Agreement signed
Elite university caves to Trump
Updated November 8, 2025 – 9:03 a.mReading time: 2 minutes
An elite university has reached an agreement with the Trump administration. In return, Cornell University will receive research funding again.
The American Cornell University in New York state has reached an agreement with Donald Trump’s government in the dispute over federal funds. She is to receive previously frozen funds totaling more than $250 million from the state treasury. In return, the elite university must transfer $30 million to the federal government in Washington over three years, the agreement says. An additional $30 million will be invested in research programs that directly benefit U.S. farmers by helping to reduce costs and improve agricultural efficiency.
The Trump administration targeted the university in April for what officials said was violating discrimination bans. The government had argued that Jewish students were not adequately protected against protests by pro-Palestinian students. At Cornell University, like at many other educational institutions in the USA, there were demonstrations against Israel’s actions in the Gaza war.
As part of the agreement, the university also agreed to provide the federal government with “anonymized student admissions data.” According to the agreement, this data will be “subject to comprehensive review by the United States.”
Cornell will also conduct “annual surveys to assess the campus climate for Cornell students, including the climate for students of Jewish ancestry,” the agreement states, among other provisions. The US government is committed to releasing all funding and ending investigations into the facility.
The university’s president, Michael Kotlikoff, said that the agreement “recognizes the government’s commitment to enforcing existing anti-discrimination laws while protecting our academic freedom and institutional independence.” The White House viewed the agreement as a win for the Trump administration. “President Trump has once again achieved a major victory for American students with this agreement with Cornell University,” White House spokeswoman Liz Huston told CNN.
Cornell University is one of the most prestigious universities in the United States and a member of the Ivy League. It was founded in 1865 in Ithaca, New York, and is considered a pioneer of American higher education because right from the start it pursued the goal of making knowledge accessible not only to an elite, but to society at large.
