Federal Judge Upholds Trump Admin’s $400 Million Freeze On Columbia University Funding

Authored by Bill Pan via The Epoch Times,

A federal judge has upheld the Trump administration’s suspension of more than $400 million in federal funding to Columbia University.

On Monday, Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil of the Southern District of New York dismissed a lawsuit brought by the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) and the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), two labor unions representing the Columbia faculty. She ruled that the unions had no standing to sue in the first place.

Only the university could challenge the funding freeze, the judge said.

“Our democracy cannot very well function if individual judges issue extraordinary relief to every plaintiff who clamors to object to executive action. Neither the executive branch nor the legislature ever awarded the grants and contracts at issue to plaintiffs or any of their members,” Vyskocil wrote in her opinion.

In March, the Trump administration said it was going to cancel Columbia’s federal grants, accusing the university of failing to address persistent harassment of Jewish students.

In the months of intense protests over Israel’s military actions in Gaza after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terrorist attack, Columbia became a focal point of campus demonstrations nationwide, with an encampment on its campus lasting more than 100 days before police were called in to break it down.

“Universities must comply with all federal anti-discrimination laws if they are going to receive federal funding,” Education Secretary Linda McMahon said at that time.

“For too long, Columbia has abandoned that obligation to Jewish students studying on its campus.”

The administration later issued a list of demands to Columbia’s interim president, Katrina Armstrong, warning that federal funding would not be restored unless the university achieved “immediate compliance.”

The demands covered both academic and campus policy reforms, including banning masks at protests, overhauling disciplinary procedures, expanding the campus police force with the authority to make arrests, and subjecting the university’s Middle East Studies program to a third-party review.

Armstrong agreed to many of the conditions before stepping down from her role. The university did not place the Middle East, South Asian, and African Studies Department into “academic receivership” for at least five years, as the Trump administration demanded, but instead pledged to appoint a new senior vice provost to oversee those academic programs. It also announced additional, voluntary changes, such as advancing its satellite campus in Tel Aviv, Israel.

McMahon later described Columbia as being “on the right track” toward restoring funding, though no final decision has been announced.

In their lawsuit filed on March 26, the AAUP and AFT alleged that the administration was using a “coercive tactic” that infringes on institutional autonomy and jeopardizes important scientific research. They sought a court order to lift the freeze and to block the administration from terminating or pausing active federal grants and contracts with the university.

Columbia University currently holds more than $5 billion in federal grant commitments, according to the departments of Education, Justice, and Health and Human Services.

The AAUP criticized Monday’s ruling and vowed to appeal.

“This is a disappointing ruling, but by no means the end of the fight,” AAUP President Todd Wolfson said in a statement to multiple media outlets. “Ultimately, lifesaving research, basic civil liberties, and higher education in communities across the country are all on the line. Faculty, students, and the American public will not stand for it. We will continue to fight back.”

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