Tricia Schumann Rakusin

It has saddened to me watch @Harvard, a university that I love from which I have greatly benefited, self-immolate through gross mismanagement, poor governance, and ideological capture that have occurred over the last 15 or so years, and that have been brought into clear focus beginning on October 8, 2023. When a day after the launch of the Hamas attack on Israel, 33 Harvard student organizations held the victims “solely responsible” for the acts of the terrorists while their extraordinarily barbaric acts were still underway, I realized that something had gone profoundly wrong at my alma mater. Further investigations on campus, including interviews and meetings I held with students and faculty, led me to conclude that the issue was not simply one of anti-Zionism or antisemitism, but rather the anti-American ideological capture of a once-great educational institution that has grossly veered from its original mission of Veritas and academic and research excellence. For nearly two decades, Harvard students have been taught that the world can only be understood as a battle between the oppressors and the oppressed, a dangerous anti-American neo-Marxist ideology that emerged on campus, permeated the administration and the faculty, and one which has been promulgated and implemented by Harvard’s Orwellian-named Office of Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging. While the OEDIB has recently been renamed the Office for Community and Campus Life and has taken down its website in an attempt to avoid scrutiny from the @realDonaldTrump administration, it has otherwise remained under the same leadership, personnel, and mission. Rather than promoting the issues suggested by its nomenclature, in practice, DEI as implemented at Harvard is a political advocacy movement that advocates and executes on behalf of certain groups that are deemed oppressed under the DEI methodology. Under DEI, one’s degree of oppression is determined based upon where one resides on a so-called intersectional pyramid of oppression where whites, Jews, and Asians are deemed oppressors, and a subset of people of color, LGBTQ people, and/or women are deemed to be oppressed. Under DEI’s ideology, any policy, program, educational system, economic system, grading system, admission policy, (and even climate change due its disparate impact on geographies and the people that live there), etc. that leads to unequal outcomes among people of different skin colors is deemed racist. As a result, according to DEI, capitalism is racist, Advanced Placement exams are racist, IQ tests are racist, corporations are racist, or in other words, any merit-based program, system, or organization which has or generates outcomes for different races that are at variance with the proportion these races represent in the population at large is by definition racist under DEI’s ideology. But rather than being anti-racist, DEI and its ideological framework are profoundly racist and illegal, and an important to contributor to what has gone wrong at Harvard in recent years. DEI has poisoned Harvard admissions practices as evidenced by Harvard being found in violation of race-based admission practices by the Supreme Court. It has led to the decline of excellence and meritocracy at Harvard, both in the student body and in the faculty. It has allowed antisemitism to explode on campus where chants for “Free, Free Palestine, From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free, and Globalize the Intifada,” were dismissed as viewpoint diversity and free speech “depending on the context” by the previous Harvard President despite repeated warnings that such calls for global violence would lead to innocents being harmed. The irony of Harvard claiming to protect free speech and free expression on campus while contemporaneously being ranked last on the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) free speech rankings has not been lost on anyone. This past week’s brutal executions of a Christian and a Jewish staffer of the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C. by a man who shouted “Free Free Palestine” after finishing off his victims as they attempted to crawl away are but a recent stark and egregious example of the consequences of the same intonated calls for violence against Jews by Harvard students and faculty who have encamped on Harvard Yard and barged into classrooms bullhorns in hand. Harvard has had nearly two years to get its act together to address antisemitism on campus, and it has been more than 18 months since the Congressional hearing at which Harvard’s former president equilibrated, ducked, smirked at, and dismissed Congresswoman Elise Stefanik’s penetrating and elucidating inquiry. While the University has taken token steps to address these issues, the April 29th release of its Presidential Task Force on Combating Antisemitism and Anti-Israeli Bias makes clear that antisemitism remains pervasive on campus because of its deep ideological roots within the faculty as explained by David Volpe (a Visiting Scholar at the Harvard Divinity School who resigned from Harvard’s Antisemitism Task Force) in a Free Press article on May 2, 2025 after the publication of the report: “But what the report offers no solution for is that there is a deep ideological commitment among much of the faculty—particularly in the humanities and social sciences—that is anti-Western, anti-Israel, and often antisemitic… Without a vast unlearning—among the faculty, not just the students—all the reports in the world will not change the atmosphere on campus. We will only be spraying perfume on a sewer.” I have recently visited the Harvard campus and spoken to students and faculty. Unfortunately, while the University has taken some steps, David Volpe is correct. The rot runs deep. Harvard has been on notice for nearly 18 months by the Congress that its failure to address antisemitism threatened the University’s federal funding. The University now appears to be shocked – despite the many previous warnings made by the Trump administration – that its Federal funding has been paused, that future Federal grants will not be considered, and that its refusal to provide requested documentation about its foreign students has led to the cancellation of Harvard’s Student and Exchange Visa Program certification. Why is Harvard in this mess? The answer I believe is arrogance. Harvard’s President Garber recently held a Zoom with alumni and claimed that the administration’s attempts to enforce Title VI violations is simply a ‘guise’ for the ideological takeover of the University by right wing interests. Rather than engage with the Administration and attempt to negotiate a resolution of these issues, Harvard has chosen to dismiss the Administration’s attempt to enforce the law as pretextual and brought lawsuits not just against the various Federal agencies, but also has chosen to personally sue Secy of HHS RFK, Jr, AG Pamela Bondi, Secy of Education Linda McMahon, Acting Administrator of the GAO Stephen Ehikian, Secy of Energy Chris Wright, Defense Secy Peter Hegseth, Secy of DHS Kristy Noem, Director Todd Lyons of ICE, Secy of State Marco Rubio, and the Directors of the NSF and NASA. When one brings a lawsuit against an individual when litigation against an entity would legally suffice, it is done to intimidate, harass, and/or waste the