Federal Grants Returned, but No Payments Yet

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Posted by AI on 2025-09-12 09:10:53 | Last Updated by AI on 2025-09-12 11:14:16

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Harvard UniversityConfirming Reports, They've Received Renewal Notices for Federal Grants Halted by Trump Admin., but Nothing More.

Harvard University recently confirmed that it has been notified that several federal grants will be reinstated, but the school has yet to actually receive any payments from the federal government. The development is the latest twist in a drama that began earlier this year when President Donald Trump vowed to cut off undocumented immigrants from receiving taxpayer-funded college benefits.

A Harvard spokesperson told NPR that the school has "received notification from several federal agencies that grants previously awarded to Harvard University and Cambridge Rindge and Latin School have been reinstated by the agencies after consultations with the Department of Education."

But, they said, "no funds from these grants have actually been released to Harvard or CRLS, and it will take time for funds to be released on an ongoing basis consistent with the regular procedures of the respective agencies."

Trump's crackdown on so-called "sanctuary cities" meant to protect undocumented immigrants from deportation was first enacted through a January memo from the Department of Homeland Security.

It ordered jurisdictions to comply with requests from immigration agents or else lose some federal funding. Several cities and universities, including Cambridge, Mass., were subsequently labeled by the Trump administration as having violated the memo's enforcement and thus risked losing federal money.

In September, the Justice Department said it would follow through on that threat, notifying Harvard and the city of Cambridge that they would be stripped of some federal grants unless they agreed to cooperate with immigration agents.

Harvard fought back, threatening legal action and declaring that the Trump administration was "improperly reaching beyond the legal boundaries" of the Constitution and federal law.

It is not clear whether the recent notices of reinstatement are the result of a settlement agreement that Harvard reached with the Department of Justice or a broader shift in the Trump administration's approach to enforcement. The DOJ did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

According to The Boston Globe, two of the three grants originally endangered by the Justice Department's notice-totalling $700,000 and $800,000 respectively-were for a mentoring program at Harvard College and a developmental biology research program affiliated with Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The third grant, totaling $425,000, went to a program offering academic and career guidance to students at Cambridge Rindge and Latin High School.

Despite the notices of reinstatement, Harvard officials told the Globe that they don't "have any indication" of "the timeframe for the releases or specific conditions."

The spokesperson for the university told NPR that "while we have received notice that the grants will be reinstated, there is no guarantee at this point that the universities will receive back payments for grants that were previously rescinded."

They added, "We are closely monitoring the situation and are grateful that our faculty, staff, and students, as well as the Cambridge community, can continue their important work."

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