'No Legal Basis,' Says Harvard After Trump Declares Tax-Exempt Status Will Be Taken Away
"Such an unprecedented action would endanger our ability to carry out our educational mission," said a spokesperson for the Ivy League school.
Eloise Goldsmith
May 02, 2025
COMMON DREAMS
Harvard University pushed back forcefully Friday after President Donald Trump declared in a social media post that "we are going to be taking away Harvard Tax Exempt Status," adding that is "what they deserve."
Trump's comment came just hours after Democratic senators sent a letter demanding a probe into whether the administration is acting illegally by trying to compel the U.S. Internal Revenue Service to yank the university's tax exemption.
Trump's post did not specify whether the IRS, the entity that has the power to remove an organization's tax-exempt status, is opting to remove Harvard's designation. Multiple outlets noted they got no immediate response from the IRS when they asked the agency for comment.
"There is no legal basis to rescind Harvard's tax-exempt status," a university spokesperson said in a statement, according toPolitico. "Such an unprecedented action would endanger our ability to carry out our educational mission."
It is illegal for the president, vice president, or other top officials to request, indirectly or directly, that the IRS audit a particular taxpayer.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and multiple other Democratic senators on Friday asked the Acting Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) to probe whether the IRS has received illegal pressure from the administration when it comes to Harvard, and to provide information about whether the agency is looking into other entities at the direction of the president or other top officials.
"It is both illegal and unconstitutional for the IRS to take direction from the president to target schools, hospitals, churches, or any other tax-exempt entities as retribution for using their free speech rights," the senators wrote in a letter dated Friday to the Acting TIGTA Heather Hill.
"It is further unconscionable that the IRS would become a weapon of the Trump administration to extort its perceived enemies, but the actions of the president and his operatives have now made this fear a reality. We request that you review whether the president or his allies have taken any step to direct or pressure the IRS to take politically-motivated actions regarding the tax-exempt status of the president's political targets," they continued.
Loss of tax-exempt status, something that would only typically occur after an audit process that allows the university opportunity to defend itself and appeal, would be extremely significant for the university. Tax-exempt status means the school does not pay federal income tax on charitable contributions to the school and other income. It also means that donations to the school are tax-exempt for those who make them.
Trump mused publicly on April 16 that Harvard should lose its tax-exempt status, after the university's president said the institution would not comply with a list of policy demands from the president, that included, according to the Harvard Crimson, derecognizing pro-Palestine student groups and auditing academic programs for viewpoint diversity. The pushback from Harvard prompted the administration to freeze over $2 billion in federal funding for the school.
That same week, it was reported that the IRS was making plans to revoke Harvard's tax-exempt status.
In response to Trump's bullying tactics, Harvard sued the administration, calling the freeze on funding unlawful and asking the court to restore it.
The tangling between Harvard and the Trump administration is part of a broader wave of scrutiny by the White House on higher education.
"Such an unprecedented action would endanger our ability to carry out our educational mission," said a spokesperson for the Ivy League school.
Eloise Goldsmith
May 02, 2025
COMMON DREAMS
Harvard University pushed back forcefully Friday after President Donald Trump declared in a social media post that "we are going to be taking away Harvard Tax Exempt Status," adding that is "what they deserve."
Trump's comment came just hours after Democratic senators sent a letter demanding a probe into whether the administration is acting illegally by trying to compel the U.S. Internal Revenue Service to yank the university's tax exemption.
Trump's post did not specify whether the IRS, the entity that has the power to remove an organization's tax-exempt status, is opting to remove Harvard's designation. Multiple outlets noted they got no immediate response from the IRS when they asked the agency for comment.
"There is no legal basis to rescind Harvard's tax-exempt status," a university spokesperson said in a statement, according toPolitico. "Such an unprecedented action would endanger our ability to carry out our educational mission."
It is illegal for the president, vice president, or other top officials to request, indirectly or directly, that the IRS audit a particular taxpayer.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and multiple other Democratic senators on Friday asked the Acting Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) to probe whether the IRS has received illegal pressure from the administration when it comes to Harvard, and to provide information about whether the agency is looking into other entities at the direction of the president or other top officials.
"It is both illegal and unconstitutional for the IRS to take direction from the president to target schools, hospitals, churches, or any other tax-exempt entities as retribution for using their free speech rights," the senators wrote in a letter dated Friday to the Acting TIGTA Heather Hill.
"It is further unconscionable that the IRS would become a weapon of the Trump administration to extort its perceived enemies, but the actions of the president and his operatives have now made this fear a reality. We request that you review whether the president or his allies have taken any step to direct or pressure the IRS to take politically-motivated actions regarding the tax-exempt status of the president's political targets," they continued.
Loss of tax-exempt status, something that would only typically occur after an audit process that allows the university opportunity to defend itself and appeal, would be extremely significant for the university. Tax-exempt status means the school does not pay federal income tax on charitable contributions to the school and other income. It also means that donations to the school are tax-exempt for those who make them.
Trump mused publicly on April 16 that Harvard should lose its tax-exempt status, after the university's president said the institution would not comply with a list of policy demands from the president, that included, according to the Harvard Crimson, derecognizing pro-Palestine student groups and auditing academic programs for viewpoint diversity. The pushback from Harvard prompted the administration to freeze over $2 billion in federal funding for the school.
