A Republican member of Congress praised the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) for rejecting the Trump administration’s attempt to pressure universities to push the MAGA agenda.
On Friday, MIT President Sally Kornbluth wrote a letter to Education Secretary Linda McMahon rejecting the White House proposal linking federal funding to demands made by the administration.
“In our view, America’s leadership in science and innovation depends on independent thinking and open competition for excellence,” Kornbluth wrote. “In that free marketplace of ideas, the people of MIT gladly compete with the very best, without preferences. Therefore, with respect, we cannot support the proposed approach to addressing the issues facing higher education.”
In a post on X, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) praised his alma mater for rejecting Trump’s “bribe”.
“The surest way to screw up the world’s best technical school is to let feds tell them how to run it,” Massie wrote. “Congrats to my alma mater for turning down a bribe to let the executive branch dictate what happens on its campus. A lot of things are wrong in [the U.S.], but MIT is not one of them.”
Earlier this month, the Trump administration sent a letter to nine U.S. universities demanding that they sign an agreement pledging to uphold the Trump administration’s higher education priorities, or risk losing preferred access to federal funding.
The administration demanded that the schools ban the use of sex and gender as factors in their admissions process, and cap their international student numbers, among other requirements, CBS News reports.
They also demanded that the school commit to “transforming or abolishing institutional units that purposefully punish, belittle and even spark violence against conservative ideas.”
In addition to MIT, the letter was also sent to University of Arizona, Brown University, Dartmouth College, University of Pennsylvania, University of Southern California, University of Texas, University of Virginia and Vanderbilt University.
