White House Looks to Seize Control of Higher Education Policy Through "Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education"

On October 1, 2025, the White House sent letters to nine universities, attaching a document called the "Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education" ("Compact"), and promising preferential federal funding to those who sign on to the Compact. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon, White House official May Mailman, and Director of the Domestic Policy Council Vincent Haley authored the letter, which offered "multiple positive benefits," including "substantial and meaningful federal grants" and "increased overhead payments where feasible" to institutions that sign the Compact.

The nine universities that received the letters were Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Virginia, the University of Arizona, the University of Texas at Austin, the University of Southern California, Vanderbilt University, Dartmouth College, and Brown University. Recipients were instructed to respond by October 20 with any feedback and to make a final decision about signing by November 21. Seven universities have rejected the terms of the Compact so far, as discussed below. One has responded without accepting or rejecting. A decision from Texas remains outstanding.

During the week of October 13, 2025, the administration extended the offer to all colleges and universities, according to a Truth Social post by President Trump and comments from administration sources. There is no reported deadline for other universities to respond with feedback or a final decision, and there have been no reports of other universities receiving letters about the Compact.

Prior administration actions against universities have generally focused on institutions that the administration contends are adhering to DEI principles or otherwise flouting the administration’s policy priorities. But here, the White House says it chose the nine universities to which it sent the Compact because it considers them "good actors." Some, like Brown and Penn, are institutions that have already reached settlements with the administration.

The Compact

The Compact contains a multitude of requirements grouped together in eight categories that reflect the administration's reform agenda for higher education: Equality in Admissions, Marketplace of Ideas & Civil Discourse, Nondiscrimination in Faculty and Administrative Hiring, Institutional Neutrality, Student Learning, Student Equality, Financial Responsibility, and Foreign Entanglements. The Compact requires signatories to take the following steps, among others:

1. Ban consideration of protected characteristics or proxies in admissions and faculty hiring;
2. Require applicants to take a widely used standardized test (and lists the Classical Learning Test as an example);
3. Foster a "vibrant marketplace of ideas on campus," partially by "revising governance structures" and "abolishing institutional units" hostile to conservative ideas;
4. Prevent disruptions caused by student protests;
5. Adopt policies banning employees from making political statements on behalf of the university;
6. Eliminate grade distortion and publish distribution data;
7. Adopt strict gender definitions;
8. Freeze tuition rates for five years;
9. Publish graduate earnings data by academic program;
10. Eliminate tuition for students pursuing the "hard sciences" if an institution’s endowment exceeds $2 million per student;
11. Comply with anti-money laundering, KYC, and gift disclosure laws; and
12. Cap international students at 15% of the undergraduate student body and share all data on foreign students with DHS/DOS.

The Compact contains both carrots and sticks. Signatories would receive "priority for grants when possible as well as invitations for White House events and discussions with officials." (A White House official clarified that federal funding would not be limited to signatories to the Compact.) Signatory universities must certify compliance annually. The Compact identifies as the consequence of violating any of these terms the mandatory return of federal funding, as well as any private contributions ("upon the request of the grantor") received during years of noncompliance. President Trump has also separately threatened investigations against institutions that do not sign the compact. Moreover, separate from the promise of preferential funding to signatories, language in the introduction to the Compact suggests that institutions that do not sign may imperil existing funding: "Institutions of higher education are free to develop models and values other than those below, if the institution elects to forego federal benefits."

University Responses 

On October 2, 2025, the Chair of UT's Board of Regents said that UT was "honored" to be chosen and "enthusiastically look[s] forward to engaging." As of the date of this alert, there has been public reporting suggesting that UT has formally responded to the Compact. 

On October 10, 2025, MIT became the first of the nine initial recipients to formally reject the "proposed approach" of the Compact. In a letter addressed to Secretary McMahon, MIT President Sally Kornbluth explained that MIT’s values and practices already "meet or exceed many standards outlined in the document," but also expressed disagreement with other provisions in the Compact, particularly those that "restrict freedom of expression and [MIT's] independence as an institution." MIT also expressed a fundamental objection to "the premise of the document" based on its "core belief that scientific funding should be based on scientific merit alone."

A few days later, on October 15, 2025, Brown joined MIT in rejecting the Compact. In a letter to Secretary McMahon, Brown President Christina H. Paxson expressed "concern that the Compact by its nature and by various provisions would restrict academic freedom and undermine the autonomy of Brown's governance." President Paxson also noted that the Compact would effectively change some of the terms of the July 30 settlement agreement Brown reached with the government.

On October 16, 2025, Penn also declined to join the Compact, according to an email from Penn President Larry Jameson to the Penn community. The decision came following a lopsided vote by the Penn Faculty Senate to pass a resolution urging rejection of the Compact.

On the same day, USC also declined to sign. Interim President Beong-Soo Kim noted many areas of alignment with the principles outlined in the Compact, but expressed concern that "tying research benefits to [the Compact] would, over time, undermine the same values of free inquiry and academic excellence that the Compact seeks to promote."

A day later, on October 17, 2025, UVA rejected the proposal. Interim University President Paul Mahoney wrote, of the decision: "A contractual arrangement predicating assessment [of research and scholarship funding] on anything other than merit will undermine the integrity of vital, sometimes lifesaving, research and further erode confidence in American higher education."

