{"id":121907,"date":"2025-08-05T21:34:09","date_gmt":"2025-08-05T21:34:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/121907\/"},"modified":"2025-08-05T21:34:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-05T21:34:09","slug":"ucla-will-negotiate-with-trump-over-339-million-in-grant-freezes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/121907\/","title":{"rendered":"UCLA will negotiate with Trump over $339 million in grant freezes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Since federal agencies surprised UCLA by freezing roughly $339 million<\/a> in research grants, faculty, graduate workers and students have sought out details on what the university \u2014 the first public higher education institution targeted by President Trump \u2014 will do.<\/p>\n

Will UCLA challenge the federal government in court, negotiate and potentially pay a large fine or tap into emergency reserves to support researchers? With more than a third of its federal grant and contract funds frozen, will UCLA be forced to lay off employees, as Columbia<\/a>, Harvard and other elite private universities did?<\/p>\n

As Trump battles to remake colleges, the administration has accused UCLA of illegally allowing antisemitism, using race in admissions and letting transgender players compete on sports teams that match their gender identity. Ivy League schools have similarly been faulted by the administration over their responses to pro-Palestinian encampments last year.<\/p>\n

Senior administrators outlined answers during a virtual town hall attended by about 3,000 faculty Monday and also at department-level meetings, including at the UCLA Medical School, which has lost hundreds of grants from the National Institutes of Health. <\/p>\n

But they cautioned that there were no final decisions. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere is a time period to resolve the questions the government has for us,\u201d Marcia L. Smith, associate vice chancellor for UCLA research administration, said during the virtual town hall. Smith said the leaders were \u201cpreparing\u201d to contact the NIH, National Science Foundation and the Department of Energy \u2014 which froze roughly 800 grants over several days last week \u2014 \u201cto talk about what kinds of information they need to lift these suspensions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Smith said she was \u201cvery hopeful\u201d that UCLA will \u201cfind a solution.\u201d<\/p>\n

Negotiation terms unclear<\/p>\n

There was no mention of the University of California potentially making a payout like Columbia, which agreed last month<\/a> to a more than $200 million fine as part of a sweeping agreement with Trump to restore suspended grants. UC as a system oversees federal relations for UCLA and nine other campuses. <\/p>\n

Speaking on background to The Times on Monday, three senior UC leaders echoed a similar message: UCLA will likely enter into negotiations, but it is too early to determine the terms. The officials were not authorized to speak publicly about internal deliberations.<\/p>\n

Negotiations would also not preclude a potential lawsuit, they said.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery single public institution in the nation is watching us very carefully,\u201d UCLA vice chancellor for research Roger Wakimoto said during Monday\u2019s town hall. He later added: \u201cWe\u2019re out of the gate setting the pace.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not just a UCLA decision, certainly our chancellor is going to be intimately involved in whatever path forward we decide, but it is also going to involve the regents of the University of California\u201d Wakimoto said, as well as the new UC President James B. Milliken, who began the job Friday.<\/p>\n

Wakimoto and UCLA leaders also said other UC campuses were offering to help, including by taking care of lab animals that may need aid.<\/p>\n

Federal judge demands answers<\/p>\n

In a separate legal case over UC cuts, a federal district judge on Tuesday suggested that the Trump administration\u2019s actions against UCLA violated a court order that prevented it from making certain science grant cuts.<\/p>\n

In that case, filed by UC Berkeley and UC San Francisco researchers<\/a>, San Francisco-based Judge Rita F. Lin of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California said in late June that the federal government engaged in \u201cquintessential viewpoint discrimination\u201d in terminating diversity-related grants from agencies including the NSF.<\/p>\n

Lin ordered Justice Department lawyers to an Aug. 12 hearing to argue why last week\u2019s actions targeting UCLA do not violate the preliminary injunction she issued in June.<\/p>\n

