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PaperclipPerfector  2d ago (text post)   11102 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 29, 2025

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Continued Evolution on "The Plan" to Deal with Universities

WaPo cites two anonymous "White House officials", one of which is described as a "senior White House official". They claim that the purpose of anonymity is "because [the plan] is still being developed". So obviously, take that for what it is. Plausibly just a trial balloon to see how it plays; plausibly just a push by one faction within the WH to change direction.

“Now it’s time to effect change nationwide, not on a one-off basis,” said a senior White House official

At least somebody at the WH is observing that doing things like indiscriminate chemotherapy wasn't working, and now little targeted things might be struggling, too.

The new system, described by two White House officials, would represent a shift away from the unprecedented wave of investigations and punishments being delivered to individual schools and toward an effort to bring large swaths of colleges into compliance with Trump priorities all at once.

Universities could be asked to affirm that admissions and hiring decisions are based on merit rather than racial or ethnic background or other factors, that specific factors are taken into account when considering foreign student applications, and that college costs are not out of line with the value students receive.

Huh. I wonder who suggested this sort of thing eight months ago. Of course, that person was also showered in downvotes for continuing to suggest something like this over "indiscriminate chemotherapy".

This was pretty straightforward all along. The playbook was already there. The hooks were already there. There are ways to affect change that are actually oriented toward the goals you want to accomplish. It seems like at least some people in the administration are continuing to find their way to it.

Of course, the wild response is wild:

Ted Mitchell, president of the American Council on Education, said the outlines of the proposal amounted to an “assault … on institutional autonomy, on ideological diversity, on freedom of expression and academic freedom.”

“Suddenly, to get a grant, you need to not demonstrate merit, but ideological fealty to a particular set of political viewpoints. That’s not merit,” he said. “I can’t imagine a university in America that would be supportive of this.”

Spoken as if universities weren't asked for ideological fealty to the left in the past. Some academics basically just tried to stay silent on the matter, while others jumped all over it.

A slightly less insane response:

Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the University of California at Berkeley’s law school, said “no one will object” if the White House simply requires universities to pledge compliance with existing law.

But Chemerinsky, one of the attorneys representing UC researchers in a lawsuit challenging terminated federal research funding, also said the administration’s view of what the law requires could be at odds with other interpretations: “It all depends on what the conditions are, and whether those conditions are constitutional.”

Chemerinsky said it would be a First Amendment violation to put schools at a disadvantage in competing for funding if they profess a belief in diversity, for example, because government is not allowed to discriminate based on viewpoint. He said it “would be very troubling” if the White House proposal deviates from the standards that have been used in awarding grants based on the quality and importance of the science, peer review and merit, and uses ideology as the judgment standard instead.

Still sort of lacking, as there was previously a (more-or-less, depending) soft disadvantage in competing for funding if one didn't profess a belief in diversity. If you want me to take this complaint seriously, then you should also say that the left having done that before was wrong. You should say so publicly and publicly commit to a position that the previous regime was, indeed, subject to the exact same concern that they were discriminating based on viewpoint.

But indeed, the Trump admin is in a legally privileged position here. They can, indeed, just demand that universities comply with existing law. I think Prof. Chemerinsky is being a bit coy about whether some universities will complain; my sense is that UCal has already been on a tighter leash for some of these things than many other unis... and yes, even just actually complying with the actual law is going to be a fight for some of them.

Universities could be asked to affirm that admissions and hiring decisions are based on merit rather than racial or ethnic background or other factors, that specific factors are taken into account when considering foreign student applications, and that college costs are not out of line with the value students receive.

Huh. I wonder who suggested this sort of thing eight months ago. Of course, that person was also showered in downvotes for continuing to suggest something like this over "indiscriminate chemotherapy".

It's still as dumb as it was eight months ago. They can just lie. You'll have a blue-haired university administrator affirming to whatever it is they are told to affirm at the same time that they do whatever they want anyway.

Lying in applications for federal funding comes with significant institutional and personal penalties. That machinery is already in place.

Lying in applications for federal funding comes with significant institutional and personal penalties.

It never has before, why would it start now? Any punishment that isn't felt keenly before Trump leaves office in 3 years is no punishment at all. I don't think that's enough time for the court case and ten appeals that would follow any attempt to punish liars.

Slight correction: You've never seen it before. Some of us have.

