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More than 500 Harvard affiliates and Cambridge residents gathered on Cambridge Common on Saturday afternoon to urge Harvard to stand up against President Donald Trump’s demands that the University comply with a slate of his agenda items in exchange for its federal funding.
Attendees braved rain and near-freezing temperatures as they listened to impassioned speeches from faculty, international and Jewish students, and prominent local politicians. Demonstrators waved signs, several of which called on Harvard to live true to its motto, Veritas, and to “grow a spine.”
Speakers at the protest urged the Harvard Corporation, the University’s highest governing board, to not yield to Trump’s conditions, which include eliminating diversity, equity, and inclusion programming and banning masks on campus. They also demanded that Harvard do more to protect international Harvard students and graduates, 12 of whom have had their visas revoked.
“I didn’t travel 5,000 miles all the way from Pakistan just to be afraid of walking five feet out of my dorm,” said Abdullah Shahid Sial ’27, who was recently elected as one of Harvard College’s student body co-presidents.
“I didn’t come to the school to sit in class and remain silent,” he added. “I came here because I believe in the values which I was promised. I believe in the values which the United States once stood for: free expression, free thought and fearless speech.”
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Trump’s demands came in a letter sent earlier this month, just days after federal agencies announced a review of roughly $9 billion in funding to Harvard and its affiliated hospitals. The letter asked for “immediate cooperation,” but Harvard has yet to give its reply.
As the wait grows longer, faculty groups and the city of Cambridge have turned up the pressure on Harvard to fight back. Last week, the Cambridge City Council voted unanimously to urge the Harvard Corporation, the University’s highest governing body, to resist Trump’s demands.
And on Friday, the Harvard chapter of the AAUP filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration’s review of Harvard’s federal funding. The faculty group also protested the administration’s immigration policies and called for Harvard to stand more strongly against Trump at a rally last month.
But Saturday’s rally — which the AAUP hosted alongside the City of Cambridge and 50501, an organization founded to protest Trump’s second term — drew a larger crowd that included several prominent local politicians, including Cambridge Mayor Denise E. Simmons, Cambridge City Manager Yi-An Huang ’05, and Massachusetts State Representative Michael L. Connolly.
“Cambridge was the cradle, and is the cradle, of American liberty. It is now to be a bulwark against those who threaten it,” Simmons said to cheers. “This city will not bow to intimidation. I will not bow to intimidation.”
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Several speakers on Saturday compared Trump’s pressure campaign against universities with the tactics of autocrats including Adolf Hitler. Cambridge City Councillor Patricia “Patty” M. Nolan ’80 said that “parallels with how autocrats historically gain power are not lost on us.”
And Karl N. Molden ’27, who is from Austria, said he studied Hitler’s dictatorship for years in his home country and that he sees “the authoritarian playbook played out right in front of my eyes” in the U.S.
“If coming from Austria teaches you one thing, it is how aspiring dictators kill democracies from within,” Molden said. “We internalize all the steps that have led to humanity’s darkest hours, and this is why what happened in the U.S. for the past two months has been scaring the shit out of me.”
Tova L. Kaplan ’26, a Jewish student, said that though antisemitism remains a serious problem on Harvard’s campus, Trump’s attempts at “dismantling our education” and silencing dissent will not protect Jewish students.
“Some may believe that the Trump administration’s efforts are helping, but I’m here to tell you today: this isn’t how we fight campus antisemitism,” Kaplan said. “We know this lesson too well. Democracy, not deportation, protects Jews.”
Harvard Law School professor Nikolas Bowie, the secretary-treasurer of the Harvard AAUP, ended his speech by calling on the Corporation to “join us and join our lawsuit.”
“We are all here to send a message: When Harvard stands up, we will stand with it,” Bowie said.
—Staff writer William C. Mao can be reached at william.mao@thecrimson.com. Follow him on X @williamcmao.
—Staff writer Veronica H. Paulus can be reached at veronica.paulus@thecrimson.com. Follow her on X @VeronicaHPaulus.
