Harvard Turns the Tables on Trump

Welcome back to Communication Breakdown, a weekly podcast from the Observatory on Corporate Reputation. Thanks for joining us. I'm Steve Dowling in Silicon Valley. And I'm Craig Carroll here all in New York City. Each week Steve and I take a look at strategies companies are using to shape headlines and sometimes save their skins. It's the post-game show for PR Pros. This week, Harvard turns the tables on Trump.

After months of trying to somehow meet the White House in the middle on issues of free speech, diversity, and academic freedom, Harvard finally drew a bright line in its own defense and on behalf of American academia. Served with a Trump administration nasty-gram two Fridays ago, Harvard responded defiantly. Not with its fight song, but with an unflinching, unambiguous message from its president. Quote, "The university will not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights."

The White House immediately froze $2.2 billion in grants and went on to threaten the university's tax exempt status. Then, they started piling on new probes and demands for documents and then things started getting weird. The New York Times, citing multiple administration sources, reported some believed that the Friday afternoon letter had been sent in error. But in the same letter, a senior White House official stuck by that letter and blamed Harvard for responding publicly.

This week, with no let up in Trump's pressure campaign, Harvard went on the offensive, suing nine federal agencies, calling the funding freeze arbitrary and unconstitutional. That was Monday. On Tuesday, more than 100 presidents of U.S. colleges and universities issued a statement rejecting what they called "undo government intrusion" and the coercive use of public research funding. The number of signatories has since climbed over 400.

And on Wednesday, Harvard president Alan Garber took his case to NBC Nightly News, asked about the pain Harvard will have to endure going head-to-head with Trump. "We don't know how much we can actually absorb, but what we do know is that we cannot compromise on basic principles like defense of our First Amendment rights." Craig, this dispute is remarkable for a number of reasons, I think, not least of which is this Clash of the Titans' quality it brings.

But what I think we're seeing here is the first actual PR blitz against the Trump administration, and it might have seemed a bit slow moving or limited in its audience because it's ostensibly a bunch of academics. But it has all the components. And this week, especially, I think Harvard has played it extremely well. If you rewind, they had a headline-grabbing rejection of Trump's threats, then the White House

stumbled with this suggestion that the letter was some kind of misfire. And instead of treating that as an off-ramp, an excuse to de-escalate, Harvard puts its foot on the gas- lawsuit, letter, big interview, and crucially, I think they were able to do what industries have not achieved so far in this administration, which is to get an overwhelming number of its peers to stand up in support. And that's just the tactics.

The substance of their message has been really strong as well, making this not about funding, but about universities being an economic asset. Healthcare has been a big part of the message. The first amendment, as we heard, there from Garber. They've broadened the dispute, they framed the issue as much more fundamental, and they've framed it importantly as a stand they have to take. It's not a war of choice.

Garber frames the issue on Harvard's terms: constitutional rights, academic freedom, national impact. That is textbook narrative control. Yeah, and what's wild is, it's not just Harvard is fighting back. It's that they're fighting forward. This is in a defensive crouch. They're using every escalation as an opportunity to widen the frame. And, Steve, the way he laid it out really drives home something bigger here. But Harvard isn't just reacting, they are reframing the entire conversation.

They're putting in emotion the three P's that we've been talking about for chaos management: principles, priorities, and perspective. I'd say, the principles are rock solid. It's about constitutional rights, academic freedom, the integrity of higher education. But it's also the value of truth seeking as a public good. That's a pretty strong moral center. It's not a tactical spin. It's pretty anchored.

And Harvard's response isn't just well timed, it's well principled, you know, they're not flailing. They're not performing, they're standing on very deliberate principles. There's so much that we can talk about here, right? But I would hit on some of the key aspects here because I think they're going to be showing up in companies' responses. They're defending constitutional integrity. They're maintaining their institutional independence, or they're protecting it.

They're being radically transparent. They're not quietly compliant and they're acting with collective responsibility. No, not just institutional self-interest. And they're keeping their composure when escalation would be so easy. We should keep in mind that the initial scrutiny from the Trump administration was ostensibly about anti-Semitism at Harvard and other colleges. And in the response, Garber called that a political ploy.

