\n<\/p>\n
In June, in an escalation of the Trump administration\u2019s pressure on Harvard University to bow to its demands, a federal Office for Civil Rights announced that the institution was violating federal law. <\/p>\n
The office released a nearly 60-page report accusing Harvard of \u201cdeliberate indifference\u201d to ongoing discrimination against Jewish and Israeli students, which is illegal under Title\u00a0VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. \u201cOCR\u2019s findings document that a hostile environment existed, and continues to exist, at Harvard,\u201d the office said in an accompanying news release. <\/p>\n
But this wasn\u2019t the Education Department\u2019s Office for Civil Rights. It was an office of the same name within the Health and Human Services Department that\u2019s been playing a more public role as part of Trump\u2019s crackdown on higher ed. Officials who served in previous administrations said agencies used to generally defer to the Education Department when it came to civil rights issues in higher ed. But since Trump retook office, colleges and universities are facing increased pressure from probes by HHS and other agencies enforcing the new administration\u2019s right-wing interpretation of civil rights. <\/p>\n
HHS OCR said it began its Harvard investigation in February by looking into the university\u2019s medical school, after alleged antisemitism during the May 2024 graduation ceremony. But, in April, it widened its probe to \u201cinclude Harvard University as a whole and to extend the timeframe of review to include events and information from October\u00a07, 2023, through the present.\u201d (The HHS OCR has jurisdiction over institutions that accept HHS funding, including National Institutes of Health research grants and Medicaid dollars.) <\/p>\n
And this wasn\u2019t the HHS OCR\u2019s only investigation into parts of Harvard that didn\u2019t appear related to health or medicine. The news release noted the \u201cfindings released today do not address OCR\u2019s ongoing investigation under Title\u00a0VI into suspected race-based discrimination permeating the operations of the Harvard Law Review journal.\u201d And Harvard is just one of several universities that this non\u2013Education Department OCR has targeted since Trump retook the White House in January. <\/p>\n
Civil rights advocates say the HHS OCR has become just one more pawn in Trump\u2019s strategy to target universities and end protections and programs that aid minority groups. For universities, Trump\u2019s HHS OCR represents a new threat to their funding if they\u2019re accused of promoting diversity, equity and inclusion; fostering antisemitism; or letting transgender women play on women\u2019s sports teams. <\/p>\n
It\u2019s unnecessary to do what the administration is doing now, unless one is operating like a mob boss.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2014Catherine Lhamon, former head of OCR at the Education Department<\/p>\n
The office\u2019s investigations and public denunciations add to the work of the ED OCR, which the Trump administration has also shifted to focus on the same issues. The two OCRs announced a joint finding of violations against Columbia University, but they\u2019ve also trumpeted independent probes into other institutions.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs we feared, the Trump administration is abusing civil rights tools to advance a radical and divisive agenda that aggressively hoards access to education, living wage jobs, and so much more,\u201d the NAACP Legal Defense Fund said in a statement. \u201cUnfortunately, HHS and many other federal agencies are being used as one of the vehicles to carry out that agenda.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Legal Defense Fund said, \u201cColleges and universities are being targeted precisely because of the critical role they play in opening the doors of opportunity and preparing the next generation to lead our multi-racial democracy. By attacking institutions that help level the playing field for Black students and other students of color, the Trump administration is ultimately weakening our democracy and our economy as a whole.\u201d<\/p>\n
Former officials at the Justice Department, to which HHS OCR can forward cases if the targets of investigations don\u2019t comply, told Inside Higher Ed<\/em> that HHS OCR historically deferred probes into universities to the Education Department. <\/p>\n Catherine Lhamon, former director of the Education Department\u2019s OCR under Presidents Biden and Obama, said, \u201cThere are 13 federal agencies with external civil rights enforcement, of which HHS is one, and it\u2019s relatively large.