The Trump administration announced on Friday that it has canceled grants and contracts worth about $400 million to Columbia University, citing what it described as antisemitic harassment on and near the school’s New York City campus.
The announcement was made jointly by the departments of Justice, Education, Health and Human Services, and the General Services Administration.
According to the statement, the funding cuts are part of a broader effort to address antisemitic incidents linked to the campus environment. However, officials declined to specify which grants and contracts were affected or to provide details on the evidence supporting the allegations. The cuts are expected to come from over $5 billion in grants currently committed to Columbia, much of which supports healthcare and scientific research.
“The cancellation of these taxpayer funds is our strongest signal yet that the Federal Government is not going to be party to an educational institution like Columbia that does not protect Jewish students and staff,” said Leo Terrell, who leads the Justice Department’s antisemitism task force.
The decision is likely to face legal challenges, with civil rights groups arguing that the contract cancellations lack due process and constitute unconstitutional punishment for protected political speech. The New York Civil Liberties Union, for instance, described the move as “unconstitutional and unprecedented” and warned that it could have a chilling effect on academic freedom.
Columbia University has been a focal point of a pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel protest movement in recent years. Student groups have, at times, seized control of academic buildings and set up encampments on campus, demanding that the university cease investments in companies supporting Israel’s military occupation of Palestinian territories. The school has maintained that it is committed to combating antisemitism and other forms of prejudice on its campus while also defending its free speech rights.
In response to the announcement, Columbia issued a statement asserting its commitment to fulfilling its legal obligations and stated that staff are working with the federal government to restore its federal funding. The university did not indicate which specific grants or contracts were impacted.
Critics, including pro-Israel advocacy groups like J Street and civil rights organizations, have expressed concern that the funding cuts may serve as a broader attack on academic institutions and could force schools to overcorrect by stifling political speech. The administration’s move follows a series of high-profile disputes over campus protests and the boundaries of acceptable political expression in academic settings.
Russian strikes killed two people in southeast Kyiv overnight, local officials said on Wednesday....
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian will make his debut at an expanded meeting of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in Turkmenistan...
Kosovo's parliament has elected economist and academic Justina Shiroka Pula as the country's new presid...
Australian counterterrorism authorities are examining the links of the co-pilot accused of attacking the captain and attempting to take control of a flydubai flight bound for Israel. Authorities in New Zealand have also said they are investigating reports the suspect had spent time in that country.
Russia's health watchdog said on Tuesday that no cases of plague had been detected among anyone who had come into contact with a Siberian plague institute laboratory worker who died last week, and locals said their lives had barely been disrupted.
An Azerbaijani citizen died and another is missing after a cargo ship was attacked by a drone in the Black Sea, near the coast of Romania on Monday, 5 October, Baku's Foreign Ministry has said.
A large Ukrainian drone attack on Moscow and the surrounding region has killed two people, damaged homes and sparked a major fire at a key fuel facility, according to Russian officials and military bloggers.
The German-Azerbaijani Connectivity Conference 2026 commenced on 6 October in Baku under the title “Mobilising Finance for Infrastructure, Transport, Logistics, Green Energy, and Digitalisation along the Middle Corridor.”
Here's your AnewZ Daily Brief for 7 October 2026. These are the top five things to expect from the CIS summit in Turkmenistan.
Russian strikes killed two people in southeast Kyiv overnight, local officials said on Wednesday.
Kosovo's parliament has elected economist and academic Justina Shiroka Pula as the country's new president, concluding a dramatic political process just hours before a constitutional deadline that threatened to dissolve the legislature.
The U.S. military has tightened restrictions on its personnel in Okinawa following the arrest of a Marine on suspicion of murder, a case that has reignited long-standing tensions over the American military presence on the southern Japanese island.
The arrest of former German intelligence chief August Hanning on espionage-related charges has drawn renewed attention to his past connections with Israeli security figures and a controversial cross-border child custody case generating significant public scrutiny.
You can download the AnewZ application from Play Store and the App Store.
What is your opinion on this topic?
Leave the first comment