The Department of Justice (DOJ) filed a lawsuit against Harvard University on Feb. 12, accusing the Ivy League school of withholding admissions data the agency says it needs to determine whether the school is engaging in discriminatory practices.
In a complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, the DOJ accused Harvard of “not complying with a federal investigation,” adding it has a “recent history of racial discrimination,” and is “continuing to discriminate in its admissions process.”
The complaint cited a 2023 Supreme Court ruling that said race-based affirmative action programs in most college admissions violate the Constitution’s 14th Amendment.
According to the DOJ, the college has “slow-walked the pace of production” or has refused to produce data and documents on admissions data, admissions policies, and other information related to race. The documents are needed to determine whether Harvard is complying with the Supreme Court’s 2023 decision, the lawsuit said.
“Harvard made its most recent production of admissions-related documents in May 2025,” the complaint stated. “The repeatedly extended deadlines for document production have long passed.”
The lawsuit said it is seeking to compel Harvard to produce materials related to any race-based admissions programs. It also argued Harvard’s failure to hand over its documents violates a term of its agreement with the government on whether it can receive federal financial assistance.
“Providing requested data is a basic expectation of any credible compliance process, and refusal to cooperate creates concerns about university practices,” Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon said in a Feb. 13 statement announcing the lawsuit. “If Harvard has stopped discriminating, it should happily share the data necessary to prove it.”
President Donald Trump recently announced his administration would seek $1 billion from Harvard to settle investigations into school policies, responding to a report indicating that the administration dropped a prior demand for payment from the college.
“We are now seeking One Billion Dollars in damages, and want nothing further to do, into the future, with Harvard University,” Trump wrote in a Feb. 2 post on Truth Social.
He also disputed a New York Times report that cited anonymous sources that said he dropped a previous demand.
The administration has been warning that it would withhold federal funds from Harvard and several other universities over pro-Palestinian activism in response to the Israel–Gaza conflict that erupted in October 2023, diversity policies, and issues related to gender dysphoria.
Officials have said that Harvard has failed to protect Jewish students on campus.
Harvard has filed lawsuits against the federal government in response to orders that halted federal funding for its research.
A lawsuit was filed by the Ivy League school against the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) after the agency suspended millions of dollars in federal research funding over the pro-Palestinian activism. A judge in September 2025 sided with Harvard against the Trump administration and vacated several order to freeze funding, prompting an appeal from the government.
Harvard President Alan Garber has also been critical of the Trump administration’s statements that it would rescind billions of dollars in funding, saying in August 2025 that the government should not be able to “dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue.”
The Epoch Times reached out to Harvard for comment but did not receive a response by publication time.
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