Harvard v. Health and Human Services – Academic Freedom

The federal government threatened to withhold billions of dollars in research funding from Harvard University after the school refused to adopt the government’s preferred ideological approach to who it admits to study, who it employs to teach, and what classes and other programs it offers.

The ACLU, ACLU of Massachusetts, and a diverse group of other legal advocacy organizations filed an amicus brief before the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts arguing that this is retaliation, coercion, and ideological bullying in violation of the First Amendment.

The district court blocked the Trump administration's attempted hostile ideological takeover of Harvard. The government appealed to the First Circuit for the U.S. Court of Appeals. The ACLU of Maine, all other ACLU affiliates in the First Circuit, and several other partners filed another friend-of-the-court brief supporting Harvard's fight to retain its academic freedom.

On April 11, 2025, the federal government threatened to revoke billions of dollars in federal research funding from Harvard unless the private university agreed to fulfil ten demands, including requirements that the school alter its admissions, hiring, and programmatic decisions to better reflect the administration’s preferred ideological approach. Harvard refused and filed a lawsuit in the Massachusetts District Court arguing that the government’s decision infringed upon its First Amendment rights and violated the Administrative Procedure Act.

On June 9, 2025, the ACLU, the ACLU of Massachusetts, the Cato Institute, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Knight First Amendment Institute, the National Coalition Against Censorship, the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, and the Rutherford Institute filed an amicus brief in support of Harvard’s motion for a summary judgement. Our brief argues that the government’s decision to withhold federal research grants from Harvard due to the university's refusal to conform to the government’s preferred ideological approach is a direct violation of the First Amendment.

The Government’s attempt to leverage federal funds to impose an ideological takeover on any private institution would violate the First Amendment, and its attempt to do so here is all the more egregious because academic freedom protects a university’s expressive decisions. Academic freedom is a cornerstone of a free society, and universities must remain independent spaces for inquiry, debate, and dissent—even when dissent runs counter to the authority’s views.

The government’s claim that its goal was to advance viewpoint diversity and avoid “ideological capture” on campus does not make its actions any more constitutional. Time and again, the Supreme Court has held that the government cannot regulate or compel private actors’ speech in order to better balance the marketplace of ideas. And that is for good reason: once the federal government is allowed to interfere in such decisions, it will inevitably do so to promote its own ideologies and suppress alternatives.

If the government’s actions are upheld, it would set a dangerous precedent, allowing officials to use funding as a weapon to silence institutions that refuse to conform. The ACLU’s brief urges the Massachusetts District Court to grant Harvard’s motion for summary judgment and make it explicit that the government cannot attempt a hostile takeover of any private institutions, much less a private college or university, to impose its preferred vision of ideological balance.