He said that the administration's effort were just disguised as an effort to address anti-Semitism. But in doing that, he's acknowledged that anti-Semitism is a real and serious issue at his institution. So that takes a weapon out of the administration's hand. He's not running from that issue. I think the general assessment is that he's taken a more head-on approach than his predecessor who resigned under pressure from Congress on the same issue.

But in this round, Harvard sounds credible rather than cornered. They're owning the issue. They're defending their autonomy. That's a powerful messaging duo. They've taken the damaging part of the criticism and they're defusing it. It doesn't make a go away, but it shows strength, to your point.

Yeah. And I think that's the distinction that matters here most, right? That Harvard isn't denying the problem, they're refusing to let it be weaponized. And I think that's a rare thing in institutional comms, right? Owning the issue without seeding the frame. And that's exactly what Garber is doing here. He's not deflecting. He's not minimizing. He's saying yes. And anti-Semitism exists here. Yes, it's unacceptable. And here's what we've done. And here's what we're doing about it.

But he's also saying you don't get to use that as a troche and horse to audit ideology, to control governance, or to dismantle academic independence. And for me, that's what's so effective here, right? It's strength through acknowledgement. He's not trying to shut the conversation down. He's trying to re-anchor it in integrity.

That contrast, especially coming off with how chaotic the previous leadership transition was, makes Harvard sound very steady, not defensive, not performative, but steady. And that changes the dynamic. It makes it harder for critics to say "Harvard won't deal with this." And it makes it easier for allies to stand with them without having to excuse the original concern. I think that's how you take oxygen out of the fire without pretending there was no fire. I agree.

And it's also, it's a classic PR jujitsu move. Because once they has defused that issue, they've moved immediately to pointing out what the government is trying to do to them. And Harvard needs to keep that point about the government being unreasonable in its demands. You need to keep that at the center of this debate. Remind people why they're on defense- why this wasn't a fight that they chose, but that they had to engage in.

And that can be difficult after a few rounds of back and forth, because the press loves a food fight. And we may be guilty of it ourselves here, focusing on the elements of Harvard's response. But Garber has been urging people to read the government's letter and framing it as pressure to audit the viewpoints of the faculty and of students and to reduce the power of students and some faculty based on their views.

And that, as he describes it, and I think it's a fair reading, it's like 'thought police' stuff. And Harvard is calling the government out for starting with anti-Semitism, but really moving quickly to try and regulate the intellectual conditions- I think that's the administration's term- at the university. So that their Harvard is doing a good job in reframing this to their advantage. And I think to the benefit of all these institutions who are under pressure from the administration.

This is where Harvard has to keep the spotlight on where it belongs, right? Because the longer this drags on, the easier it is for people to lose the plot. So you get caught up in the headlines about lawsuits or tone shifts or media strategy. But at the heart of it is the April 11th letter, a federal document telling a private institution how to govern, who to hire, and how to think. That's not reform, that's redesign. And it's not just about anti-Semitism.

It's a blueprint for intellectual control. You know, reduce the power of certain faculty based on ideology. That's not campus safety. That's speech regulation dressed up as a discipline. You're exactly right. Garber's smartest move so far has been to keep pointing back to that letter because when people actually read it, it's hard not to see that it's overreach. That's the challenge in this politicized media environment.

You have to keep re-centering the unrestable thing where else the debate shifts to your reaction instead of to their demand. In a weird way, I'd say this is a test of narrative stamina. Can Harvard keep anchoring the story in what was asking of them? And everyone else is trying to shift the frame to how they responded. Great. This is a question I have for you: From an outsider's non-academic perspective like mine, I have to wonder if this is one of those things that only Harvard could do.

They're the oldest college in the country, the richest university in the world. We won't get into a debate about prestige, but they're on a very short list. Could an institution like Columbia or UCLA or the University of Minnesota - all of whom are on Trump's hit list - Could any of them or their peers have been just as defiant and rallied the troops as effectively? Or did it have to be Harvard? It's a great question.

