Trump rules Harvard Feh

(Bloomberg) President Donald Trump said that Harvard University would lose its tax-exempt status and increased his attack on the Ivy League school with a threat that was condemned to be from his jurisdiction.

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Trump made the announcement after weeks of changing the tax -free treatment of the school. “We will take Harvard's tax exemption status away. It is what you earn!” Trump wrote in a post early Friday morning.

Harvard claimed that there is “no legal basis” to remove his tax -exempt status, and Trump's announcement triggered a quick criticism. MP Richard Neal, the ranked democratic member of the house's tax writer's committee, described the move as illegal and said that the president had weapons the Internal Revenue Service.

Four democratic senators, including Elizabeth Warren from Massachusetts, called on the early Friday whether Trump's Targeting violates Harvard against a criminal law that prevents the President from punishing the IRS, punishing his political opponents or rewarding his allies.

According to the Federal Law, the President, the Vice President or his employees cannot instruct an IRS official to “carry out or terminate or terminate an examination or another examination of a certain taxpayer with regard to the tax liability of these taxpayers”.

From Friday morning it was unclear whether Trump's announcement was due to his decision or that of the tax authority.

“I cannot understand how the president works as if he had the authority to direct this. He is not and is expressly prohibited to do this,” said Steven Bloom, deputy vice president for government relationships at the American Council on Education.

The authority to revoke tax benefits lies with the IRS and it is a lengthy process that begins with an exam, he said. According to Bloom, Harvard would also have the opportunity to fix problems.

The Tenenbaum Law Group, a law firm based in Washington, DC, which represents non -profit organizations, said in a report dated April 28 that the tax -fighting federal status cannot be removed with a “stroke of a abbey”.

“These procedures require individual case-by-case-IRS audits of each organization, with plenty of opportunity for the company to defend themselves and involve several calls of appeal,” said the law firm.

Painful blow

Conservatives have spoken out in recent years against Harvard and other elite universities for allegations of ideological prejudices and accusations of an increase in anti -Semitism in the face of the campus against the war in the Gaza. Trump and other Republicans have accused the institutions of promoting liberal agendas and so -called “wokess”.

The Department of Department of the White House, the IRS and the Treasury rejected a statement.

“For a long time, the government has released the universities from taxes to support their educational mission,” said a spokesman for Harvard in an explanation given by e -mail.

The school said that the campaign would lead to reduced financial support for students and the task of critical medical research programs. “The illegal use of this instrument would generally have great consequences for the future of university education in America,” the explanation said.

Around 1,700 private universities do as non -profit organizations in view of their contributions to society. You will receive this benefit as part of a section of the Tax Code, in which education expressly mentioned as a purpose that can receive the exemption.

Harvard's tax -exempt status would fulfill a painful financial blow to the university. Harvard's tax -exhausted status offers the school a variety of advantages, e.g. It can sell bonds that pay interest rates that are freed from federal taxes, lure investors and reduce the credit costs.

A Bloomberg News Analysis estimated that Harvard's tax benefits were at least $ 465 million in 2023.

Trump's fight against Harvard has escalated since the university rejected the government's demands to the reform of campus policy and argued that they went far beyond their declared efforts to combat anti -Semitism and threatened the independence of the school. The administration has frozen billions of dollars of funds that support projects such as as and as and tuberculosis Research, and Harvard sued several US agencies and top officials in response.

“There is a process that must be persecuted that would probably take a few years,” said James Repetti, a legal professor at Boston College, who spoke in an interview before Trump's announcement. “It would probably take a long time to work through the dishes,” said Repetti.

The IRS has previously revoked the tax -exempt status of a college in a process that took years. Bob Jones University in South Carolina lost its tax deflections from federal tax in 1976 because it banned interracial dating. The decision was confirmed by the Supreme Court in 1983. Bob Jones University dropped politics in 2000 and regained its tax advantages in 2017.

Analysts by JPMorgan Chase & Co. in a research note in April pointed to Bob Jones's precedent in April that the IRS would revoke Harvard's taxable status, “We would expect immediate legal measures that could take years in order to solve the current administration over the current term of the current administration.”

Strong balance sheet

As the richest school in the country, Harvard is available a lot of firepower to ward off surprise strokes. It is equipped with flawless credit ratings and a foundation of 53 billion US dollars. In the 2024 financial year, the school generated sales of $ 6.5 billion and achieved an excess of $ 45 million.

Harvard recently took steps to collect more cash through a taxable sale of $ 750 million. Officials from the foundation have previously discussed that the sale of proportions from private equity find in the amount of around 1 billion US dollars was sold.

At the beginning of this week, the University of Lang was published reports on anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim pre-incorporation, which paints a devastating picture of how the students treated each other on October 7, 2023 after the Hamas attack.

“I am sorry for the moments when we did not meet the high expectations that we have rightly determined for our community,” said Harvard President Alan Garber in a letter that accompanied the reports.

Garber has recognized the need to tackle anti -Semitism and noted that he had experienced it directly while serving as a university leader, and said Harvard was obliged to work with the administration.

In the past few weeks, the school has placed the Harvard student of the Palestinian Solidarity Committee on Probation and forced the faculty leaders of the Center for Studies on the Middle East to leave their positions. Harvard also established a partnership with Birzeit University in West Bank and named its diversity, equity and inclusion office in lifespan and campus life.

-With the support of Janet Lorin, Magan Crane, Alisa Parenti and David Voreacos.

(Updates to add details on the IRS process and restrictions that are shown in the third paragraph)

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