Columbia agrees to pay more than $300m to settle Trump fight

The Trump administration cancelled more than $600m in grants and contracts in March, saying the university ignored harassment of Jewish students.

Protesters wave Palestinian flags on the West Lawn of Columbia University in April 2024. Picture: AFP

Columbia University has reached a deal with the Trump administration, ending a high-stakes confrontation that disrupted the US higher-education industry and sparked a contentious renegotiation of academia’s relationship to the federal government.

As part of the deal, Columbia will pay $US200m ($302m) to the federal government over three years to settle allegations that the school violated antidiscrimination laws.

The school also agreed to settle investigations brought by the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission for $US21m.

In return, the Trump administration will restore nearly all of the hundreds of millions of dollars in research grants it had pulled from Columbia in March. The school will also be able to access federal funding in the future.

The deal does not include a consent decree, which the Trump administration initially pursued.

That would have given a federal judge responsibility for ensuring Columbia changes its practices.

Instead, a “jointly selected independent monitor” will assess Columbia’s compliance with the terms of the resolution.

Students on the campus of Columbia University. Picture: AFP

The federal government cancelled $US400m in grants and contracts in March, charging that the university had violated civil-rights laws by ignoring what it determined was harassment of Jewish students after the Hamas attacks against Israel on October 7, 2023.

The Trump administration’s battle with Columbia was the first of a series of broadsides against elite research universities that depend on federal funds to operate.

It helped fulfil a campaign promise made by President Donald Trump to rein in the progressive ideas at elite universities that he said amounted to a “Marxist assault on our American heritage and Western civilisation itself”.

Still unresolved is the White House’s fight with Harvard University. On Monday, a federal judge heard arguments from Harvard, which contended the government had no basis to cut $US2.2bn in research funding.

Lawyers for the government insisted it had the power to cancel contracts with universities that no longer align with government priorities.

The Trump administration’s moves to reshape higher education have torpedoed a half-century-old university business model, up-ending research and scrambling the careers of thousands of scientists whose work the federal government funds.

Columbia became a target for the Trump administration after pro-Palestinian protests in 2024 led the school to move classes online, while a campus rabbi warned Jewish students against returning to campus after Passover break because he feared the climate was not safe.

Former Columbia University president Nemat Minouche Shafik. Picture: AFP

Columbia’s then-president Minouche Shafik was unable to reconcile the factions and resigned in August 2024 after just 13 months on the job.

This year, interim president Katrina Armstrong stepped down after playing down commitments she had made to the federal government in closed-door meetings with faculty.

The university board’s co-chair, Claire Shipman, was named acting president.

The Wall Street Journal