Trump ramps up conflict against defiant Harvard

President Donald Trump escalated his war against elite US universities Tuesday with a threat to strip Harvard's tax-exempt status if the country's most famous educational establishment refuses to submit to wide-ranging government oversight.

Harvard stands out for defying Trump, in contrast to several other universities and a string of powerful law firms that have folded under intense pressure from the White House in its crackdown on American institutions.

The threat of a major tax bill comes after Harvard saw $2.2 billion in federal funding frozen on Monday.

Trump said non-profit Harvard "should lose its Tax Exempt Status and be Taxed as a Political Entity" if it does not submit to his demands for the college to change the way it runs itself, including selection of students and authority for professors.

Tax-exempt status is "totally contingent on acting in the PUBLIC INTEREST," he added in the post on his Truth Social network.

Trump and his White House team have justified their pressure campaign on universities as a reaction to what they say is uncontrolled anti-Semitism and support for the Palestinian militant group Hamas.

Trump "wants to see Harvard apologize. And Harvard should apologize," Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told journalists.

The anti-Semitism allegations are based on controversy at protests against Israel's war in Gaza that swept across campuses last year.

Columbia University in New York -- an epicenter of the protests — stood down last month and agreed to oversight of its Middle Eastern department after being threatened with a loss of $400 million in federal funds. AFP