On Monday, the Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) Office for Civil Rights (OCR) issued a Notice of Violation finding Harvard in breach of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The federal Joint Task Force to Combat Antisemitism also released a letter summarizing the findings and warning: “failure to institute adequate changes immediately will result in a loss of all federal financial resources and continue to affect Harvard’s relationship with the federal government.”
While the government had already frozen about $3.3 billion in funding to Harvard by June, roughly $5.6 billion in multi-year federal support remains under review. That includes:
Over $1.7 billion in FY24 research funding to Harvard Medical School-affiliated hospitals like Mass General and Dana-Farber
$191 million in FY24 federal student aid, including Pell Grants — 18% of all student aid used at Harvard
This threat to federal student aid is compounded by Congress's proposed changes to the university endowment tax, which could raise Harvard’s tax rate from 1.4% to over 8%. Institutional aid — which accounts for 66% of all student aid — depends heavily on endowment payouts, about 20% of which go toward financial aid.
This Notice is similar to one issued to Columbia in May (covered in our last weekly newsletter), offering insight into what may come next for Harvard.
In this special edition, we break down:
What Title VI is and how it applies to Harvard
New revelations from federal investigators’ data requests
Key findings that led to the violation notice
The risk of losing accreditation and additional federal funding
How Harvard is likely to respond, including its school-level action plans
How the Notice may affect ongoing talks with the White House
Background on Title VI and Harvard
Title VI prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, or national origin by organizations that receive federal funding.
Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits discrimination based on race, color, or national origin — including shared ancestry or ethnic characteristics — by any organization receiving federal financial assistance.
Institutions that do not accept federal funds are not bound by Title VI. For example, Hillsdale College, a small religious school, forgoes federal student aid and research funding to remain a “truly independent institution.”
Title VI antisemitism investigations began under the Biden administration and have continued under the Trump administration.
In November 2023, the Biden administration’s Department of Education (ED) opened a Title VI investigation into Harvard over alleged failure to address antisemitic harassment on campus.
In July 2024, ED closed the investigation — not because Harvard was cleared, but because six students had filed a lawsuit with similar claims.
Harvard settled that lawsuit in two parts: first in January 2025, then in May 2025.
In February 2025, the Trump administration’s Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) launched a separate Title VI investigation into Harvard Medical School.
In March 2025, ED warned Harvard and 59 other institutions of possible enforcement actions under Title VI for antisemitism.
In April 2025, HHS expanded its investigation to cover university-wide conduct since October 7, 2023.
The Biden administration also investigated Harvard for anti-Palestinian, anti-Arab, and anti-Muslim discrimination — and reached a resolution.
ED reached an agreement with Harvard in January 2025. The University did not admit wrongdoing but agreed to implement several reforms: clarifying its Non-Discrimination and Anti-Bullying Policy, improving recordkeeping, sending out a voluntary “climate survey,” monitoring its anonymous hotline, and certifying that employees had received Title VI training by June 30.
Harvard faces other ongoing Title VI investigations beyond antisemitism.
In April 2025, ED and HHS launched an investigation into both the University and the Harvard Law Review over alleged race-based criteria for publication and membership.
Key Takeaways
The investigation found Harvard acted with deliberate indifference toward discrimination and harassment of Jewish and Israeli students after October 7.
The 57-page Notice of Violation outlines how Harvard met all five legal criteria for a Title VI violation due to “deliberate indifference”:
Harassment was “severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive”
It “deprived” the student of educational opportunities or benefits
The school “knew of the harassment”
The harassment occurred in the school’s programs or activities
The school’s inaction or response was “clearly unreasonable in light of the known circumstances”
The Notice states that proving deliberate indifference “requires more than a showing that the institution’s response to harassment was less than ideal”; instead, it means “affirmatively choosing to do the wrong thing, or doing nothing, despite knowing what the law requires” — a response so clearly unreasonable or neglectful that the institution effectively ignored its legal obligations.
The investigation details examples of this unreasonable failure, including:
Harvard’s delayed implementation of mandatory Non-Discrimination and Anti-Bullying (NDAB) Policy and Procedures training for teaching staff, which is designed to help instructors recognize and address antisemitism, and was launched only in spring 2024 — nearly two years after the NDAB Policy was adopted.
Numerous examples of blocking access to educational areas and activities, such as “die-ins” on the steps of Widener Library in 2024 and 2025, “study-ins” that interfered with students’ ability to use academic spaces for their intended purposes, and “reports of students whose ability to sleep, study, and move freely about campus has been disrupted” by the Spring 2024 Yard encampment, as described by President Alan Garber.
Repeated instances of the University not enforcing its own rules, especially regarding time, place, and manner for protests. This includes class walkouts and disruptions in October 2023, the occupation of University Hall in November 2023, and faculty participation in study-ins that violated these policies without facing consistent disciplinary measures. The report cites Harvard Corporation chair Penny Pritzker’s own acknowledgment of the University’s “uneven enforcement of the rules.”
Failure to identify or discipline perpetrators of antisemitic vandalism and harassment, including “[r]eports of Jewish and Israeli students being spit on in the face for wearing a yarmulke, stalked on campus, and jeered by peers with calls of ‘Heil Hitler,’” swastika stickers being posted near Harvard Hillel, and the physical assault of a Jewish student that resulted in criminal charges but minimal University disciplinary action — all despite incidents being reported to campus police or administrators.
Drawing together these and other findings, the Notice argues that Harvard’s response was “clearly unreasonable in light of the known circumstances” because:
It lacked clear procedures for reporting and addressing antisemitic harassment;
Disciplinary measures were inconsistently applied, undermining accountability and deterrence; and
Protesters repeatedly violated time, place, and manner rules without consequences, limiting Jewish students’ access to campus spaces.