DOJ says UCLA will pay \u2018heavy price\u2019<\/p>\n

The grant suspensions last week, affecting research into neuroscience, clean energy, cancer and other fields, came after the Justice Department and U.S. Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi<\/a> said UCLA would pay a \u201cheavy price\u201d for acting with \u201cdeliberate indifference\u201d to the civil rights of Jewish and Israeli students who complained of antisemitic incidents since Oct. 7, 2023. That\u2019s when Hamas attacked Israel, which led to Israel\u2019s war in Gaza and the pro-Palestinian student encampment on Royce Quad.<\/p>\n

The DOJ had given UCLA until Tuesday to indicate it would negotiate over those findings. Otherwise, a letter to UC said the Trump administration would sue by Sept. 2. That letter was sent just two days before the federal agencies began notifying UCLA Chancellor Julio Frenk that vast portions of the university\u2019s research enterprise must come to a halt.<\/p>\n

In statements since last week, Frenk has challenged<\/a> the idea that UCLA\u2019s alleged antisemitism is justification for pulling grants.<\/p>\n

\u201cA sweeping penalty on life-saving research doesn\u2019t address any alleged discrimination… We have contingency plans in place and we are doing everything we can,\u201d Frenk said without elaborating on the plan.<\/p>\n

In a video<\/a> posted to social media Monday, Milliken did not directly address suspensions but broadly mentioned the \u201cchallenges\u201d facing universities.<\/p>\n

\u201cHigher education is facing greater challenges and change than at any point in my career,\u201d Milliken said. \u201cAt the same time, I know that our work is essential to improving lives, strengthening the economy and providing lifesaving health care, more so than ever.\u201d<\/p>\n

The video elaborated on a brief Friday letter <\/a>to the UC community in which he called the UCLA research grants and contract suspensions \u201cdeeply troubling.\u201d<\/p>\n

Faculty demand aggressive defense<\/p>\n

Hundreds of faculty have their own ideas.<\/p>\n

In a petition circulating across UCLA and other UC campuses, professors are asking UC<\/a> to challenge the government more head-on. A growing number have signed.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe do not have to bend to the Trump administration\u2019s illegitimate and bad-faith demands… We demand in the strongest possible terms that the University of California demonstrate our strength as the world\u2019s largest university system and reject the malicious demands of the Trump administration,\u201d said the petition from the UCLA Faculty Assn. As of Tuesday, the petition had garnered about 1,200 signatures, many from UCLA professors.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe demand that the UC name these demands as what they are: efforts to erode the strength of American higher education. Each university that falters legitimates the Trump administration\u2019s attacks on all of our institutions of higher education and we must stand up now. To protect our democracy we must protect our universities. Only when academic workers and the community as a whole collectively organize can we fight back against the threat to our campuses and our democracy,\u201d the petition said.<\/p>\n

It also made another suggestion: that UC tap into billions in unrestricted endowment funds to bridge the gap left by suspended grants. University leaders have not publicly indicated whether that is on the table.<\/p>\n

Carrie Bearden, a professor at UCLA\u2019s Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior and Brain Research Institute, is among those who signed. She is the director of a now-suspended five-year, $2.36-million NIH training grant that funds students doing neurogenetics research.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat is an immediate, terrible impact on all the trainees. We do not know what other funding will cover them right now,\u201d said Bearden, who said she was told by faculty leaders to potentially expect further grant cancellations, which is the way freezes took place at East Coast universities in recent months.<\/p>\n

Vivek Shetty, a UCLA professor of oral and maxillofacial surgery and biomedical engineering, also had an $828,154 four-year NIH grant frozen. His, which had been renewed over 11 years, focused on training digital health researchers, such as those who develop apps and wearables to flag irregular heartbeat, steer daily diabetes control and deliver medical care remotely.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe funding freeze endangers the very care that will protect us and our families tomorrow,\u201d said Shetty, a former UCLA Academic Senate chair. \u201cStarve these brilliant minds today, and we extinguish an entire generation of life-saving ideas. However fierce its public objections, the University of California will likely acquiesce to Washington\u2019s terms, painfully aware of the deep human and scientific costs of this harsh decree.\u201d<\/p>\n