College is the place where many students entering adulthood find their voice. But when it comes to addressing the White House’s ongoing battle with elite higher education, many institutional leaders seem to have lost theirs.
“I don’t know how many calls you have to make to get one (university) president to call you back,” President Michael S. Roth of Wesleyan University told CNN. “The fact that I can, you know, name the people and count them on my hand, it’s clearly an effort to keep one’s head down and hope that your school will not suffer.”
Roth is one of relatively few top university leaders who still openly criticizes the Trump administration for its monthslong campaign to pull funding from schools that don’t toe its line on a host of issues, from diversity programs to transgender athletes and pro-Palestinian protests.
Trump administration reaches $50 million deal with Brown University to restore funding
While most students and professors were away from campus over the summer, the administration spent the season racking up wins against many of its top targets, with settlements from major universities that have promised a combination of fines, donations and policy commitments in line with Trump priorities.
