California vows to ‘instantly’ cut funding to universities that cave to Trump ‘compact’; The Guardian, October 2, 2025

Lois Beckett, The Guardian ; California vows to ‘instantly’ cut funding to universities that cave to Trump ‘compact’

"Any California universities that sign the Trump administration’s proposed “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education” will “instantly” lose their state funding, California governor Gavin Newsom said in a statement.

The Trump administration on Wednesday offered nine prominent universities, including the University of Southern California, the chance to sign a “compact” that asks the universities to close academic departments that “purposefully punish, belittle, and even spark violence against conservative ideas”, limit the proportion of international undergraduate students to 15% , accept the administration’s definition of gender and ban the consideration of race or sex in hiring and admissions, in exchange for “substantial and meaningful federal grants”.

Newsom’s office described the offer as “nothing short of a hostile takeover of America’s universities”.

“It would impose strict government-mandated definitions of academic terms, erase diversity, and rip control away from campus leaders to install government-mandated conservative ideology in its place,” the governor’s office said in a statement. “It even dictates how schools must spend their own endowments. Any institution that resists could be hit with crushing fines or stripped of federal research funding.”

“If any California University signs this radical agreement, they’ll lose billions in state funding – including Cal Grants – instantly. California will not bankroll schools that sell out their students, professors, researchers, and surrender academic freedom,” Newsom said in the statement. Cal Grants is the state’s $2.8bn student financial aid program."