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Trump Moves To End All Remaining Federal Contracts With Harvard; Harvard President: "It Is Hard To See The Link Between" Canceling Research Funding And Antisemitism; King Charles Visits Canada In Rebuke To Trump's 51st State Push; Canada Tourism To U.S. Drops Amid Ottawa-Washington Tensions; Poll: Three In Four Canadians Are Boycotting U.S. Products. Aired 12-12:30p ET
Aired May 27, 2025 - 12:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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DANA BASH, CNN HOST, INSIDE POLITICS: Today on Inside Politics, turning the screws. President Trump tells his government to cancel all contracts with Harvard. The latest move in a full-frontal assault on America's most prestigious university. It's a fight, the White House thinks it's winning, and it's already rippling across America.
Plus, O Canada, America's neighbor to the north invites the British king to open parliament. A clear message about Canadian sovereignty, after President Trump's talk of pushing the U.S. border all the way to Quebec. And Andrew Cuomo comeback, what will New York's state of mind tell us about the former governor's latest political bid?
I'm Dana Bash. Let's go behind the headlines at Inside Politics.
We start with President Trump's fight against the nation's first university. This morning, the administration moved to cancel all remaining federal contracts with Harvard, which could total $100 million. Now that is on top of the two plus billion dollars in frozen research grants.
And last week, the homeland security department banned the school from enrolling international students. A federal judge temporarily paused that move. Harvard has refused to bend to the administration's barrage of demands, but the White House is clearly relishing this fight.
CNN's Kristen Holmes joins me now. Kristen, what are you hearing from your sources inside that building about how these moves are going and what's next?
KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yeah. Well, Daniel, we're hearing that as early as this afternoon, the Trump administration is going to send a letter directing federal agencies to cut off any remaining federal grants, any remaining federal contracts with Harvard University. As you said, that's roughly $100 million.
In addition to that, they are advising them to look for alternatives, any contracts that they had been considering Harvard for or had upcoming meetings with Harvard about. They are asking them essentially to scrap that and start seeking alternatives. Now, again, they have the agencies until June 6 to come back with those cancelations and say which contracts they've been canceling.
But as you said, Dana, I mean, this is just the latest in the Trump administration's attempts to undermine and really kneecap the institution. Just to walk through the timeline here, that started just about a month ago, on April 14, when the Trump administration froze $2.2 billion in grants.
The next day, they threatened Harvard's tax-exempt status. The 17th, they demanded international student records. On the 13th of May, they froze another $400 million in funding. The 22nd, they moved to bar international students, which you mentioned. The 26th, they considered redirecting $3 billion to trade schools. And then, of course, today, the 27th, the administration telling these agencies to cut the funding.
Now, of course, as we've reported, the administration is accusing Harvard of several things. One, liberal bias. Two, allowing antisemitic activity on campus, but three, having too many foreign students, something that Donald Trump himself has talked about. Take a listen.
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DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: We give them billions of dollars, which is ridiculous. We do grants, which we're probably not going to be doing much grants anymore to Harvard. I'm not going to have a problem with foreign students, but it shouldn't be 31 percent, it's too much, because we have Americans that want to go there and other places, and they can't go there because you have 31 percent foreign.
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HOLMES: Now, I will tell you, they spoke to some administration officials who said that they're hearing from their allies, and their allies are backing these movements, essentially meaning the base is backing a lot of what they're doing in this fight against Harvard. But again, this idea that Donald Trump is freezing these funds to kind of take it to the elite.
Just a reminder, that a lot of this money is not just money that goes to Harvard or to elite education. It's also research grants on things like medicine or different programs technology that's being developed.
BASH: Yeah, absolutely. Thank you so much, Kristen. I appreciate that reporting. And I'm joined here by four amazing reporters, CNN's Phil Mattingly, Seung Min Kim of the Associated Press, CNN's Isaac Dovere and CNN's Priscilla Alvarez. Hello everybody.
