Opinion: California must take a bolder stand for universities targeted by White House

The Trump administration’s assault on American higher education has recently been fixated on UCLA, where I teach administrative law and executive power.

The White House has moved to cut off $584 million in federal funds for the university’s supposed failure to prevent antisemitism on its campus. It has demanded a penalty of almost $1.2 billion dollars, insisted that the university not admit “anti-Western” students, publicly disavow recognition of the transgender community, and end gender-affirming care at the university’s hospitals.

This a moment to stand up and fight. The University of California Regents must challenge the Trump administration in federal court. At the same time, Gov. Gavin Newsom and the state legislature must provide the UC system with the financial support it needs to stand for the rule of law and academic freedom.

The university has the law on its side. My colleagues and I drafted an open letter to the UC Regents explaining why the funding terminations were unlawful. Over 170 professors at UC law schools have signed it. The Trump administration has ignored the clear procedural requirements of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Administrative Procedure Act of 1946 — such as the requirement that it provide for a hearing before an impartial decisionmaker before terminating funds, report to Congress and offer substantial evidence for its charges.

Last week, a federal judge temporarily blocked the Trump administration from terminating UCLA’s funds. However, the Supreme Court has created jurisdictional doubts about this and other lawsuits, suggesting that some claims may need to proceed in the obscure federal Court of Claims.

A suit by the regents in the Court of Claims would help to fill any gaps created by the Supreme Court’s unclear and evolving jurisprudence. It would also provide legal and symbolic support to researchers who have so far been fighting the university’s legal battle on their own.

These days the law is not always enough. Since the government has failed to provide due process, universities reasonably fear that failure to comply will only bring on more deadly funding cut-offs, and perhaps other forms punishment, such as loss of nonprofit status.

Given this climate of fear, the university and the state will need to partner to challenge the government’s illegal persecution. Newsom has already urged the regents to fight back against the Trump administration, asking, “How could you possibly accept this fine. Fine for what?”

He’s right. But the university receives over $17 billion a year in federal funding, including $5.7 billion for research and program support. It would struggle to survive, much less maintain its status as a world-class research and educational institution, if all of those funds were withdrawn.

Newsom and the state can help. Democratic lawmakers in California have proposed a ballot measure that would provide for $23 billion in funding for state grants for research. The proposal would leverage California’s unparalleled economic strength to check the Trump administration’s lawlessness.

Faculty, staff and students know that we will bare serious burdens in a protracted legal battle with the Trump administration. But we cannot do it alone. We need the support of our state and of our fellow Californians.

California holds a unique place in the American mind — above and beyond the output of Hollywood. America would not be the same without that western boundary, where the endless and often destructive quest for imperial expansion once reached its limit.

If California succeeds, then the history of the United States can move forward on broad, sunlit beaches. If we fail, we may slip into a night made darker by the dimming of scientific light.

Blake Emerson is a law professor at UCLA. He wrote this for CalMatters.