The Academic Freedom Podcast

On the Trump Administration's Higher Education Compact

Keith Whittington is joined by Genevieve Lakier, professor of law and Herbert and Marjorie Fried Teaching Scholar at the University of Chicago. They discuss the Trump Administration's approach to higher education reform, particularly its recent Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education [https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/Compact-for-Academic-Excellence-in-Higher-Education-10.1.pdf], a proposal that would grant access to federal funds in exchange for agreeing to certain demands. Lakier recently wrote a blog post [https://blog.dividedargument.com/p/the-unconstitutional-conditions-doctrine] on the Compact as it relates to the unconstitutional conditions doctrine. Whittington also published a recent op-ed [https://thedispatch.com/article/trump-compact-universities-coercion/] in The Dispatch on problems with the Compact and signed a joint statement [https://tomginsburg.substack.com/p/on-the-compact-for-academic-excellence] on the matter with other professors.

Should the Government Tax University Endowments?

Featuring Brian Galle [https://www.law.georgetown.edu/faculty/brian-galle/], the Agnes Williams Sesquicentennial Professor of Tax Policy at Georgetown University Law Center, an expert on taxation and nonprofits. Galle recently served as a senior fellow in the division of corporation finance at the Securities and Exchange Commission. He joins us to talk about the proposed tax on university endowments [https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/20/us/universities-endowment-tax-republicans.html] now making its way through Congress. The Republican House Ways & Means Committee issued a press release proclaiming that their bill “holds woke, elite universities that operate like major corporations . . . accountable.” What is the endowment tax and what is its significance for the future of higher education? - 6/11/25

Can the Government Block Student Visas Over Campus Speech?

Keith Whittington is joined by Eugene Volokh [https://www.hoover.org/profiles/eugene-volokh], the Thomas M. Siebel Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution. He is the author, among other works, of the textbook, The First Amendment and Related Statutes. On May 22, the Department of Homeland Security announced [https://www.dhs.gov/news/2025/05/22/harvard-university-loses-student-and-exchange-visitor-program-certification-pro] that Harvard University has lost its certification to participate in the Student and Exchange Visitor Program. As a consequence, international students enrolled at Harvard University will no longer be given student visas. Volokh and Whittington discuss what the administration has done and what constitutional questions it raises. - 5/29/25

On Withholding Federal Grants to Universities

Keith Whittington interviews Cass Sunstein, the Robert Walmsley University Professor at Harvard Law School, whose scholarly interests include free speech, constitutional law, and administrative law. He recently authored a paper, “Our Money or Your Life!’ Higher Education and the First Amendment,” available here [https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=5186735], which explores the First Amendment constraints of federal funding to American universities. Sunstein helps unpack the legal and constitutional questions raised by the Trump administration's strategy of withholding federal grants from schools like Columbia and Harvard to force internal policy reforms. - 5/27/25

On Trump's Threat to Harvard’s Tax Exempt Status

Keith Whittington sits down with Daniel Hemel, [https://its.law.nyu.edu/facultyprofiles/index.cfm?fuseaction=profile.overview&personid=56070] professor of law at New York University Law School, with an expertise in taxation, nonprofit organizations, and constitutional law. They discuss the Trump administration’s threat to strip Harvard University of its tax-exempt status and the implications of the tax code for the workings of American universities. - 5/21/25