The investigation drew upon media reports, congressional investigations, Harvard’s Antisemitism Task Force report, the Harvard Jewish Alumni Alliance’s antisemitism report, and OCR’s own investigation and data requests.
Harvard disclosed new information about campus discipline and reform during the investigation.
Harvard admitted that “almost none” of the highlighted incidents of vandalism (e.g., swastika stickering, defacement of public property) led to anyone being identified, held accountable, or disciplined, despite being referred to campus police.
Harvard disclosed that the nine students who occupied University Hall in November 2023 received only a “written reprimand.” Likewise, five students who disrupted class during a walkout that month organized by the African and African American Resistance Organization (AFRO) — an unrecognized, self-described “militant” group — faced no more than a written reprimand.
The Notice also said the University will have “new leadership” for the Center for Middle Eastern Studies (CMES), effective next academic year. FAS divisional dean David Cutler dismissed CMES leadership in March, and FAS Dean Hopi Hoekstra has defended the move as necessary to ensure effective management and commitment to viewpoint diversity.
This investigation is the kind of due process Harvard argues the government must provide in its lawsuit over frozen funding.
Harvard’s complaint asserts that before federal funds can be frozen for alleged Title VI violations, the government must satisfy the “detailed procedures” in Title VI set forth by Congress — procedures Harvard claims were ignored, rendering the funding freeze unlawful.
By undertaking and effectively concluding its investigation with this Notice and referring the case to the Department of Justice for potential enforcement, the government is now taking formal actions aligned with the Title VI process — steps that could be seen as bolstering its defense against Harvard’s claims.
While a Harvard spokesperson rejected the government’s finding of indifference — saying the University “strongly disagrees with the government’s findings” and is “far from indifferent” — Harvard has not denied antisemitism on campus and instead points to its “substantive, proactive steps to address the root causes.”
Harvard has already addressed this new Notice of Violation in a new court filing in its federal funding freeze lawsuit, arguing that it underscores the government’s failure to follow Title VI procedures.
In a memorandum filed hours after receiving the Notice, Harvard contends that by sending the Notice only now, the government effectively concedes it could have followed the Title VI process from the start, but instead “deliberately chose to ignore it in its rush to inflict pain and punishment upon Harvard” — thereby confirming the freeze and terminations violated statutory requirements.
Harvard also argues that the government’s Notice relies almost entirely on Harvard’s own voluntary Antisemitism Task Force Report, which undermines the government’s claim that the University acted with “deliberate indifference” to antisemitism.
HBS appears not to have complied with HHS’s request to share its working group reports, including the Antisemitism Working Group’s.
Despite frequent mentions of antisemitism at HBS, the Notice never cites the HBS Antisemitism Report, which OCR requested in April, while repeatedly citing the University-wide Task Force report.
In a June interview, HBS Dean Srikant Datar provided no detail on HBS’s actions regarding antisemitism.
Meanwhile, Harvard Law and Harvard Divinity School students charged with assaulting an Israeli HBS student in October 2023 received no apparent discipline from Harvard and were later honored with a fellowship and class marshal position.
What’s Next
Harvard has at least 10 days to comply with Title VI — then risks loss of “all federal financial resources” and loss of its accreditation, as Columbia was warned Monday.
While the federal government froze about $3.3 billion in contracts with Harvard in June 2025, approximately $5.6 billion in remaining federal support — spread across multi-year commitments — is still under review. This includes:
Grants and contracts with Harvard Medical School-affiliated institutions like Mass General and Dana-Farber, where many of HMS’s 12,000 faculty conduct research (over $1.7 billion in FY24, as we calculated in our March 9 newsletter)
Federal student financial aid, such as Pell Grants, which totaled $191 million in FY24 — 18% of all aid Harvard students used to finance their education
As we noted in our last weekly newsletter, ED is required to notify accreditors when a school is found in violation of Title VI or VII.
That’s what happened after Columbia’s 10-day correction window expired. ED publicly announced it had alerted Columbia’s accreditor, the Middle States Commission on Higher Education (MSCHE).
On Monday, MSCHE sent Columbia interim president Claire Shipman a formal Notification of Non-Compliance Action, warning that “its accreditation may be in jeopardy because of insufficient evidence that the institution is currently in compliance with Standard II (Ethics and Integrity).”
Institutional accreditation is required to receive federal funding. Losing accreditation could also disrupt credit transfers. For example, Harvard College itself accepts transfer credits only from accredited institutions.
Harvard’s school-level action plans — which were due Monday — are expected to outline how it will address Title VI concerns.
Even as Harvard sues the federal government over funding freezes, President Alan Garber has consistently emphasized the University’s commitment to internal reform, including on antisemitism.
When Harvard released its Antisemitism and Islamophobia Task Force reports in April 2025, Garber asked each school to submit implementation plans by June.
Harvard has since referenced this June 2025 deadline in court filings but has not shared updates on progress or disclosed who is responsible for the plans.
This investigation could reshape ongoing talks between Harvard and the federal government — which resumed two weeks ago after higher ed leaders urged Harvard to re-engage.
This investigation could affect talks between Harvard and the federal government, which had restarted two weeks ago after American higher education leaders asked Harvard to re-engage on behalf of academia.
Bloomberg reported Monday that talks have “stalled,” with a potential resolution “knocked off course last week although hopes remain for an accord.”
The intensity of the Notice — including the imminent automatic notice to Harvard’s accreditor — raises pressure on the University. But the investigation’s completion may also address some of Harvard’s due process concerns, even as it continues to contest that in court.
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