\u201d She said they\u2019re pieces of Trump\u2019s broader strategy. <\/p>\n \u201cThe administration has used every agency in a contemporaneous, simultaneous assault on universities,\u201d Lhamon said, multiplying the amount of federal funding it can threaten. <\/p>\n The HHS OCR\u2019s announced investigations under Trump show it\u2019s investigating similar issues to the Education Department OCR\u2014or what\u2019s left of that office after the administration\u2019s cuts. Lhamon said the practice for decades has been for the agency with principal expertise over an area to investigate that area\u2014hence why universities were mostly investigated by the Education Department OCR. <\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s unnecessary to do what the administration is doing now, unless one is operating like a mob boss,\u201d Lhamon said. <\/p>\n An HHS spokesperson said, \u201cWe\u2019re leading implementation of the president\u2019s bold civil rights agenda,\u201d which includes four focuses: upholding religious conscience rights, fighting antisemitism, ending race-based discrimination embedded in DEI programs and \u201cdefending biological truth\u201d in sex-discrimination enforcement. She also said that fighting antisemitism, for instance, is a priority across the whole administration, \u201cso our office is going to be a part of that and going to participate to the fullest extent that we can.\u201d<\/p>\n It remains unclear how much of the HHS OCR\u2019s daily workload is now devoted to Trump\u2019s targeting of higher ed. HHS OCR did investigate higher ed institutions even before Trump took office, the HHS spokesperson said. <\/p>\n \u201cWe may be being more public about it now,\u201d the spokesperson said, \u201cparticularly because that\u2019s where the issue areas with respect to this administration are.\u201d <\/p>\n She said the office also continues to investigate non\u2013higher ed\u2013related medical providers and non\u2013civil rights issues that it has responsibility for despite the office\u2019s name\u2014such as information privacy under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act.<\/p>\n The spokesperson said the HHS OCR news releases don\u2019t tell the full story of what the office is currently investigating because\u2014out of the roughly more than 40,000 complaints it receives annually\u2014it doesn\u2019t normally disclose which complaints lead to probes \u201cto protect the integrity of the investigation.\u201d The office also launches some investigations without receiving complaints, she said. <\/p>\n \u201cIn the past we\u2019ve not announced through press releases that we\u2019ve opened major investigations,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n She didn\u2019t provide Inside Higher Ed<\/em> a list of the office\u2019s current investigations. She also didn\u2019t say how many employees HHS OCR has. HHS\u2019s fiscal year 2026 budget request said that \u201cin FY 2010, there were 111 investigators onboard, and in FY 2022, this number fell to 60, while simultaneously HHS received the highest number of complaints in its history (51,788).\u201d (For comparison, the ED OCR, in a FY 2024 report, said it had received its highest-ever volume of complaints, but the number was only 22,687.) <\/p>\n Since taking power, the Trump administration has been slashing the federal workforce\u2014the administration laid off nearly half of the Education Department\u2019s OCR staff in March. It\u2019s unclear how much HHS OCR has been cut. The FY 2026 budget request said the HHS OCR \u201chas faced a continually growing number of cases in their backlog, rising to 6,532 cases by the end of FY 2024.\u201d And that was before the office launched these new probes based on Trump\u2019s priorities.<\/p>\n The HHS OCR receives roughly more than 40,000 complaints annually, a spokesperson said.<\/p>\n Kayla Bartkowski\/Getty Images <\/p>\n Since Trump\u2019s Jan. 20 inauguration, HHS OCR has announced a spate of higher ed investigations, mostly without naming the institutions. The spokesperson said most are ongoing. <\/p>\n In early February, it announced investigations of four unnamed medical schools, also citing reports of antisemitism during their 2024 commencements. (That was the same month the Harvard investigation began, HHS OCR later said, so Harvard was likely among the four.)<\/p>\n On Feb. 21, Trump told Maine governor Janet Mills during a televised White House event that her state must bar transgender women from women\u2019s sports or lose federal funding, to which Mills replied, \u201cSee you in court.\u201d In response to this, the HHS OCR issued a news release that same day announcing an investigation into \u201cthe Maine Department of Education, including the University of Maine System,\u201d due to reports that the \u201cstate will continue to allow biological males to compete in women\u2019s sports.\u201d (The HHS spokesperson said the investigation eventually found that the most relevant issues were unrelated to higher ed.)<\/p>\n In March, the office announced investigations into four unnamed \u201cmedical schools and hospitals\u201d over \u201callegations and information\u201d concerning medical education or scholarships \u201cthat discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, or sex.\u201d The news release didn\u2019t have much further detail but referenced a Trump executive order targeting \u201cillegal\u201d diversity, equity and inclusion programs. Later that month\u2014again citing the anti-DEI order\u2014it announced it was investigating \u201ca major medical school in California\u201d over whether it \u201cgives unlawful preference to applicants based on their race, color, or national origin.