The Trump administration is yet again escalating its fight with the Ivy League, pressuring Columbia University’s accreditor to take action over allegations the institution violated federal antidiscrimination laws. The government sent a similar notice in May about the University of Pennsylvania’s alleged violation of Title IX.
Columbia and the Trump Administration
The threat against Columbia is another example of how the administration is stretching the boundaries of federal law and regulation to achieve its ideological goals, accreditation experts said. While it’s unlikely to result in any significant penalty against Columbia, let alone a loss of accreditation, the move could also give the Education Department a pretext to punish the accreditor.
In terms of individual colleges, the federal government has no direct authority to interpret an accreditor’s standards, said John R. Przypyszny, a lawyer who specializes in accreditation. So Trump alone can’t revoke Columbia’s accreditation, which would cut off access to federal financial aid.
The Education Department’s letter, sent Wednesday, argued that Columbia has violated the standards of the Middle States Commission on Higher Education.
Because Columbia failed to adequately respond to antisemitic behavior during protests against the war in Gaza, the department’s Office for Civil Rights concluded last month, the institution has violated Title VI, which bars discrimination based on race, color, or national origin, including shared Jewish ancestry. Therefore, the letter continues, Columbia “fails to meet the standards for accreditation,” the department said in a news release. In light of that, the department said, the Middle States Commission must require the university to “establish a plan to come into compliance.”
“Just as the Department of Education has an obligation to uphold federal antidiscrimination law, university accreditors have an obligation to ensure member institutions abide by their standards,” Education Secretary Linda McMahon said in the release. McMahon added that she expected the accreditor to keep the administration “fully informed of actions taken.”
Heather Perfetti, president of the Middle States Commission, said in an email that the organization is reviewing the letter from the department. “Consistent with our commission’s management of investigative findings,” Perfetti wrote, “we will process these findings in accordance with our policies and procedures.”
Perfetti said the accreditor has already begun looking into Columbia’s response to the charges of antisemitism. On May 16, the accreditor sent a request to Columbia for information on meeting several standards, including those for ethics and integrity, supporting the student experience and governance, and administration. Commission representatives have also visited the campus, and the commission is scheduled to review Columbia’s response at a meeting later this month.
Wednesday’s letter is the latest of many steps the administration has taken to try to punish Columbia and numerous other selective colleges over what it has deemed antisemitism and other kinds of discrimination on campuses.
In early March, the Trump administration announced it was canceling $400 million in federal grants and contracts to Columbia over “continued inaction” in the face of discrimination against Jewish students. Since then, the university has agreed to sweeping demands to overhaul student disciplinary procedures and increase oversight over the Middle East studies department.
Those concessions did nothing to mollify the administration, which has sought to force more changes at Columbia — including by asking a federal judge to enact a consent decree that would give the government widespread authority over the university for years, possibly.
The Trump administration has also sought to exert more authority over accreditors, the private nonprofit organizations that serve as the gatekeepers to more than $100 billion in federal student aid. On the campaign trail, President Trump threatened to “fire the radical left accreditors,” which he blamed for forcing colleges to adopt diversity, equity, and inclusion measures and lowering academic rigor.
In April, Trump issued an executive order that seeks to bar accreditors from setting standards for diversity, equity, and inclusion; make it easier for institutions to change accreditors; and expedite federal approval of new accreditors.
But it’s unusual for the Education Department to try and enforce an alleged civil-rights violation through accreditation, said Przypyszny, the lawyer, since accreditors are usually tasked with ensuring that colleges comply with the rules for disbursing federal financial aid.
Accreditors don’t have any independent way to determine if a college has violated antidiscrimination laws, he said, and they usually have to accept the determination of another agency, such as a federal Office for Civil Rights or the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
Antoinette Flores, a higher-education policy expert at New America who worked in the Education Department under President Joe Biden, said Middle States and most other accreditors require members to uphold federal laws, but the department can’t specify what action, if any, an accreditor should take if it finds a college isn’t meeting its standards.
If the commission were to find that Columbia was out of compliance, it would issue a warning or place it on probation, typically — allowing the institution up to two years to develop new policies and procedures that are meant to correct any deficiencies. Only a handful of colleges lose accreditation each year, most often because of financial problems, and many remain under extra scrutiny from accreditors for years.
What could occur, Flores said, is that the department could seek to penalize the Middle States Commission if its findings don’t comport with the government’s conclusions, by arguing the accreditor isn’t enforcing its own standards.