I think the honest answer is probably not in the same way, but maybe in their own way. The challenge is that Harvard has a sense of institutional gravity that a lot of universities simply don't have. When they speak, it ripples, not just an acudeme, but across business politics, philanthropy, media. That kind of cultural capital that gives you a lot of room to take a swing without immediately getting flattened by the backlash. Now at the same time, you can't let that be an excuse, right?

There are things that Columbia can do, that UCLA can do, Minnesota can do, and any institution that can reframe an attack on them as an attack on something bigger - on education, speech, autonomy - they can mount a credible defense. And they might not get 150 universities to rally behind them overnight, but they could build legitimacy through clarity. So yeah, Harvard had the runway. They did just lean on the prestige, they used it strategically.

Now they framed this around systems and not status, research, medicine, constitutional rights, national interest. I mean, these are the things that make it resonate beyond the Harvard bubble. And I think that part is replicable. So yeah, sure, they did have the runway, but what they did with it, that's the playbook. And I think the real takeaway here is that institutions don't need to be elite to be effective. They just need to be principled. They need to be consistent.

And Harvard just happened to be the first one out of the gate with all three, you know, being principled, strategic, and consistent. They definitely broke out of this trap that other institutions we saw last summer. I think it was with all the congressional hearings, just like not being able to finally draw that line and say no more and then go on, you know, while still on defense go on offense to take control of the situation.

Yeah. I want to talk about the support that they're getting from other universities in a second, but the tactician in me cannot let this one thing go. There was one flaw in Harvard's execution last week that was, it was not very consequential in the end, but I think it was somewhat telling about the balance that Harvard is trying to strike and those of us in communications, you know I think recognize the situation that they ended up in.

But here's what it was, on Monday the 14th when Harvard first responded to that White House

letter with real defiance, a really well written letter. Garber told his community, the initial quote was, "The university will not negotiate over its independence or its constitutional rights." On the Harvard website, his letter was edited to read (that line instead said), "The university will not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights." I think the first version "will not negotiate" was in an email and the second "will not surrender" was public facing on their site.

I don't think that Harvard was looking to signal any more flexibility with that change, but this theme of engagement seems very important. And I think it's because you seem unreasonable if you won't come to the table at all, if you say we will not negotiate. So it was an edit for tone- "We won't negotiate." Right. It was a little crisper, but "we won't surrender" is just as strong and felt like maybe it was meant to embrace dialogue.

But just from an execution standpoint, when I got an alert about that change, I thought, "Oh geez, like that's going to look like a backpedal." And it's really hard to get away with that, making a change after you've released the message. But clearly it was important. And that messaging has been so consistent and strong on not surrendering, not compromising that it hasn't hurt them.

I think it's a good reminder for every corporate communications team out there, tone is not just dialogue strategy, especially in moments like this when you're under public scrutiny. The difference between defiance and dignity is often... it could be just one line of copy. And we've seen this in Boardrooms too. Some companies want to sound strong and sometimes they overshoot, they go out with a statement that's too sharp or too closed and then they have to walk it back a little bit.

And that might make the milk a little weaker than if they just said less. But what Harvard did in that edit, we won't negotiate too, we won't surrender. That's a kind of calibration that matters. It protected their red line, it invited continued dialogue. And I would say that's what good corporate affairs strategy does. It defends the boundary, but it also keeps the door open because once you lose tone, you're going to lose trust and not just with your critics, but with your own people.

And we should point out the language that Harvard has been using is really strong and clear. Everything they are saying is rooted in the stakes. What's at stake? Constitutional rights, academic independence. The long-term benefits of academic research, especially in medicine. These are broad and sweeping, but they're not hyperbolic. They're about shared values and they're not abstract. They mention Parkinson's research, Alzheimer's, diabetes.

Harvard says the government is threatening the health of millions of people and that's hard to ignore.

Yeah, yeah. And what's striking is how consistently Harvard has linked language to consequences that matter. They're not just using slogans, they're using stakes and not abstract ones. Concrete measurable ones. Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, battlefield medicine, that kind of research that doesn't just advance knowledge, it extends lives. And that's doing more than just moral positioning, to type of systems framing, if you will.