time of the target. Harvard had no legal need to bring personal lawsuits against these public servants, but it did so anyway out of spite. What more do you need to know to understand why President Trump and the other leaders of this Administration would be appropriately angered by this dismissive and extremely antagonistic response of Harvard? My goal is to help Harvard out of this mess, but I have been stymied in doing so. Multiple Harvard affiliates have suggested that I reach out to the Harvard Corporation Board, and I have done so. I have received no response to my outreach to the members of the Board with whom I have had a (perhaps once) good relationship. A number of others have offered to connect me with President Alan Garber or have told me that he would be reaching out to me shortly, but no such outreach has occurred; hence, I am herewith sharing my advice to Harvard. So what should Harvard do? While much has been made of the Administration’s April 11th letter to Harvard which was clearly overreaching in certain respects, I am relying here on the April 3, 2025 letter from the Administration rather than the April 11th letter, as the Administration has explained that the April 11th letter was sent in error. (See: nytimes.com/2025/04/18/busin…) The April 3rd letter documentcloud.org/documents/… makes nine reasonable and straightforward requests: “1. Oversight and accountability for biased programs that fuel antisemitism. Programs and departments that fuel antisemitic harassment must be reviewed and necessary changes made to address bias, improve viewpoint diversity, and end ideological capture. 2. Disciplinary reform and consistent accountability. Harvard has an obligation to consistently and proactively enforce its existing disciplinary policies, ensuring that senior administrative leaders are responsible for final decisions. Reforms must include a comprehensive mask ban (with medical and religious exemptions, given identification is always displayed) and a clarified time, place, and manner policy. Harvard must review and report on disciplinary actions for antisemitic rule violations since October 7, 2023. 3. Student group accountability. Recognized and unrecognized student groups, and their leadership, must be held accountable for violations of Harvard policy. 4. Governance and leadership reforms. Harvard must make meaningful governance reforms to improve its organizational structure to foster clear lines of authority and accountability, and to empower faculty and administrative leaders who are committed to implementing the changes indicated in this letter. 5. Merit-based admissions reform. Harvard must adopt and implement merit-based admissions policies; cease all preferences based on race, color, or national origin in admissions throughout its undergraduate, graduate, and other programs; and demonstrate through structural and personnel action that these changes are durable. 6. Merit-based hiring reform. Harvard must adopt and implement merit-based hiring policies; cease all preferences based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin in hiring throughout its teaching and research faculty, staff, and leadership; and demonstrate through structural and personnel action that these changes are durable. 7. Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) programs. DEI programs teach students, faculty, staff, and leadership to make snap judgments about each other based on crude race and identity stereotypes, which fuels division and hatred based on race, color, national origin, and other protected identity characteristics. All efforts should be made to shutter such programs. 8. Cooperation with law enforcement. Harvard must cooperate with law enforcement to ensure student safety. 9. Transparency and reporting to ED, DHS, and other federal regulators. Harvard must comply fully with existing statutory reporting requirements under Section 117 of the Higher Education Act, commit to full cooperation with DHS and other federal regulators, and make organizational changes as necessary to enable full compliance.” None of the April 3rd requests are unreasonable. and all appear to be lawful. Furthermore, the nine requirements would likely be welcomed by the substantial majority of faculty, students, and alumni of the University. President Garber has labelled the Administration’s demands as “violating Harvard’s First Amendment Rights,” “exceeding the statutory limits of the government’s authority under Title VI,” and “threaten[ing] our values as a private institution devoted to the pursuit, production, and dissemination of knowledge.” While President Garber’s strong words have inspired some alumni donors to make donations, I can find no basis for his statements in the demands made by the Administration in its April 3rd letter, in its cancellation of the Student and Exchange Visitor Program, or in the law. The answer to what Harvard should do is therefore obvious and straightforward. Harvard must commit that it will promptly accept the Administration’s requests and take all necessary steps to immediately implement its requirements. The recent cancellation of the Student and Exchange Visitor Program (“SEVP”) is devastating for foreign students and the University, and it needs to be resolved immediately. The solution here is simple: Harvard must comply with the record requests from the Administration. Harvard has no right under the law or our Constitution to have a SEVP program or to withhold the requested student records. Furthermore, the information requests appear to be appropriate and having an adequate basis. There is credible evidence that certain foreign students at Harvard have received funding from foreign actors, have been involved with facilitating funding and/or otherwise been supporting foreign terrorist organizations, so there is no basis for Harvard withholding this information. Harvard must also show that it is taking the Administration’s requests for governance reform seriously. While Senior Fellow Penny Pritzker may be a fine person, she has led Harvard during a period of substantial damage to the institution’s global reputation, the explosion of antisemitism on campus, and dramatic deterioration in Harvard's financial wherewithal. She has destroyed Harvard’s relationship with the Trump Administration, which will remain in office for nearly four more years. For all of these reasons, she cannot effectively continue as Harvard’s leader. I have also heard from hundreds of Harvard alumni, faculty and students, a clear and resounding call for Penny Pritzker's replacement, including from members of her own family, for the harm she has caused during her leadership of Harvard during her term in office. Don’t rely on my words, just ask around. Importantly, it is critically important that Harvard sends a very clear message to the Trump Administration that it is taking its requests and concerns seriously, and that material and responsive actions will immediately occur. I bear no personal grudge against Penny Pritzker, but her involvement here is toxic and antithetical to restoring Harvard to excellence and solvency. If Harvard continues on its current path, it won’t be long before permanent and irreversible damage is done. Leadership and good governance require strong and decisive actions, particularly in the midst of a crisis. The time to start saving Harvard is now.