UW, other WA universities decry Trump’s ‘political interference’
The University of Washington and Seattle University presidents are among at least 150 institution leaders around the country to decry what they call “unprecedented government overreach and political interference” from the Trump administration.
“We must oppose undue government intrusion in the lives of those who learn, live, and work on our campuses,” the leaders wrote in a signed statementreleased Tuesday morning by the American Association of Colleges and Universities. “We will always seek effective and fair financial practices, but we must reject the coercive use of public research funding.”
The statement is the strongest sign yet of an emerging front against the Trump administration’s threats to pull billions in federal grants and contracts from universities. Several elite colleges, most of them Ivy League schools, have already been impacted and dozens more are also in danger of losing federal funding.
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Leaders from at least nine colleges and universities across Washington state — Peninsula College, Pacific Lutheran University, Whitman College, UW, the University of Puget Sound, Renton Technical College, Centralia College, Seattle University, and North Seattle College — signed the statement. Terri Standish-Kuon, the president and CEO of the Independent Colleges of Washington, which includes several private schools, also signed it.
UW and Washington State University are among dozens of schools under investigation by the Trump administration for alleged racial discriminationagainst white and Asian American students. The Trump administration has also warned several schools in the state of possible enforcement actions for alleged Title VI violations relating to antisemitic harassment and discrimination.
The Trump administration has also revoked visas with no notice for dozens of international students across the state. Attorneys representing those students have said the terminations often happen without formal charges or convictions.
“Our colleges and universities share a commitment to serve as centers of open inquiry where, in their pursuit of truth, faculty, students, and staff are free to exchange ideas and opinions across a full range of viewpoints without fear of retribution, censorship, or deportation,” the leaders said in the statement.
The institutions’ leaders said they are open to “constructive reform” and do not “oppose legitimate government oversight.” But they argued that they have “the essential freedom” to determine who can be admitted to their schools and what is taught in their classrooms, along with how and by whom.
“The price of abridging the defining freedoms of American higher education will be paid by our students and our society,” the leaders said in the statement.
The statement comes less than a day after Harvard University filed a lawsuit to halt the freeze of more than $2.2 billion in federal funding.
“Colleges and universities are engines of opportunity and mobility, anchor institutions that contribute to economic and cultural vitality regionally and in our local communities,” the institutions’ leaders wrote in their statement. “Most fundamentally, America’s colleges and universities prepare an educated citizenry to sustain our democracy.”
Kai Uyehara: The Seattle Times. 206-652-6419 or kuyehara@seattletimes.com.