They're not just reminding the public and regulators here that this isn't just about one institution being defined, it's about what happens when government overreach interrupt systems that benefit everyone. And I think that's a very different kind of appeal. It's not just 'protect Harvard'. It understands what Harvard enables and what they've done, which I think is what a lot of corporate leaders can learn from here is they've avoided the temptation to center the institution itself.

They've centered impact. Yeah, it's not about being self-important. That's it. Yes. Right. And when you do that, you're not just defending the brand, you're defending a benefit. And the language just flows naturally from that posture. Let's talk about the other universities now. I think it's over 400 who have signed on to that message that came out the day after Harvard made its big stand with the lawsuit. I think the defiance of Harvard's stance is really important.

But it may be just as significant that this was the week that colleges and universities started taking collective action. And I think it looks to be a very effective way to counter this White House's approach. The academics working together and maybe some signs that businesses might be ready to as well from some other developments this week. Could we be looking at a different equation?

Because I think up until this week, as Harvard takes this stand and the other university stand up for the promise of higher education in Harvard's words, it's a really important departure from what we've been seeing and how others have dealt with the Trump administration to date, which is basically, if I can cut a deal for myself, I'm going to do it and the rest of the industry or the rest of the economy, they can figure it out for themselves.

The white shoe law firms, I think are probably the best example of that or the worst depending on how you look at it. But now we have the universities taking collective action and it feels to me like this could

be a different equation. Yeah, that's right. And what you're describing is the shift from fragmentation to formation. Trump's approach has always relied on isolating institutions. Find the weak point, apply pressure and make the response look like an overreaction. It's intimidation by fragmentation. And for a while, it worked, right? Schools, companies and even industries have backed off because they didn't want to stand alone. But what we saw this week was a different kind of posture.

Collective institutional defense, right? You know, first Harvard steps up, then Columbia, then MIT, then the University of Minnesota. And suddenly now, you know, you've got 400 university presidents saying this isn't about Harvard. It's about higher education. That, I think, reframes entire encounter. It stops it being a referendum on one school and becomes a challenge to the legitimacy of the pressure itself.

And, you know, if business joins in, not politically, but structurally around research, innovation and shared values, then the train can shift again because now it's not about whether one university will comply, it's about whether this whole idea of public / private partnerships can operate under political threat. And that's a much harder question for the administration to answer. Yeah. And it's a much easier place for institutions to align without looking partisan.

Yeah. The Trump team loves this "flood the zone" approach where they have so many outrageous things going on at once that the press can't keep up, let alone the rest of the audience. This is the first time I think that we've seen a serious, multi-prong pushback. And I wonder how the White House is going to keep up with the sustained battle - if they can sustain it - against consistent messaging.

Harvard has 400 universities and countless voices out there lining up under this banner of the promise of higher education, freedom of speech, health research, and all the benefits of that brings. They could, I think because of all the voices, they can keep that fresh and keep making consistent points. The White House...Trump signed another executive order on Wednesday. I think it was targeting admissions. He's out on his Twitter-lookalike, calling Harvard anti-Semitic.

But I don't see anything in the White House playbook except more pressure and more doubling down. And that's not to dismiss those things. It's just, I think it's likely going to feel like even more overreach, which would play into Harvard's strategy. This is where it flips, right? Trump's model has always been about movement without message. Create enough chaos that clarity becomes impossible. And Harvard didn't try to just match the volume.

They matched it with message consistency and that's much harder to counter.

The real reversal here is that the longer the White House keeps throwing new threats: executive orders, new accusations, loyalty tests- the more they start to sound erratic. Meanwhile, Harvard keeps saying the same thing in different ways with more people. This is about research, this is about speech, this is about how institutions function in the democracy. And I think that's what's giving the response more power. It's not escalation, it's repetition with discipline.

And there's examples of that at every one of these, I'm sure, 400 plus universities who have signed on, which means there could be a local story there. There could be a trend in a certain area of research. And anyone who's tried to orchestrate a campaign like this, and we don't have any insight about how much coordination Harvard's actually doing behind the scenes, but when you run something like this, one of the first things you look for is supporters, surrogates.