That same week, it was reported that the IRS was making plans to revoke Harvard's tax-exempt status.
In response to Trump's bullying tactics, Harvard sued the administration, calling the freeze on funding unlawful and asking the court to restore it.
The tangling between Harvard and the Trump administration is part of a broader wave of scrutiny by the White House on higher education.
The Yahoo News/YouGov survey finds that more Americans disapprove (49%) than approve (35%) of the president's pressure campaign against the elite university.
Andrew Romano
·Reporter
Updated Fri, May 2, 2025
"Veritas" on a wall at Harvard University. (David L. Ryan/The Boston Globe via Getty Images)
President Trump said Friday that he would be "taking away" Harvard University's tax-exempt status, a move that would upend the school's finances and escalate his pressure campaign against some of America's most elite universities.
"It’s what they deserve!" Trump wrote on social media.
But in the ongoing battle between Trump and Harvard, significantly more Americans side with Harvard, according to a new Yahoo News/YouGov poll.
The survey of 1,597 U.S. adults was conducted from April 25 to 28, just days after Harvard sued the Trump administration in federal court. On April 11, the administration sent Harvard a letter saying it would lose billions of dollars in government funding unless it changed its hiring practices, admissions criteria and classroom priorities to make the campus “viewpoint diverse.” When Harvard refused, the Trump administration froze more than $2 billion in federal research grants to the university and threatened its tax-exempt status.
Federal law prohibits the president from using the Internal Revenue Service as a political tool, and if IRS employees receive an order from the White House to conduct a tax investigation, they're required to report it to an inspector general. The first time Trump said he would strip Harvard of its status, White House officials insisted the IRS would act independently and come to its own conclusion.
“There is no legal basis to rescind Harvard’s tax-exempt status,” a Harvard spokesperson said Friday. “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.”
Like other nonprofit educational institutions, Harvard is exempt from paying most federal taxes under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986. Donors can also write off gifts to the school on their personal tax returns. Forcing Harvard's to pay taxes would drain it of funds currently used for education, research and aid; it could also cause donations to dry up.
Is Trump's pressure campaign popular?
Citing concerns about Gaza War protests and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs, Trump has moved to impose his ideological preferences on other prestigious universities as well, using government money as leverage. But Harvard was the first to forcefully push back.
The public largely supports the school’s decision. According to the new Yahoo News/YouGov poll, a plurality of Americans (48%) approve of Harvard rejecting Trump’s demands; just 31% disapprove. (The rest — 21% — are not sure).
Likewise, 49% of Americans disapprove of the Trump administration’s response (i.e., freezing Harvard’s research grants and threatening its tax-exempt status); only 35% approve.
Finally, far more Americans agree with an anonymous statement summarizing Harvard’s side of the argument than with an anonymous statement summarizing Trump’s:
49% agree that “no government — regardless of which party is in power — should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue" (Harvard President Alan Garber).
35% agree that "the gravy train of federal assistance to institutions like Harvard is coming to an end” because “taxpayer funds are a privilege, and Harvard fails to meet the basic conditions required to access that privilege" (White House spokesperson Harrison Fields).
The politics of Trump vs. Harvard
Since World War II, the U.S. government has sought to innovate and compete globally by funding scientific research at private universities — an arrangement that Trump and other Republicans have called into question by accusing these schools of discriminating against white and Jewish students, allowing transgender athletes to compete in women’s sports and harboring liberal, even anti-American, biases.
Some concessions have already been made. In March, Columbia University agreed to overhaul its protest policies, security practices and Middle Eastern studies department in an effort to claw back $400 million in federal funds. On Monday, Harvard changed the name of its Office for Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging to “Community and Campus Life”; the following day, it released twin reports detailing how the war in Gaza had inflamed campus antisemitism and Islamophobia.
Yet while most Americans agree with Trump and his allies that the politics of U.S. universities are "mostly liberal" (42%) rather than "mostly conservative" (6%) — or "neither liberal nor conservative" (25%) — they still approve of the federal government funding scientific research at such universities by a wide margin, 57% to 17%. Most Americans also see U.S. universities favorably (57%) rather than unfavorably (29%) — and the same goes for Harvard itself (52% favorable to 29% unfavorable).
Trump’s favorable rating, in comparison, is just 43%; his unfavorable rating is 10 percentage points higher (53%).
Democratic support for Harvard’s position is more uniform than Republican opposition: A full 73% of Democrats approve of Harvard's refusal to comply with Trump’s demands, while just 51% of Republicans disapprove.
GOP approval for the administration’s response — i.e., freezing billions in federal grants — is higher, at 73%, but that support is concentrated among Republicans who say their most-watched cable network is Fox News (82%). There is less support for Trump’s response among Republicans who don’t watch any cable news (69%) or prefer CNN, MSNBC or some other network (59%).
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The Yahoo News survey was conducted by YouGov using a nationally representative sample of 1,597 U.S. adults interviewed online from April 25 to 28, 2025. The sample was weighted according to gender, age, race, education, 2024 election turnout and presidential vote, party identification and current voter registration status. Demographic weighting targets come from the 2019 American Community Survey. Party identification is weighted to the estimated distribution at the time of the election (31% Democratic, 32% Republican). Respondents were selected from YouGov’s opt-in panel to be representative of all U.S. adults. The margin of error is approximately 2.9%.
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