Harvard received $49 million in federal funding for 'unlawful' DEI programs: Complaint

America First Legal (AFL) and the Justice Department's (DOJ) Office of Civil Rights on Wednesday accused Harvard University of illegally prioritizing at least $49 million in federal funding for diversity programming.

The groups claimed the Ivy League institution violated Title VI and Title IX, President Donald Trump’s recent executive orders and the Supreme Court’s ruling banning affirmative action in college admissions, per the New York Post.

AFL attorney Megan Redshaw said some violations occurred when Harvard closed its Office for Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Strategic Belonging and opened its Office for Community and Campus Life, which she claimed was just a rebranding of the diversity office. 

Other alleged violations happened through internships, clerkships and grants for Harvard Medical School, including a $21.9 million grant for the medical school's Clinical and Translational Science Center to “train and diversify” its workforce by prioritizing “underrepresented” and “diverse” populations to address “health inequities.”

Another $8.9 million grant was given to the medical school for medical and doctoral programs that called DEI a “core priority” to recruit “young talent.”

“This is not only illegal, it is unethical," Redshaw said. "By using new labels to sustain the same discriminatory system and elevating identity over individual merit, Harvard is turning the training of physicians into a vehicle for demographic engineering and social activism. 

"The American people deserve physicians chosen for skill and competency—not because they checked the right diversity box," she added. 

The groups also accused the university of still using “diversity-based essay prompts” in its admissions, in an apparent violation of the Supreme Court's affirmative action ruling.

“Rather than dismantle its ‘discrimination, exclusion, and intolerance’ practices as required, Harvard has chosen instead to rename, repackage, and redeploy the same unlawful practices under new euphemisms,” the groups wrote. “It has chosen defiance over compliance.”

AFL demanded an investigation into Harvard's medical school admissions, scholarships, clerkships and residency programs, along with its alleged "rebranding" plot. It also called for a full dismantling of its DEI programs.

Misty Severi is a news reporter for Just The News. You can follow her on X for more coverage.