Punishment for the lying depends on

  1. The lying being discovered and proven and

  2. Political misalignment between the punisher and the lies

That won't happen here. The lie will be very difficult to discover and prove to the standards necessary, and a friendly administration will almost certainly take over and put a halt to the attempts at punishment.

To the extent it is a problem, (1) is a problem for any scheme of enforcement. (2) is another form of a "government is sometimes held by my opponents" problem.

But you're distracting from the real question, of course. It appears that even the Trump administration is coming around to the idea that it's best to go after specific things, where they are strong, and enforce them broadly, using the hook of federal funding and existing mechanisms. As I suggested months ago. Not indiscriminate chemo for no purpose, no rhyme or reason, just blasting randomly. It's not like blasting randomly is going to solve these concerns you're now bringing up. It's just silly misdirection.

To the extent it is a problem, (1) is a problem for any scheme of enforcement. (2) is another form of a "government is sometimes held by my opponents" problem.

Which is why this method cannot work.

If indeed the Trump administration is "coming around" to the idea that things like having ideologues pro forma swear they aren't doing things according to their ideology rather than the formal rules will help, the administration is screwing up.

this method

is undefined, so one cannot determine how generally scoped your claim is. My comment was very clearly making a scope argument (about your own argument), so this is just non-responsive.

Alternatively, the most natural of the charitable interpretations is that you agree with my scope claim and acknowledge that your own proposal suffers at least the same defects.

Slightly less charitably, you're just doubling down on misdirection and obfuscation. Bad faith argumentation stuff.

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Yes, but enforcement actions will likely cross from one administration into the next, in which case a friendly administration will just drop it. We've seen this repeatedly. All deeply embedded Democratic partisans need to do is run the clock out until one of their guys gets back in power, and then all is forgiven and things can ratchet another degree.

If that's your worry, then I'm all ears for your plan on how to reduce the ability to use the federal government as a weapon for partisan purposes against universities. Or, well, anything else for that matter. This isn't even a university problem. It's a "government is sometimes held by my opponents" problem.

It's a "government is sometimes held by my opponents" problem.

Which is best solved by an Augustus or Bonaparte, who can then go full Henry VIII (with maybe a little Qin Shi Huangdi) on academia.

I slightly worry that if and when we do get one of those folks, it's not going to be good for me. Not because I think it's going to be someone who you think is in your image. It's probably not going to be that either. But it will likely be the forever boot in the face that @The_Nybbler is always concerned about.

Meh, it’s practically impossible to run a right wing authoritarian regime in thé US without support from my community, in particular, we’re not the only one, I’d suggest you join one.

To which community do you belong?

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Well, during the Obama administration, their plan to harden the policy objectives against a hostile government was multi pronged.

Slightly in bounds, but still corrupt as hell, they began suing companies and structuring the settlements such that Democratic aligned NGOs were paid out exorbitant warchest. It was a naked shake down, and Bill Barr ended the practice, but then the Biden admin brought it right back. It allowed NGOs to have deep, deep pockets to fight in court everything Trump ever did.

Of course, they didn't stop there. They also fabricated a criminal conspiracy that the Trump administration had to spend virtually their entire presidency fighting in court.

The Biden administration of course emptied the government coffers, throwing money to NGOs as quickly as they could and left the incoming Trump administration right up against the debt ceiling. I think the Trump admin was able to claw some of this back, but it's also being used by leftist organizations to fight them in court.

Since these tactics are just so damned effective, I think Republicans should adopt them. I want to see more political prosecutions, and I want to see more naked corruption between republican governments and their aligned NGOs. Let Trump's DA start suing universities left and right, and structure the settlements so that they have to give some Elon headed NGO all the money, so he can sue them some more long after Trump is out of office. It's a strategy that clearly works since the D's have run it successfully for over 10 years now.

Fair enough as a description of your preferences. I think the right, in general, is debating to what extent to engage in a similar strategy, due to the risk of never-ending reprisals and descent into further banana republic (which I think folks who are somewhat aligned with you in this question would say the country already was). Nevertheless, there's nearly nothing in here about universities. I mean, I guess there's a sentence about somehow getting settlement money from them to Elon, but not a single sense of what that sort of thing might actually look like. How the mechanics of it could work. I'm not even looking for a complete strategy, but some sort of something that a person can squint at and say, "Ah yes, I can mayyyybe imagine how that might work." Call it, say, "concepts of a plan".

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