US President Donald Trump has called for Harvard University to lower the percentage of foreign students it admits to around 15 per cent to make more space for American applicants. His comments come after recent government actions that froze federal funding for Harvard and limited its ability to accept students from abroad.
“I think they should have a cap of maybe around 15 per cent, not 31 per cent. We have people who want to go to Harvard and other schools, [but] they can’t get in because we have foreign students there,” Trump told media at the Oval Office.
Just last month, the Trump administration paused $2.2 billion in federal funding to Harvard. More recently, it also stopped the university from enrolling more international students. These moves followed Harvard’s failure to meet federal demands, including addressing incidents of antisemitism and sharing lists of foreign students and their nationalities with authorities.
“Harvard is treating our country with great disrespect,” Trump said, while adding, “I want Harvard to be great again.” He also mentioned the idea of redirecting federal funds away from Harvard and instead supporting trade schools.
Trump said he would prefer to see $5 billion redirected from Harvard to trade schools. He accused Harvard, and some other colleges of being openly antisemitic, claiming that this behavior has now been “very exposed”.
He also stated that each time the university resists government efforts, it loses another $250 million in funding. According to Trump, officials recently identified an additional $100 million that could be withheld. He pointed out that Harvard has a $52 billion endowment, much of which he claimed came from the US government. “I think it’s ridiculous,” Trump said, reported New York Post.
Trump went on to say that many people have expressed support for using such funds to build world-class trade schools. “Everyone’s coming up to me saying, ‘We love the idea of trade schools, with that kind of money … you can have the best trade schools anywhere in the world,” Trump said, the report added.