The Trump administration revoked Harvard University’s ability to enroll international students. Reuters breaks down the impact of the move. Trump held a behind-closed-doors gala for top investors of his cryptocurrency coin. Declan Harty from Politico discusses the ethical ramifications. It’s nearly five years since the murder of George Floyd. The Marshall Project’s Jamiles Lartey joins to assess where police reform is in the country. Plus, the Supreme Court in a split decision blocked an effort to establish the first taxpayer-funded religious charter school, another major ruling against Trump’s efforts to dismantle the Department of Education, more details emerged about the suspect in the Israeli Embassy staffer shootings, and the U.S. is getting rid of the penny. Today’s episode was hosted by Shumita Basu.
Chapter 1: What did Trump's administration do to Harvard?
But first, the Trump administration says Harvard can no longer enroll international students and that existing foreign students must transfer or lose their legal status. The move comes as the administration has been trying to pressure Harvard, the nation's oldest and wealthiest university, to conform to its policies and political leanings.
In a post on X, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said, quote, it is a privilege, not a right for universities to enroll foreign students. And she said this was a warning to other universities, telling them to get your act together.
Previously, DHS had threatened to revoke the university's ability to enroll these students if Harvard did not turn over records of what Noem claimed were illegal and violent activities from international students on campus. In this new letter, Noem said their international program certification could be renewed if records are sent within 72 hours.
Harvard enrolled around 6,800 international students this year. That's a little over a quarter of its entire student body. And international students are a huge source of income because they tend to pay full tuition plus room and board.
Chapter 2: How many international students does Harvard enroll?
A spokesperson for the university referred to the administration's decision as unlawful and retaliatory and said it's quickly working to provide guidance to students. Here's Ryan Enos, a professor of government at Harvard and a member of a group of professors currently suing the Trump administration over funding cuts, speaking to CNN.
This is one of the great things about the United States is that people come from all over the world to study here. It's an incredible blessing. It's something that no other country has where the smartest people in the world come to our institutions to study. And ultimately, that punishment isn't just going to Harvard. It's going to the United States.
It has taken away a great resource that has built up through these universities like Harvard.
A resource that, in a way, subsidizes a lot of other students' tuitions, as explained by NBC News correspondent Antonia Hilton.
So who this is actually going to hurt? All of the marginalized and underprivileged Americans who depend on financial aid.
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Chapter 3: What are the international students at Harvard facing now?
This is just the latest in a month's long back and forth between the administration and Harvard. The New York Times tallied up at least eight investigations the Trump administration has launched against Harvard across at least six agencies — Nearly $4 billion in grants and funding has been frozen, which the university has sued the administration over.
Last month, Harvard's President Alan Garber wrote a letter to the Harvard community saying it would not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights, and saying no government should dictate what private universities can teach or who they admit. As for what comes next for international students at Harvard, Hilton said on NBC, many are now deeply worried.
There are international students waiting for their graduation day in just a couple days right now. With this system being revoked, technically what students are telling me they're fearful could happen. DHS agents, ICE agents could come to the campus if they do not leave and go back to their home countries in the next couple days.
And they could essentially go through what we've seen happen to students in other campuses across the country over the last couple months.
But Harvard might get some short-term relief. Just hours after Noem announced this move, a federal judge in California blocked the Trump administration from terminating the legal status of international students nationwide while another case on the issue is pending. Now to an invite-only crypto gala hosted by the president in Virginia last night.
It was an event with an exclusive and expensive door policy. There was no press, no cameras, and to get a ticket, you needed to be among the top 220 investors in the Trump family crypto coin. Declan Hardy covers capital markets for Politico and has been digging into the guest list. He notes that the collective sum to get into the event was over $100 million.
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Chapter 4: What was the purpose of Trump's crypto gala?
Some attendees spoke on the record before the gala.
Chapter 5: Who attended Trump's crypto gala and why?
They're largely saying that this is about meeting the president. It's getting an unusual opportunity to meet the president in a way that maybe wouldn't be available to them in other means. For some critics, there is a concern, however, that others are attending this to curry favor with the president or influence his perspective on certain policies.
Trump launched his coin in January, just before his inauguration. And when people buy Trump coins, he directly benefits.
Anytime this meme coin goes up in value, that stake becomes that much more valuable. In addition to that, whenever the token itself is traded, whether it's bought or sold, there's a tiny little fee that's collected by the Trump family and its partners who are behind the venture. And that has in total generated millions of dollars in trading fees for them alone.
Chapter 6: How is Trump benefiting from the crypto coin?
Some have been explicit in their desire to buy attention from the president of the United States. A trucking logistics firm purchased $2 million of Trump coin, and the chief financial officer said he was sure Trump, quote, likes to follow who's purchasing his coins.
Houston-based Freight Technologies justified their purchase by describing it as an opportunity to, quote, champion fair and free trade across the U.S.-Mexico border, essentially saying they were hoping to have some sway on tariff policy.
The concern here is multifaceted. And on one end, it is about trade. this is the president enriching himself in office. For another perspective, there's a concern here about who the president is associating with, whether these are folks who are looking to influence his policy or his perspective on certain issues, whether that be crypto or something else.
Chapter 7: What are the ethical concerns surrounding Trump's crypto coin?
Democrats want to ban presidents from offering meme coins in the future. Representative Maxine Waters of California, who is the top Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee, introduced a bill along those lines yesterday. Others have criticized last night's event as a pay-to-play scheme, a blurring of the lines between Trump the president and Trump the businessman.
Some of the president's defenders have pointed out that he comes from a career in business, his family is in business, and they shouldn't be expected to stop doing business while Trump is in office. Others have stated that this really isn't all that different, at least in their perspective, from donor dinners or lobbyist dinners that happen in Washington every night.
The difference being, he added, money from donor dinners goes toward political parties or organizations, not to a president's personal business ventures. Trump once denounced cryptocurrencies as a scam, but has become its loudest advocate, declaring his intent to be the first crypto president.
He has supported a bill designed to regulate and boost crypto potential, which passed the Senate with some support from Democrats this week. He's hired pro-crypto regulators, and he's paused federal investigations into firms. But while guests last night won their ticket, they may have lost something, too.
The Guardian's analysis shows that nearly half of the top 220 investors have suffered a net loss from purchasing Trump's coin since the coin's January launch. Let's turn now to the state of police reform in America. This Sunday marks five years since the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin.
The killing sparked a global protest movement and calls for reforms across the country. Today, we're in a very different place.
If you take a step back and you look around, you can see all of these kind of different signs of a movement in retreat or of a moment that has passed.
That's Jamiles Larte, a staff writer with The Marshall Project, a news site that supports criminal justice reform through its journalism. He's been tracking how many police reform efforts have either failed or been rolled back. For example, in Alabama, lawmakers recently passed a law known as Back the Blue. It expands legal immunity for police officers.
In Minnesota, an organization that was created to help people pay their bail announced just a few days ago that it would be ending that mission. And in New York, the state Supreme Court voted last month to strip one local police accountability board of their power to investigate cases of misconduct.
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