United States President Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened to target US universities that are hubs of student protests, from even before his election in November.
Since he was sworn in on January 20, he has taken steps to back his plans, including executive orders. On Monday, he launched a new tirade, threatening to halt federal funding for schools, colleges, and universities if they allow “illegal protests”.
Trump took to his Truth Social platform to deliver his newest threat, one that includes a promise to imprison “agitators”.
“Agitators will be imprisoned/or permanently sent back to the country from which they came. American students will be permanently expelled or, depending on the crime, arrested,” Trump wrote.
But who is he targeting, what has Trump done so far, can he compel universities to act against student protesters, and how might higher education institutions respond?
Who are the intended targets?
US Ambassador to the UN Elise Stefanik shared Trump’s remarks in a post on X, saying “antisemitism and anti-Israel hate will not be tolerated on American campuses”, confirming that pro-Palestinian protesters and speech critical of Israel are the targets of the president’s threat.
Under President @realDonaldTrump, colleges and universities will be held accountable. Antisemitism and anti-Israel hate will not be tolerated on American campuses. Promises made, promises kept. @POTUS @realDonaldTrump @WhiteHouse pic.twitter.com/h9nq1gVJRO
— Elise Stefanik (@EliseStefanik) March 4, 2025
Trump’s announcement comes after he signed a series of executive orders in January targeting alleged anti-Semitism on campuses.
In one directive, he pledged to deport foreign university students and staff involved in pro-Palestinian protests as part of the crackdown.
He also created a task force through the Attorney General’s office devoted to combating alleged anti-Semitic speech, investigating universities that do not do enough to crack down on such speech.
The orders and threats come months after huge pro-Palestine, student-led protests swept the country last spring as Israel’s genocide raged in Gaza. Students demanded an end to Israel’s military offensive, an end to US support for Israel, and for their universities to divest from companies with ties to Israel.
Columbia University was widely seen as the epicentre of the protests, which resulted in mass arrests and student suspensions, ending in the resignation of the university’s president, Minouche Shafik, several months later.
The demonstrations also spread to other universities including Harvard, Yale, and the University of California.
Can Trump legally compel universities to stop protests?
“It’s complicated,” said Jenin Younis, a civil liberties and free speech lawyer.
“It’s hard to say that the tweet itself is unlawful, since it alone isn’t enforceable,” Younis told Al Jazeera of Trump’s latest post threatening funding. “So, it depends how the administration executes this particular threat, and it has not yet given details.”
Radhika Sainath, a senior lawyer at Palestine Legal, a US-based nonprofit, said the executive orders aren’t binding rules for universities to follow.
“This executive order sets up a framework to encourage – but not require – schools to spy on and report their non-citizen students and staff,” Sainath told Al Jazeera. “As far as we can tell, these will be non-binding guidelines with no enforcement power or pressure.”
Still, Trump’s directives are extremely concerning, experts said.
“The strength of these orders lies in their chilling effect,” Younes said, adding they are clearly intended to silence First Amendment-protected speech.
Fearing consequences, some universities may voluntarily clamp down on speech they believe will subject them to funding cuts, she said, and pressure students and professors alike into silence.
Universities received $60bn in funding for research and development in 2023, constituting 55 percent of their total budget for science and engineering research.
According to Sainath, this is the “most significant escalation in McCarthyite tactics from the Executive Branch regarding Palestine since October 7, [2023]”.
Michael Schaeffer Omer-Man, director of research for Israel-Palestine at the nonprofit DAWN, says Trump’s threats are a “twisted new form of transnational repression”.
“Restricting free speech and expression by cutting state funds, or more accurately, creating a chilling effect by threatening to do so, is a hallmark of autocratic takeovers,” Omer-Man told Al Jazeera, adding that in his view, such tactics can be “as effective as outlawing unpopular political views outright”.
Were universities targeted under Biden’s administration?
Yes. Universities that witnessed pro-Palestine protests across the country were also targeted in multiple ways under former US President Joe Biden, who was critical of the student encampments.
University heads had tried, and largely failed, to quell the demonstrations, which often saw the police intervening violently, with videos emerging from different states showing hundreds of students and even faculty members being arrested.
In Columbia University, several deans resigned, as well as Shafik, who stepped down as president after she was summoned to a congressional committee over allegations the university had failed to protect students and staff from rising anti-Semitism.
After the questioning, Shafik allowed police into campus to arrest the students and was faced with angry calls to resign.
Trump now appears to be doubling down on targeting universities and students.
He is “escalating the crackdown” on the Palestine movement and attempting to undermine the students’ and staff’s constitutional rights to speak out and organise, Sainath said.
Will the threats work?
Not on protesters, according to the experts.
Omer-Man said the unprecedented support for Palestine on US campuses was “so powerful precisely because students and faculty already faced consequences for speaking out against Israeli apartheid and stood up anyway”.
Students have continued to speak up for Palestine ever since Trump unveiled his executive orders.
Universities, though, are under pressure. This week, Columbia University was forced to reiterate its commitment to “combating antiSemitism” after Trump’s administration said it could pull more than $50m in contracts between the university and the federal government.
A statement by federal agencies cited the school’s “ongoing inaction in the face of relentless harassment of Jewish students”.
However, Omer-Man said young Americans have “never been dissuaded by violent attempts to bury the nation’s conscience”.
Sainath agreed.
“Students – and faculty – are continuing to speak out, often at great personal risk, as people of conscience have done throughout history,” she said. “Their voices are key in ending US support for Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza, which is why Israel’s supporters are doing everything they can to stop this growing movement.”
How might universities respond?
It might be difficult for universities to legally challenge these executive orders, Younes said.
It could be “easier to challenge them in a specific case”, once the government withholds funds or implements policies pursuant to the executive order, she said.
Sainath said it was important for schools to “stay on the right side of history here – they do not have to cooperate and indeed should not cooperate” with these orders.
Universities should resist pressure to engage in “racist, anti-Palestinian censorship campaigns and protect the right to academic freedom and free speech”, Sainath added.
