President Donald Trump said Friday that he will be “taking away” tax exempt status for Harvard University in a post to Truth Social.
Trump has previously implied that his administration could revoke Harvard’s tax exempt status if the school does not fall in line with the administration’s demands to crackdown on antisemitism and cut diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) out of the institution. The Trump administration has already frozen billions of dollars in federal funding for Harvard, which has resisted the government’s basic demands.
“We are going to be taking away Harvard’s Tax Exempt Status,” Trump wrote in his post. “It’s what they deserve!”
Harvard currently has 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status with the federal government, meaning that the university does not pay taxes on its net earnings while donors are able to get deductions on their income taxes. If Trump follows through with removing the university’s nonprofit status, Harvard would have to start paying considerable amounts of taxes, and donations could dwindle if the incentives change.
The Trump administration has cracked down aggressively on elite universities in the U.S. through his first 100 days in office, freezing funding and threatening further action unless university administrators take on antisemitism on campus and cut DEI.
“The government has long exempted universities from taxes in order to support their educational mission. The tax exemption means that more of every dollar can go toward scholarships for students, lifesaving and life-enhancing medical research, and technological advancements that drive economic growth,” a Harvard spokesperson told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “There is no legal basis to rescind Harvard’s tax-exempt status.”
“Such an unprecedented action would endanger our ability to carry out our educational mission. It would result in diminished financial aid for students, abandonment of critical medical research programs, and lost opportunities for innovation,” the spokesperson added. “The unlawful use of this instrument more broadly would have grave consequences for the future of higher education in America.”
Notably, Harvard also received a rebuke from the Supreme Court in June 2023, when the highest court in the land ruled that the university was afoul of the law in using race as a key criteria in the admissions process. The university could potentially take the Trump administration to court over the possible revocation of its tax exempt status, as it already has done with the billions of dollars in federal funding for the university that the administration froze.
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