A US federal judge ruled on Wednesday that President Donald Trump acted unconstitutionally when he confiscated about $2.2 billion in Harvard University’s federal research grants as punishment for the institution’s alleged failing to address antisemitic harassment and discrimination on campus.

In her ruling, US District Judge Allison Burroughs, who was appointed to her position in 2014 by then-President Barack Obama, said that the Trump administration “used antisemitism as a smokescreen for a targeted, ideologically motivated assault on this country’s premier universities.”

Burroughs went on to argue that the federal government violated Harvard’s free speech rights under the US Constitution’s First Amendment and that it was the job of courts to “ensure that important research is not improperly subjected to arbitrary and procedurally infirm grant terminations.”

As previously reported by The Algemeiner, Harvard became a hub of campus antisemitism in the wake of the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, invasion of and massacre across southern Israel, amid the ensuing war in Gaza. The wave of incidents included a public assault on recent Harvard Business School graduate Yoav Segev in which assailants allegedly identified him as a Jew and proceeded to encircle him while screaming “Shame!” in his face; an anti-Zionist faculty group’s sharing an antisemitic cartoon aimed at inciting anti-Jewish hatred in the Black community; masses of students roaming the halls calling for a genocide of Jews in Israel; and the university’s admitting that it has refused to afford Jews the same protections against discrimination enjoyed by other minority groups.

Burroughs’s ruling has restored Harvard’s access to billions of dollars in funds paid for by the American taxpayer, preventing a fiscal crisis which has caused draconian budget cuts at other institutions facing similar financial penalties imposed by the Trump administration.

The decision also awards Harvard University president Alan Garber a major political victory, as he has in recent weeks endured growing criticism from faculty and Democratic lawmakers for entertaining a settlement with the Trump administration which would have included concessions to the conservative movement on issues ranging from diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) to viewpoint diversity on campus. Such a deal would risk inciting a mutiny at Harvard, where 94 percent of faculty donated to Democratic candidates in 2024.

On Wednesday, the White House vowed to continue fighting in court — which may include requesting emergency proceedings at the conservative-leaning US Supreme Court — accusing Burroughs of being compromised by partisanship.

“This activist Obama-appointed judge was always going to rule in Harvard’s favor, regardless of the facts,” Liz Huston, spokesperson for the White House, said in a statement following the ruling. “We will immediately move to appeal this egregious decision, and we are confident we will ultimately prevail in our efforts to hold Harvard accountable.”

Harvard said on Thursday that the ruling supported its contention that the Trump administration had acted unlawfully.

“The ruling affirms Harvard’s First Amendment and procedural rights, and validates our arguments in defense of the university’s academic freedom, critical scientific research, and the core principles of American higher education,” Garber said in a statement. “Our principles will guide us on the path forward. We will continue to champion open inquiry and the free exchange of ideas, and to build a community in which all can thrive.”

Harvard’s legal woes did not draw to a close with Wednesday’s decisions, as it sits at the center of yet another federal lawsuit alleging that school officials, including its private law enforcement agency, exposed a Jewish student to antisemitic abuse by refusing to intervene and correct a hostile environment even as the misconduct escalated to include violence

Filed in July, the mammoth complaint, totaling 124 pages, lays out the case that the university miscarried justice in the aftermath of two students, Ibrahim Bharmal and Elom Tettey-Tamaklo, allegedly assaulting Segev during the fall semester of the 2023-2024 academic year — just weeks after Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel — by refusing to discipline them and later rewarding them the university’s highest honors.

“This malicious, violent, and antisemitic conduct violated several university policies — such as its anti-discrimination and anti-bullying policies — and it prompted criminal charges,” the complaint said. “No one doubts for a second that Harvard would have taken swift, aggressive, and public actions to enforce its policies had the victim been one of Harvard’s ‘favored’ minorities.”

It continued, “Harvard’s antisemitic intent is obvious. Several of its faculty publicly supported the attacker and tried to blame the victim (because, the faculty said, his Jewish presence was ‘threatening’ to other students). And, of course, hundreds of rabidly anti-Israel students disrupting campus life pressured the Harvard administration. Ultimately, and shamefully, the university kowtowed to the antisemitic mob it had allowed to take over its campus.”

Alleging violations of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, breach of contract, and conspiracy to deny civil rights, the suit demands all relevant recompense, including damages and the reimbursement of attorneys’ fees.

Nearly two years after the assault, Bharmal and Tettey-Tamaklo have not only avoided hate crime charges but also even amassed new accolades and distinctions — according to multiple reports.

After being charged with assault and battery, the two men were ordered in April by Boston Municipal Court Judge Stephen McClenon to attend “pre-trial diversion” anger management courses and perform 80 hours of community service each, a decision which did not require their apologizing to Segev even though Assistant District Attorney Ursula Knight described what they did as “hands on assault and battery.”

Harvard neither disciplined Bharmal nor removed him from the presidency of the Harvard Law Review, a coveted post once held by former US President Barack Obama. As of last year, he was awarded a law clerkship with the Public Defender for the District of Columbia, a government-funded agency which provides free legal counsel to “individuals … who are charged with committing serious criminal acts.” Bharmal also reaped a $65,000 fellowship from Harvard Law School to work at the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), an Islamic group whose leaders have defended Hamas’s Oct. 7 atrocities against Israelis.

As for Tettey-Tamaklo, he walked away from Harvard Divinity School with honors, according to The Free Press, as the 2024 Class Committee for Harvard voted him class marshal, a role in which he led the graduation procession through Harvard Yard alongside the institution’s most accomplished scholars and faculty.

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.