Trump Takes College Crusade to the Courtroom in Strategic Shift

President Donald Trump’s administration appears to be retooling its aggressive campaign to reshape elite universities, bringing lawsuits into a fight that it has primarily waged with funding freezes and executive action.

Last year, Trump’s approach centered on applying financial pressure. He suspended billions in federal research dollars across nearly a dozen schools and issued a series of proclamations aimed at squeezing their budgets. The tactics ultimately led to six settlements from colleges collectively pledging hundreds of millions in fines and a bevy of policy changes.

But two of his biggest targets, Harvard University and the University of California Los ...