Judge Orders Trump Administration to Restore $2.6 Billion to Harvard
A federal judge ordered the Trump administration to reinstate billions in frozen research grants to Harvard University, ruling the cuts were an unconstitutional ideological assault.
U.S. District Judge Allison D. Burroughs ordered the Trump administration to restore between $2.2 billion and $2.6 billion in frozen research funding to Harvard University on September 3, 2025. The court ruled that the administration used concerns over campus antisemitism as a "smokescreen for a targeted, ideologically-motivated assault" on the university. The funding freeze, which began in April 2025, targeted nearly 1,000 projects including research on cancer and Alzheimer's after Harvard rejected government demands to overhaul its governance, hiring, and admissions policies.
While Judge Burroughs acknowledged that Harvard was "wrong to tolerate hateful behavior for as long as it did," she determined the funding cuts were illegal retaliation that violated the First Amendment and the Administrative Procedure Act. The ruling bars the government from future retaliatory cuts and vacates all freeze orders issued on or after April 14, 2025.
The White House and Education Secretary Linda McMahon vowed to appeal the decision, with spokesperson Liz Huston labeling Burroughs an "activist Obama-appointed judge." President Donald Trump has publicly demanded a payment of at least $500 million from Harvard to resolve the conflict, citing similar settlements reached by Columbia and Brown universities.
By September 12, federal agencies had begun notifying Harvard researchers that funding was being reinstated, though university spokesperson Jason Newton confirmed that actual payments had not yet been disbursed. In response to ongoing federal pressure, Harvard has voluntarily merged its gender equity and nondiscrimination offices and added antisemitism programming to its training modules.
