Defense Secretary in culture war with elite universities

The Hill - Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is expanding his culture war into academia, threatening to pull service members’ tuition assistance at potentially dozens of top colleges and universities he views as biased against the armed forces.

The move is setting off alarm bells in the military and academic communities, who worry about cutting off a key pipeline to the officer corps.

“This is stunningly short-sighted of Hegseth, on multiple levels,” said Georgetown law professor and former Pentagon adviser Rosa Brooks. “Cutting off their access to the best universities in the country is just plain dumb, and suggests Hegseth thinks officers can’t be trusted to bring any critical thinking to their classes and academic work, distinguishing between opinion and fact.”

Hegseth’s effort was first alluded to in a video message last week that announced the Pentagon’s decision to cut all academic ties with Harvard University starting in the 2026/2027 school year, claiming it is “one of the red-hot centers of hate-America activism.”

The former Fox News host had a long list of criticisms for America’s oldest university. He asserted without evidence that “too many faculty members openly loathe our military,” cast the armed forces in a negative light and “squelch anyone who challenges their leftist political leanings.”