00:00of the Trump administration's retribution campaign against Harvard University,
00:04and now the independent student-run law journal on campus, stunning revelations about how the
00:09Trump administration is wielding power to punish its perceived enemies and impose its political
00:15agenda. New York Times is reporting this, quote, the Justice Department quietly approached Harvard
00:21University last month with startling claims and signaled that it was reviewing claims of
00:26discrimination against white men at the Harvard Law Review and accused the renowned publication of
00:31destroying evidence in an open investigation. Quote, in a series of letters that have not been
00:36previously reported, the government also disclosed that it had a, quote, cooperating witness inside the
00:42student-run journal. That witness now works in the White House under Stephen Miller, the architect of
00:48the administration's domestic policy agenda, Trump officials confirmed. Quote, the witness, Daniel
00:54Wasserman was identified as a government cooperator in two of the letters to Harvard University from
01:00the Justice Department last month when he was still an editor at the Harvard Law Review. Joining our
01:06conversation is New York Times correspondent Michael Bender. He's bylined on that reporting we just read
01:10from. Amanda, Barb, and Miles are still with us. This seems wild, Michael Bender. Take us through what
01:18you're reporting. Yeah, this has been one of the more remarkable stories, I think, in this entire saga
01:25from Trump, his assault on academia, mostly, most recently on Harvard. I think this is, you know,
01:34whether it's sort of the, his deportation policy or his terror policy or these attacks on higher
01:43education, the Trump administration has prioritized speed and shock value first and foremost. And what
01:50this story does, I think, is sort of shows the risks and the rewards of that kind of shoot first
01:56mentality. You mentioned there is a cooperating witness for the Department of Justice who works
02:05in the White House. It is not clear to me that the White House knew he was a cooperating witness when
02:12the Justice Department hired him. It's not clear to me that the Justice Department knew he was
02:17working in the White House or interviewing with the White House when they started working with him
02:21on his case. And that has led to, as you can imagine, a lot of complications, a lot of complications
02:28in this investigation. On the other hand, the administration did extract some concessions out
02:35of the Harvard Law Review. Now, this is a student-run publication that doesn't have any, is independent
02:41of Harvard and doesn't receive any federal funding. And it was fairly extraordinary that they got involved
02:48at the Law Review on behalf of this student in the first place. But the Law Review did decide to revoke some
02:56disciplinary action against this student for downloading documents in violation of their privacy policy. And
03:04they have largely moved away from their requests of him to stop disseminating those documents. Maybe not a big deal
03:14in and of itself, but, you know, where the Trump administration is concerned, even though small things are viewed as
03:21big victories inside the administration.
03:23Michael Bender, just explain to me why Harvard is engaged or how layered it is for the Law Review
03:36person who viewed himself as, I guess, wrongfully reprimanded based on the reporting. At what point in the
03:44timeline does he become a West Wing staffer in the Trump war against Harvard?
03:49Yeah, so he is, there is some overlap in those timelines. He, his first day in the White House
04:01was at the end of May, at basically the same time the Department of Justice is sending Harvard letters
04:07informing them that they have a, that they have a cooperating witness from inside the Law Review.
04:13It's, it's, it's our reporting that, that this, this employee, this, this former Harvard Law student
04:22started interviewing with the White House about roughly at the end of April. That's also about the
04:30same time this issue first bubbled up within the Law Review of potential discrimination against white men,
04:38white authors at, inside their review, was from a conservative publication, a story in the, in the
04:43Washington Free Beacon, that, that, that, that sort of spun up this, this story and launched
04:48investigations now from the Department of Education, the Department of Health and Human Services,
04:53and the Department of Justice into, into the Harvard Law Review.
04:58Amanda Carpenter, I don't know where to begin. We are now, I guess with a straight face,
05:08to swallow the discrimination cases being pursued by the almighty United States Department of Justice
05:15civil division. The reporting suggests it may eventually become a criminal investigation
05:19by a young man who is now a West Wing staffer. Tell me all the things that is wrong here.
05:28Yeah, I mean, it's worth taking a step back because it's hard to like keep track of all the ways,
05:33right, that Donald Trump is seeking to punish Harvard. And so like, what, what is this about?
05:38I mean, this originally started with claims of the university not protecting Jewish students,
05:44and that was a reason to question all these practices. And now it's just kind of spiraled out
05:49of control to the way that they want to police the editorial practices of a student-run paper,
05:55right? I mean, this is, I mean, I think we should see this for what it is. This is an all-out attempt
06:01for a hostile takeover of one of America's premier places of higher education, right? Like these people
06:09want to use these threats and withholding federal funding essentially to make every college in America
06:16Hillsdale. They are questioning their ability to set their own hiring practices, admission, curriculum,
06:22and now what students write and say among themselves for their own papers. I mean, this is
06:29an incredible, incredible overreach. And, you know, I think they're so focused on Harvard precisely
06:35because it is a crown jewel of education. Essentially, if you can break Harvard, you can break all the
06:40colleges because they have more resources. And so this, this is a roadmap. I don't think it's working,
06:46but it is working with some, with some success, right? Even at Harvard, because they have to engage
06:51in all these harassing investigations. The students now have to be afraid of what they're doing on
06:58their own. And so this is, this is going to be tough, but I do think everybody should be looking
07:03closely, not, not just on the nitty gritty and day by day of what they're doing to Harvard, but the big
07:09picture, all the things they're doing. And, you know, I just got to praise Michael and everyone else who's
07:13really been following the story at the New York Times, because it is hard to track. It does take a
07:17lot of resources. I think they're up to something like eight separate investigations into Harvard
07:21right now. But if they can do it to Harvard, they'll do it to everyone else.
07:43So, I'm excited.
07:44Okay.
07:45Thank you very much.
07:49Thank you very much.
07:55Okay.
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