On October 18, 2025, Dartmouth responded, but did not elect to join the Compact. In a letter to the administration, Dartmouth President Sian Leah Beilock explained that she did "not believe that the involvement of the government through a compact—whether it is a Republican- or Democratic-led White House—is the right way to focus America’s leading colleges and universities on their teaching and research mission." President Beilock elaborated in an email to the Dartmouth community discussing the response, writing that the Compact "would compromise our academic freedom, our ability to govern ourselves, and the principle that federal research funds should be awarded to the best, most promising ideas."

Shortly before the deadline to provide feedback on October 20, 2025, Arizona and Vanderbilt submitted more nuanced responses to the administration.

While Arizona President Suresh Garimella wrote in a statement that "the university has not agreed to the terms outlined in the draft proposal," he stopped short of rejecting it. Instead, he determined after a call from government representatives clarifying that they "were not seeking a definitive response," that "engagement is in the best interest of the university." To that end, Arizona responded with a Statement of Principles.

Similarly, Vanderbilt Chancellor Daniel Diermeier explained in a letter to the Vanderbilt community that "[d]espite reporting to the contrary," the university "[had] not been asked to accept or reject the draft compact." Instead, it was only asked to "provide feedback" as part of an "ongoing dialogue," and that is the university's "intention."

Takeaways 

The offering of the benefits of increased research funding in exchange for compliance with unrelated laws and the administration's policy priorities presents legal challenges for those universities considering whether to sign on to the Compact. One challenge is that institutions may face conflicting risks. For example, California Governor Gavin Newsom conditioned California universities' continued receipt of state funding (including money from the $2.8 billion student financial aid program, Cal Grants) on institutions not signing the Compact. For California institutions, accepting or rejecting the Compact may carry significant risks. 

Another challenge is that the Compact contains numerous statements that may or may not impose additional requirements. For example, in a section titled "Marketplace of Ideas & Civil Discourse," the Compact states that signatories "commit themselves" to various goals, like "fostering a vibrant marketplace of ideas," which "requires" that "no single ideology [be] dominant." Likewise, in the section titled "Student Learning," signatories "acknowledge that a grade must not be inflated, or deflated, for any non-academic reason." The language in these provisions stands in contrast to the Compact’s liberal use of the word "shall." Whether the provisions impose additional enforceable requirements or simply set the stage for other demands is unclear.

Moreover, many of the provisions are vague, such that determining if a "violation" has occurred will depend on who is enforcing the provisions. For instance, compliance with requirements to "screen out students who demonstrate hostility to the United States, its allies, or its values" may prove difficult, as would ensuring "an intellectually open campus environment." These ambiguities also increase risk for signatories, who may face investigations and enforcement under the False Claims Act (FCA) based on any failure to adequately implement any term in the Compact. In that way, the Compact is reminiscent of the DEI certifications that federal contractors are now required to sign.

If multiple institutions agree to sign the Compact and start receiving significant benefits as a result, momentum may build for other institutions to do the same. We will be monitoring the developments and issuing client updates.

Conversely, the Compact may be the subject of litigation in the near term, and thus may, at least in the short-term, render any such agreement to its terms invalid. Students, colleges, universities, or interest groups that count any stakeholders among their ranks may try to sue the administration to enjoin enforcement of the Compact or to otherwise protect themselves from the implicit coercion that comes with it. Those potential plaintiffs may target the Compact for any number of perceived vulnerabilities, including, for example:

• Compact usurps/sidesteps the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) and Congressional Appropriations authority. The compact appears to condition access to federal funding on compliance with new policy requirements that were not enacted through formal rulemaking or authorized by Congress. In some instances, this approach could improperly sidestep the APA’s procedural safeguards and may violate the separation of powers by allowing the executive branch to unilaterally impose conditions on appropriated funds.
• First Amendment Violations. The compact’s mandates—such as enforcing institutional neutrality, restricting campus speech, and requiring ideological balance—may infringe on free speech rights of universities, faculty, and students. Conditioning funding on viewpoint conformity could potentially be challenged under the unconstitutional conditions doctrine, which prohibits the government from forcing institutions to surrender constitutional rights in exchange for benefits.
• Due Process Violations—Vagueness. Terms like "noxious values," "hostility to American values," and "vibrant marketplace of ideas" are vague and subjective, making enforcement arbitrary and potentially discriminatory. This vagueness undermines due process and opens the door to selective punishment. Also, the amount of process that is due before a finding of violation is unclear, and the Department of Justice would appear to have the unilateral authority to make such a finding, without any recourse under the APA. Schools that enter into the compact would face a lot at risk with this uncertainty given that amounts paid by the federal government and, upon request, private donors need to be returned if a violation is found to have occurred. Moreover, disputes under the Compact may need to be brought in the US Court of Federal Claims, which would offer only limited recourse for injunctive relief for those schools that sign on to it.
• Enforceability Against the Government. Although the administration may claim that the compact is a binding commitment when seeking to enforce it, the benefits purportedly provided to those schools that sign on to it are sufficiently non-specific that there would be concerns about being able to enforce the compact if the federal government does not follow through. Signatories may also end up receiving significantly less out of the arrangement than expected based on the wide range of interpretations that could be applied to the current language.
• Violation of the Higher Education Act (HEA). The compact may conflict with provisions of the HEA that prohibit federal interference in institutional governance, curriculum, and admissions policies. Imposing mandates on tuition freezes, admissions criteria, and governance structures could exceed HEA’s limits on governmental intrusion into traditional educational governance areas.