Trump Administration Launches Investigation into Harvard Law Review for Alleged Racial Discrimination
People walk through Harvard Yard on the Harvard University campus in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on April 15, 2025. Joseph Prezioso | AFP | Getty Images
The Trump administration on Monday announced the opening of two investigations into Harvard University and the Harvard Law Review following a report that the prestigious legal journal was selecting articles for publication based on their authors’ race rather than merit.
This announcement comes amid tensions between the Trump administration and Harvard, including demands for the Ivy League university to implement a series of changes, such as dismantling its DEI programs and screening international students for ideological concerns.
Two weeks ago, the Trump administration froze $2.2 billion in grants to Harvard due to worries about antisemitism on campus and related issues. Last week, Harvard responded by suing the administration, challenging the legality of the grant freeze.
On Monday, the civil rights offices of both the Department of Education and the Department of Health & Human Services stated they would investigate allegations of discriminatory practices at the Harvard Law Review. “The investigations are in response to information ED and HHS received about policies and practices for journal membership and article selection that may violate Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964,” according to a joint statement issued by the departments.
A Harvard University bus drives past the campus on April 17, 2025, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Sophie Park | Getty Images
The probes were announced three days after a conservative news outlet published an article under the headline “Exclusive: Internal Documents Reveal Pervasive Pattern of Racial Discrimination at Harvard Law Review.” This article cited what it claimed were internal documents at the Harvard Law Review that spanned over four years, stating that those documents “reveal a pattern of pervasive race discrimination at the nation’s top law journal and threaten to plunge Harvard, already at war with the federal government, into an even deeper crisis.”
The article claimed that “just over half of journal members … are admitted solely based on academic performance.” It continued, stating that the rest are chosen by a “holistic review committee” that has made the inclusion of “underrepresented groups”—defined to include race, gender identity, and sexual orientation—its “first priority,” according to a resolution passed in 2021.
The investigation also noted that the Law Review has “incorporated race into nearly every stage of its article selection process,” and that “editors routinely kill or advance pieces based in part on the race of the author.” The joint statement from the U.S. departments mentioned a Law Review editor who found it “concerning” that “[f]our of the five people” who wanted to respond to an article about police reform “are white men.” Another editor suggested that a piece should be expedited for review because the author was a minority.
Craig Trainor, the Education Department’s acting assistant secretary for civil rights, remarked, “Harvard Law Review’s article selection process appears to pick winners and losers on the basis of race, employing a spoils system in which the race of the legal scholar is as, if not more, important than the merit of the submission.” He added, “Title VI’s demands are clear: recipients of federal financial assistance may not discriminate on the basis of race, color, or national origin. No institution—no matter its pedigree, prestige, or wealth—is above the law. The administration will not allow Harvard, or any other recipients of federal funds, to trample on anyone’s civil rights.”
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