Governor Newsom went on Friday to the controversy that surrounds a compact of higher education that President Trump has presented to nine universities, including the USC, rebuking the leadership of the campus to “do the right thing” and reject the offer.
The compact, sent on Wednesday to the University of Southern California and other campuses throughout the country, has traveled higher education with its demands for changes in the policy of the right to the right in exchange for priority federal funds.
On Thursday, Newsom returned to Trump's proposal and threatened to reduce “billions of dollars in state funds to any University of California that accepts.
Newsom offered burning comments during a bill in UC Berkeley on Friday, increasing bets in the high pressure decision facing USC.
“Do the right thing,” he said. “What is the point of the system? What is the point of the university? What is the point of all this if we do not have academic freedom? … It is not an option, and the fact that I felt that I needed to send that message is quite shocking, because some people think it is so.”
Newsom mocked the idea that USC, a private institution, even has to deliberate about Trump's offer, calling it a “false option.”
The conservative objectives of the compact
The offer of the White House to the USC and a small group of prominent universities, including the University of Arizona, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Texas and the University of Brown, asks the campuses to follow Trump's opinions about admission, diversity and freedom of expression, among other areas. In return, they would get more favorable access to federal research subsidies and additional funds, in addition to other benefits.
Universities would also have to accept the government's gender definition and would not be allowed to recognize the gender identities of transgender people. The registration of foreign students would be restricted. Regarding freedom of expression, schools would have to commit to promote a wide range of views on campus, and change or abolish “institutional units that punish, despise and even cause violence against conservative ideas,” according to the compact.
In a letter from the campus on Friday, the interim president of the USC, Beong-Soo, Kim, said that the White House offer “covers a series of issues that I think are important to study and discuss.”
“I have already heard from several members of our community, and in the coming weeks, I will be consulting with the Board of Trustees; the Deans and Leadership team; and members of the Academic Senate, the Liberty Freedom Task Group, the Advisory Committee of the Faculty of the President and other groups of interested parties to listen to their perspectives of wide variety,” Kim said. “These conversations can take time, but they are essential to generate trust and community.”
He said it was his responsibility “to advance in the USC mission and maintain our central values.”
Speaking at the Berkeley event, Newsom said that USC is among the “great universities” of California that are “all in this together”, since the campus face an uncertain and rocky future amid the presidency of Trump.
A day before, the governor threatened to retain the subsidies of CAL, the largest financial aid program to the public and private universities of California signed by Trump's agreement. Subsidies are granted based on income, and students become eligible through the free Federal Student Aid or the request of the California Dream Law.
In 2024-25, $ 2.5 billion in lime subsidies were distributed throughout the state. USC received lime subsidies worth approximately $ 28 million during that academic year.
Ongoing UC negotiations
In response to a question about the proposal to USC and if Newsom would issue the same threat to eliminate state financing to UCLA: the issue of ongoing negotiations on ample anti -Semitism research of the United States Department of Justice: the governor said that “he was not worried” for the UC system.
“I am not worried about its ability to organize a strategy that is reflective and deliberative that maintains our values … without resorting to the type of expressed concerns that I have about the university in question that was on that list,” said Newsom.
While UCLA continues to negotiate with the Trump administration, Newsom said he has confidence in the university system, whose leaders have been working “in collaboration for weeks” to reach a resolution.
The most tempered comments of the governor were a change of his comments in August and September, when he said that UC should “sue” Trump and should not “bend the knee”, a reference to his belief that the agreements made by the universities of Brown and Columbia with the White House were bad movements that enhanced the government to direct more campus.
“Governor Newsom, [UC] President [James B.] Milliken and the Regent Board are totally aligned in the protection of values, integrity and incomparable quality of the University of California, ”said the president of the UC Regent Board, Janet Reilly, on Friday in a statement to the Times following the Newsom comments.
In a Friday letter, Milliken said Trump's compact was also a topic of conversations between system leaders.
“Just in recent days, the Administration has announced a plan to impose a myriad of new requirements on universities that seek federal funds, which we will soon discuss with the leadership of the faculty,” said Milliken, without explaining the matter.
Trump's proposal has not been sent to UC. A White House official said that the initial campuses on his list were the first group in many more universities to receive the terms.
After the Department of Justice found in July that UCLA violated the rights of Jewish students in the midst of their response to the pro-palestinian manifestations of spring 2024, the Trump administration sought a penalty of almost $ 1.2 billion of the school. The Government is also looking for changes to admissions, the registration of foreign students, diversity programs and other priorities of the Republican Party in Higher Education.
While praising the management of Federal UC negotiations, Newsom supported the recent actions of UC Berkeley to disseminate the personal information of 160 employees to the Department of Education as part of a federal investigation into the alleged anti -Semitism of the campus.
UC officials said they strive to protect the privacy of employees and were asked to share information with the department because it enforces the Civil Rights Law on Campus. The Faculty has criticized the movement, and some have compared it with anti-book speech practices during the McCarthy era.
Newsom said that “he requested an independent review” of data release to “judge whether or not it was appropriate, whether or not it was consistent with past practices or whether or not to adjust in terms of politics.”
USC 'between a rock and a hard place'
Rick Hess, an education analyst at American Enterprise Institute, a group of conservative experts, said Newsom's comments “did not seem inappropriate.”
“Yes a [Kamala] The administration of Harris had tried something like this, I think that Republican governors would be also furious, ”said HESS, director of the Institute's educational policy studies.
“USC is between a rock and a hard place,” HESS added. “If they say no, what does something mean? What does it mean not to be prioritized for federal research funds?
Newsom criticized the institutions that have already been “exhausted” by signing Trump's compact. The University of Texas has suggested that it could accept the terms. Texas system leaders were “honest” that Austin's campus was chosen to be part of the compact and its “possible financing advantages,” according to a statement on Thursday by Kevin Eltifife, president of the Regent Board.
“In this state, our mental state must be resolved,” said Newsom. “I don't want to press people. I need to press this moment and pressure test where we are in the history of the United States, not only in the history of California. And so they forgive me for being so firm. This is everything. We are losing this country.”
