, reported that some 75% are considering leaving the US, particularly early career researchers, including graduate students and postdocs. Applicants from Europe and China for science jobs have plummeted; the international science community is increasingly looking to avoid academic conferences and other forms of engagement with a Trump-led America.

It is not yet clear how significant the brain drain will be. But the chaos and geopolitical disruption caused by Trump’s war against Iran and suppressive domestic policies are sending a cumulative message: America is not only unwelcoming of foreign talent; it is also having an impact on the budgets and viability of many colleges and universities, particularly those in states with declining populations.

In turn, universities across Europe have launched programmes to recruit US scientists, and the European Commission has announced a €900 million (US$1 billion) initiative to make Europe “a magnet for researchers”. Canada, Australia and Japan have launched similar poaching campaigns.

Meanwhile, China – which is increasing its own investment in universities and key fields like AI and quantum computing – is the biggest winner, exploiting the erosion of American soft power to expand its global influence. It is also pursuing efforts to enrol more international students.

America is rapidly ceding its position as the world’s pre-eminent academic superpower, to the long-term detriment of global cooperation on challenges like climate change, pandemic preparedness and AI governance. Under Trump, America is playing an outsized role in what I call an emerging “neo-academic Cold War”.

State budget woes

A substantial and not fully recognised threat to higher education is posed by the passage last year of Trump’s so-called One Big Beautiful Bill. It includes provisions to shift costs to states, including cutting federal subsidies for Medicaid, the federal health insurance programme for low-income families.

It includes new work requirements for Medicaid eligibility. Imposing new fees on enrollees and placing a greater burden on states to fund Medicaid will result in a large increase in uninsured individuals and families. The bill also cuts funding for other social safety net programmes, including federal cost-sharing for food assistance (SNAP), and phases out clean energy credits and funding to combat climate change.

Most provisions, including the cuts in Medicaid that make health insurance unaffordable for many, do not go into effect until early 2027, after the November 2026 mid-term elections. It is a blatant attempt to soften the probable political backlash on Republicans.

Trump officials are also reducing funding for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and making states primarily responsible for coping with natural disasters, including what will be rising costs and damages likely due to climate change, which Trump continues to call a hoax.

The net effect is that states will need to assess if they should increase spending on SNAP and Medicaid, including mitigating the mass closures of rural hospitals. This will further squeeze state discretionary budgets that fund public higher education.

With the possibility of anaemic economic growth nationally and among many states or even a recession, and rising inflation and state costs related to entitlements, a likely scenario involves cuts to the operating and capital budgets of public colleges and universities.

Trump’s legacy

Even if the intensity of the effort fades, or if mid-term elections significantly increase the ability and desire of Congress to play a more substantial role in containing his claimed presidential powers, Trump’s impact on higher education will be long-lasting.

The historic partnership between the federal government and colleges and universities of the post-World War II era has been radically redefined and perhaps permanently changed. Compounding this American story is the proliferation of laws and the stacking of governing boards and university presidencies in red (Republican-dominated) states.

Regardless of a change in leadership in Washington, colleges and universities in these red states will continue to face a political environment that condones often harsh political interventions and a degradation of institutional autonomy unheard of only a few decades ago. There will likely be significantly different trajectories in the breadth of their research productivity, in their levels of academic freedom, and in their prestige and ability to attract talent.

Taken as a whole, one hope is that the infrastructure, culture and norms of America’s universities and science communities can withstand the Trump administration’s blitzkrieg and eventually recover; that the US will resurrect its reputation and policies that attract international talent and seek constructive engagement with universities throughout the world.

But recovery will also require a renewal of the federal government’s partnership with higher education. Whatever form that takes, there will remain the human toll of fear, self-censorship and an erosion in the autonomy of colleges and universities.

Perhaps the greatest casualty of our era, however, is trust in America’s higher education institutions, as well as the perceived public value in science and expertise, in academia and beyond. Trump’s neo-nationalist discourse leads his followers to equate academic research, and facts, as hopelessly politically biased and, hence, part of the fake news machine of the opposition.

Today’s factual relativism adds to the degradation of public institutions, creating obstacles to the identification of real societal and environmental challenges, and the search for solutions with lasting effects. At the same time, the precipitous decline in public trust in America’s colleges and universities is a broad phenomenon that may take years if not decades to resurrect.

Trump’s impulsive war with Iran is a morass that is adding to his falling poll numbers and damaging America’s standing in the world. But he and his acolytes continue to claim broad presidential powers that will continue to wreak havoc on higher education and more broadly the values of an open society.

John Aubrey Douglass is a research fellow at the Center for Studies in Higher Education, Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley, United States. He is the lead author of Neo-Nationalism and Universities (Johns Hopkins University Press). This essay is adapted from a chapter in Douglass’ pending book Turning Points in American Higher Education – From the rise of the publics to the age of Trump with De Gruyter/Brill. This article was first published on Douglass' substack here.

This article is a commentary. Commentary articles are the opinion of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of University World News.