First Columbia University. Now Harvard and eight other colleges could be the next schools to see federal funding yanked by the Trump administration, the NYT is reporting.  … The administration said last week that it was pulling $400 million from Columbia due to its alleged failure to crack down on campus antisemitism. But don’t buy it. That’s only partly the reason. The driving force behind this is long-standing right-wing animus toward higher-ed and its lefty ways stretching back decades and beyond. As Steven Levitsky, a Harvard professor, recently told the Globe, the funding cuts are all part of a broader campaign against higher-ed. “They are coming after the universities and they are using antisemitism as an easily available weapon,” he said. “The attacks are coming.” …  

And they are indeed coming, as the Times reports, and they’re initially going to use antisemitism as a cover. But Corey Deangelis, a conservative education activist, recently spilled the beans on Fox News about how the real goal for the Trump administration needs to be eliminating left-wing dominance of higher-ed in general. It won’t be just funding they’ll go after. They’re also going to go after audit accreditors and others to force radical changes, as Inside Higher Ed and Brookings have recently reported.

Update –From the NYT’s David French: “The MAGA Culture War Comes for Georgetown Law.” …