\u201d <\/p>\n In April, it announced it was investigating an \u201cHHS-funded organization\u201d over whether it excludes \u201ccertain races\u201d from a \u201chealth services research scholarship program.\u201d Later in April, it launched an \u201conline portal where whistleblowers can submit a tip or complaint regarding the chemical and surgical mutilation of children\u201d\u2014the Trump administration\u2019s phrase for gender-affirming care. Simultaneously, it announced it\u2019s investigating \u201ca major pediatric teaching hospital\u201d for allegedly firing a whistleblower nurse who \u201crequested a religious accommodation to avoid administering puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones to children.\u201d (The HHS spokesperson said the first Trump administration brought a focus on religious conscience rights to the office that disappeared under Biden but has now returned.)<\/p>\n Also in April, it announced a second Harvard probe: a joint investigation with the Education Department\u2019s OCR into both Harvard and the Harvard <\/em>Law Review \u201cbased on reports of race-based discrimination permeating the operations of the journal.\u201d The HHS OCR news release said an editor of the law journal \u201creportedly wrote that it was \u2018concerning\u2019 that \u2018[f]our of the five people\u2019 who wanted to reply to an article about police reform \u2018are white men.\u2019\u201d The office also raised concern about another editor allegedly suggesting expedited review for an article because the author was a minority.<\/p>\n In May, the HHS OCR announced it\u2019s investigating a \u201cprestigious Midwest university\u201d over alleged discrimination against Jewish students. Later that month came its announcement of its joint finding with the Education Department OCR that Columbia University violated Title\u00a0VI through \u201cdeliberate indifference towards student-on-student harassment of Jewish students.\u201d (This was part of the administration\u2019s pressure campaign on Columbia that culminated with a controversial July settlement.) <\/p>\n In June came the HHS OCR\u2019s Title\u00a0VI finding against Harvard in the investigation of alleged antisemitism. Then, in July, HHS OCR said it was investigating \u201callegations of systemic racial discrimination permeating the operations of Duke University School of Medicine and other components of Duke Health,\u201d which includes \u201cother Duke health professions schools\u201d and \u201chealth research programs across Duke University.\u201d In a statement alongside that announcement, HHS secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said, \u201cFederal funding must support excellence\u2014not race\u2014in medical education, research, and training.\u201d<\/p>\n And last week, after months of silence on new higher ed\u2013related investigations, the HHS OCR announced an investigation into the legal scholarship of an HHS-funded \u201cnational organization,\u201d over allegations that it \u201cpreferences applicants of certain races and national origin groups.\u201d <\/p>\n Lhamon, the former Education Department OCR head, said what the administration has called civil rights investigations into Harvard, Columbia and other universities aren\u2019t really investigations. She noted the administration has used a \u201cmob theory\u201d by going ahead and pulling HHS and other funding from multiple institutions before the investigations are over. <\/p>\n Instead, she said, this is \u201can assault on universities, which is a very different thing from ensuring compliance with the civil rights laws as Congress has enacted them.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In June, in an escalation of the Trump administration\u2019s pressure on Harvard University to bow to its demands, a federal Office for Civil Rights announced that the institution was violating federal law. The office released a nearly 60-page report accusing Harvard of \u201cdeliberate indifference\u201d to ongoing discrimination against Jewish and Israeli students, which is illegal<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23649,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[1454,2346,3095,7403,495,2112,702,71],"class_list":{"0":"post-23648","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-education","8":"tag-arm","9":"tag-civil","10":"tag-crackdown","11":"tag-hhs","12":"tag-higher","13":"tag-joins","14":"tag-rights","15":"tag-trumps"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23648","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23648"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23648\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/23649"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23648"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23648"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23648"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}A String of Investigations<\/h2>\n