Harvard University is the latest dragon to have slowed, if not yet entirely slayed, the Trump administration\u2019s march. A federal judge in Boston on Wednesday ordered the President to reverse immediately more than $2.2bn (\u00a31.6bn) in research funding cuts, using uncompromising language to describe Trump\u2019s scorched earth battle against the Ivy League institution<\/a>.<\/p>\n Judge Allison Burroughs ruled that the White House had engaged in illegal retaliation after Harvard rejected Trump\u2019s demands to change its governing policies and force its faculty and administrative staff to be vetted for \u201cwoke\u201d viewpoints. She also argued forcefully that Trump used pro-Palestinian protests on Harvard\u2019s campus as a lever, illegally to try to control the university\u2019s activities.<\/p>\n She assessed<\/a> the government \u201cused antisemitism as a smokescreen for a targeted, ideologically motivated assault on this country\u2019s premier universities\u201d. She ruled that the funding cuts were \u201carbitrary and capricious\u201d, and that Trump\u2019s claim to be cracking down on campus antisemitism was deliberately designed to obscure an assault on the \u201cdefendants\u2019 power and political views\u201d.<\/p>\n The court loss came on the very same day that the White House lodged an appeal at the Supreme Court against another ruling: last week\u2019s 7-4 judgment by a federal appeals court that Trump acted illegally in April when he unveiled his so-called \u201cliberation day\u201d reciprocal tariffs <\/a>on trading partners worldwide, including the UK.<\/p>\n The judges upheld a lower court<\/a> ruling that Trump had no justification for implementing his tariffs via the International Emergency Economic Powers Act that he cited in order to sideline Congress. Rejecting the argument that a trading or national security \u201cemergency\u201d existed, the court argued that Trump flagrantly overstepped his authority. The setting of tariffs, it ruled, is a \u201ccore Congressional power\u201d, although the judges left the tariffs in place until 14 October, affording the White House a chance to launch its appeal.<\/p>\n Trump is now warning that if the Supreme Court strikes the tariffs down, \u201cit would be a total disaster for our country\u201d. He called last week\u2019s ruling \u201cvery shocking\u201d and the work of a \u201cliberal court\u201d, adding that \u201c\u2026without the tariffs, this country is in serious, serious trouble\u201d. <\/p>\n Certainly any loss at the Supreme Court would complicate Trump\u2019s ability to deliver on the promises he has made to his \u201cMake America Great Again\u201d faithful<\/a>. They have been told that eventually, tariff revenues will be so significant that he will scrap federal income tax<\/a>, funding the government instead via a promised \u2013 but still non-existent \u2013 \u201cExternal Revenue Service\u201d. If the tariffs are struck down, that pledge would be upturned and instead his government would have to refund billions of duties already collected from US importers.<\/p>\n Also dogging Trump\u2019s footsteps as autumn gets under way is his failure to deliver on his promised transparency over documents pertaining to disgraced and deceased financier Jeffrey Epstein<\/a>. Fox News and the other right-wing TV and streaming networks carried non-stop live coverage of Wednesday\u2019s effort by Epstein survivors<\/a> to force the full release of files that Trump pledged last year on the campaign trail.<\/p>\n Survivors took to the steps of the US Capitol to urge lawmakers to pass legislation requiring the files\u2019 release. \u201cWe are not going away, we are not going to be quiet, and we are not going to give up,\u201d said Annie Farmer, a victim who testified at jailed Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell\u2019s <\/a>2021 trial.<\/p>\n Prominent Republicans, including Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and Congressman Thomas Massie of Kentucky, are now joining Democrats in demanding full transparency regarding the files<\/p>\n Trump, at the White House, dismissed Wednesday\u2019s event as a \u201cDemocrat hoax\u201d, but he is now on notice that his numerous efforts to distract his followers\u2019 attention away from the issue have entirely failed.<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/SEI_264619712.jpg\")
Harvard University won a court case against the White House over cuts in federal funding (Photo: Shannon Stapleton\/Reuters)<\/p>\n