Prominent people who can keep the conversation going, write those op-eds, appear on television, demonstrate the support for your position. And I can't think of an institution in this country that has a more potent network of surrogates than Harvard. Totally. And what's impressive is that they're not overplaying it. They're using the circuit network strategically.

They're not flooding the zone with big names, but letting those validators surface organically in ways that feel credible, not coordinated. I think that's a hard balance to strike. We've got op-eds, interviews, legal minds, former cabinet members, all reinforcing the core narrative without stepping in. That's key, right? You don't want to have circuits introducing new messages. You want them to repeat, amplify, and lend legitimacy. Yeah. And here's the broader point.

Most institutions might not have Harvard's rolodex, but every organization has got some form of a circuit ecosystem. Alumni, former exec, strategic partners, people with credibility, yes, suppliers, right? Yeah. People whose credibility carry weight with key audiences. The question is whether or not who they are and whether or not you're prepared to use them in a moment like this, because when the heat comes - and it will - you're not going to have time to recruit.

You need to have people art at position to speak, not just on your behalf, but on behalf of the principles that you share. Yeah. I think the configuration in this instance with the academic institutions that we talked about collective action, and so it's more like peers, rather than someone whose business is dependent on, let's say, a company that's running a campaign like this. But I think we are seeing perhaps the signs of more collective like action in the private sector.

We talked on this podcast about GM and Stellantis directly with Trump over tariffs, but we've heard of some companies and sectors supposedly getting exemptions for themselves from the tarot. A really interesting story in Bloomberg had this week about a major Coca-Cola, Cola bottler who had given money to Trump. Anyway, on the same day that Harvard sued Trump met in the Oval Office with who CEOs of Target, Walmart, Home Depot, private meeting, so very different, I think.

Their message reportedly was about higher prices in this summer of scarcity that we've started to hear about empty shelves with a possibility of empty shelves at big box retailers. So maybe we are seeing other signs that industry is going to be more likely to take this collective approach. Well, let me make one other point here about this notion of collective action because the

colleges and universities, I think, have really landed on something here. And that is, you know, the targets are one thing, but this is a group of peers who are each finding themselves in the same situation. And they have finally found a voice and a sort of rally round effect here thanks to Harvard. I wonder what lessons the business community can take from this because they have approached it very differently.

I think with the most important thing from a tactical point of view is that Harvard has broken out of the pattern we've seen of institutions and companies dealing with this administration, which has basically been, if I can cut a deal for myself, I'm going to do it and everybody else can figure it out for themselves. We've talked on this podcast about GM and Stellantis dealing directly with Trump over tariffs.

We've heard of other companies and other sectors supposedly getting exemptions for themselves. I think there's an interesting contrast to draw here because on the same day that Harvard sued Monday of this week, Trump met in the Oval Office with the CEOs of Target, Walmart and Home Depot together and reportedly their message was a unified one about higher prices coming because of tariffs.

And this concept of summer of scarcity that we've started to hear about that there may be empty shelves at the big box retailers. And I just wonder if there's going to be signs of a different approach here for business. Yeah, I think that's probably the cleanest contrast that you could ask for.

On one side of Pennsylvania Avenue, you've got Harvard saying, we're drawing a constitutional line in the sand and on the other, you've got CEOs walking into the Oval Office saying, let's talk supply chains. Neither approach is wrong in its own, but if they tell you everything you need to know about the current playbook for power, if you're not aligned politically, you better be aligned economically. What makes this moment so striking is that it shows two different models for access.

Harvard's betting on principled resistance to find the institution, protect the system, and the big box CEOs, that's transactional navigation. Stay in the room, protect the margins, but both are trying to manage the chaos and both are trying to do so using totally different instruments. But they're both showing strength and numbers, I think, as much as the point I was trying to make. They're both showing strength and numbers.

But let's be honest, corporate America has largely at this point, try to stay out of the ideological line of fire this time around, and that came at a cost because if you're not careful, the silence starts to look like complicity or worse opportunism and this climate, what you get seen that way, your license, stop rate can evaporate overnight. So I think the contrast is vivid. Harvard's showing lines, big business is cutting deals.

