OAN Staff Lillian Mann
12:26 PM – Wednesday, July 8, 2026
United States Secretary of Education Linda McMahon issued a stark warning to Harvard officials that she would take firm action on the Ivy League university if it continues to covertly violate federal law by pursuing diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs.
Following his inauguration in January 2025, President Donald Trump made the elimination of collegiate DEI initiatives a core administration priority, signing executive orders (EOs) that directly targeted Harvard and other higher education institutions.
The university is also facing a multi-front legal battle: the Department of Education is investigating Harvard’s race-based admissions and reports of campus antisemitism, while the Department of Justice (DOJ) has sued the Ivy League institution for failing to purge past admissions data.
In an episode of the podcast “Pod Force One,” McMahon said that Harvard remains informed as the administration continues to attempt to eliminate what it refers to as unlawful discrimination in higher education.
“Having always the hammer, if you will, of investigation, of losing federal funding for research and programs, as well as having lawsuits potentially brought by the Department of Justice are certainly things that they bear in mind as well,” the education secretary.
The White House has sought to revoke $2.2 billion in federal grants to Harvard after determining the university was not complying with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, alleging it failed to adequately protect Jewish students from campus antisemitism and harassment.
A federal judge subsequently ordered the restoration of the funds, a decision the Trump administration has since appealed.
McMahon highlighted that the administration does not intend to strip universities of critical research funding, but she made it clear that compliance with federal law remains nonnegotiable.
“It is not the goal or the desire of the federal government to take away that funding, because our research universities provide an unbelievable amount of very effective and good research and invention for the country,” McMahon stated. “We want to make sure that that research can continue, but they just need to know that they’re going to have to operate within the confines of the law to do that.”
“What we have seen as a result of a lot of the action that we have taken is there have been civics institutes set up on many of the campuses where civics is taught, history of our country is taught, and less of the ideology,” she added.
The education secretary said she remains skeptical of the progress, further asserting that some universities are attempting to preserve DEI initiatives by changing their names to be less dubious.
“However, if I’m looking at it objectively, I would bet that there are many who have just changed the name and maybe given it enough window dressing that it’s passed muster for the time being,” she stated.
Trump administration officials have cited schools such as Columbia University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as examples of institutions that have rescinded DEI initiatives or related policies after adhering to federal directives.
Conservative legal groups have also asserted that Harvard reportedly continues to operate taxpayer-funded DEI programs despite the administration’s directives.
McMahon, the former president and CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), serves as the 13th Secretary of Education. Appointed to both of her federal roles by Donald Trump, she assumed her current office in March 2025 after previously serving as the Administrator of the Small Business Administration (SBA) starting in February 2017.
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