And it's not just about their ability to work together or to elicit so much support from other universities. I was impressed with the letter they wrote in the first place, just circling back to where

we began, right? The whole idea of that they're not going to take Trump's charge to them, a non-disclosure agreement, right? That they're going to handle this behind the scenes. They were very open. They put the letter out there. They stood firm in their principles and they're allowing everyone else to see it for themselves. That's something any other company could do. And I wonder if we might be in a different place if other companies had been willing to do that. Maybe, maybe not.

I mean, maybe Harvard might have given the size of, given their size based on the size of their downwind and also the number of the alumni that they have infusing all throughout society and throughout the world. I think the key there is the message is rock solid and it was clear, like I said, bright line.

This is a hard no. But in addition, what it signaled was, it was an acknowledgement that what they'd been trying wasn't working and they needed to do something else if they wanted to break out of this limbo. Well, who's the they? Harvard.

I and the other colleges and universities who have been stuck in this trap and they get hold in front of Congress and then they're, you know, the next thing you know, they're university president is out and it just feels like, you know, capitulation on important issues that were also reducing, you know, their standing and their ability to fight this because I think maybe they were kind of trying to do it halfway.

And I remember reading that there was, you know, a movement inside of Harvard by hundreds of members of the faculty essentially saying like, it is time to fight back. And I think that's what we saw this week. I think that's, you know, the dual frame that they've got a whole principle and consequence. If it's just about values, it starts to sound at risk sounding a little abstract, but if it's only about money, it's the same time, right? It sounds self interested. And it sounds worse.

Yeah, even worse, right? But when you put them together, constitutional overreach on one side and cancer trials on the other, then I think that's when the public starts to get it. And to your point, look, they're still on defense, but it doesn't feel like retreat. Yeah. You know, it feels like resolve. Yeah. And that's what's rare. Final thoughts from the professor? I would say you look when most institutions, when they're under this kind of pressure, they're

either going to law you up and go quiet or they over-correct and they spend those cell center corner and Harvard's done either one of these. They've stayed in the conversation. They've kept their tone steady and they've kept asking the public to read the letter. I think that's the move. What's next? I think it depends on other institutions treating this as Harvard's fight or if it's the rehearsal. This playbook won't stay on campus.

The idea that you can engineer compliance or public funding or reputational pressure or loyalty signaling, that's not going to go away. I think the only question is who's ready for it when it shows up at their doorstep? Yeah, I agree. Harvard's approach here, I think, is packed with lessons for communicating through a crisis and turning the tables on an attack. They're still on defense. That's a key message.

They didn't start this fight but with the moves that they've made over this past week, they've shifted from simple self-defense to a really principled stand. As I said, they're credible rather than cornered. They've found their narrative. They're getting ahead of the critics. They're rallying support. I don't know what Trump's going to come back with, but I said earlier, Harvard needs to keep that concept of government overreach at the center of this for the principle. And the rest of us.

Yeah, and they've got to keep talking about the negative impact of the funding freeze for the practical. In closing out here, I think the chief concern that I have is we're doing a podcast where Harvard is in the center of it is the idea that any organization says, "Well, we're not Harvard. We can't do that. An only Harvard could do this." For me, it circles back to the idea that when you don't have resources, you have to be resourceful.

Every organization can think about the resources they have, the capacity they have, but it starts with the belief that there's something that they can do and that they have the power to think creatively. And with clarity about, "Okay, what's the end goal? What are we trying to accomplish here?" Yeah. You got to plant the flag, draw the line, choose your metaphor, and really stick to it, commit to it. And figure out how you can be consistent in that message and in that stand.

And so far, I think we've seen Harvard and now 400 other universities rallying to it, so we'll see where it ends up. Well, that's our show for this week. We want to thank Shawn P Neal and the team at AdvoCast as well as the People Forward Network for making our podcast possible. If you have comments or suggestions for the podcast, we'd love to hear from you. Our email address is podcast@ocrnetwork.com. And breakdown is a production of the Observatory on Corporate Reputation.

I'm Steve Dowling. And I'm Craig Carroll. Thanks for listening. We'll be back next week. [MUSIC]

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