Phil Mattingly, let's just start with the latest news that we expect, as Kristen said, to happen later this afternoon, which is officially stopping, I think, the rest of the federal funding that hasn't already been stopped, and that was the grants and so forth. And just the overall fight here, there's no question that this is good for the Republican base.
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I mean, this is what they have been pushing for, fighting for, it was this notion of what they call woke higher education institutions has been a part of their directive for a very long time, and now he's actually doing it. The question is, the repercussions?
PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN ANCHOR & CHIEF DOMESTIC CORRESPONDENT: The most informative conversation I had as it relates to this was middle last month, kind of at the start of everything. And I was texting with an outside ally, kind of, what Kristen was mentioning folks who support where the president is on education issues. And I said, how high up the escalatory ladder are you guys going to go here, specifically as it pertains to Harvard? And the individual said nuclear to the very top. And I think that is really critical to understanding here that as they go back and forth, there is no trigger where the administration feels like they need to back down here.
One, when it comes to things, especially on grants and loan programs. They have the authority within the federal government. This is one of their levers of power that they can pull. They've pulled it across several sectors. I think, two, the sheer belief in the politics of this, that they don't see any downside whatsoever.
And I think that's where to your question -- the question, I think the issue becomes, are you so blinded by the political upside that you see, that you don't see the potential long game problems here on things like research.
BASH: OK. So, I'm glad you said that, because you're right. In the short term, the politics for them is like a no brainer. But when it comes to what people may not understand about what Harvard actually does and other institutions what they do to help with humankind and the science that helps us all. That is something that Alan Garber, who is the relatively new president of Harvard, is out with a new interview at NPR talking about.
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ALAN GARBER, HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT: The research funding, it's not a gift. The research funding is given to universities and other research institutions to carry out work that the research work that the federal government designates as high priority work. Cutting off that work does not help the country, even as it punishes Harvard, and it is hard to see the link between that and say antisemitism.
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SEUNG MIN KIM, WHITE HOUSE REPORTER, AP: Right. And it's not just Harvard. I mean, there could be chilling repercussions across the higher education spectrum. I mean, there are already signs that -- there are already institutions that have scaled back what they would do otherwise, particularly to avoid the wrath of this administration. So, the repercussions could be really broad, not just with the kind of research that Harvard does and the -- and the broader impact that that research could have, but also what other institutions do.
But again, you know, this isn't, I mean, the Trump administration is certainly not going to relent. And I didn't see -- and I saw a really perfect sort of encapsulation of the whole MAGA versus elite. Yesterday when the president said, I want to take this bill, $3 billion that goes to Harvard, and give it to trade schools across the country. I mean, that's kind of the picture that the administration is hoping for.
Obviously, Harvard wants to make this more of a fight about academic freedom, First Amendment grounds. The courts have sided with them so far on some of the court challenges that they've had. But in terms of the framing, you're right, Republicans are certainly eager to have that fight politically.
EDWARD-ISAAC DOVERE, CNN SENIOR REPORTER: Look, it comes at a moment where we've had a lot of different rationales expressed for what's going on here. Is it about fighting antisemitism? Is it about the ties between Harvard and the Chinese Communist Party, which came up last week? Is it about fighting woke DEI ideology on campuses? It's all these things have been offered up by the Trump administration.
And what is going on is the political fight that they're looking for, and in a broader way, trying to -- I think as you said, chill speech and chill the way that people approach what they're teaching on campuses, and in a way that models after what we've seen going on in Hungary with Viktor Orban and other places where you have literally situations where professors are being ratted out essentially by their students or by fellow professors. And it is already happening on American campuses far beyond Harvard.
BASH: And let's talk about something that is very much in your wheelhouse, Priscilla, which is something that is on hold, which is the administration's desire to forbid foreign students from getting visas, student visas.
This is what the Harvard Hillel director said about that. His name is Rabbi Jason Rubenstein. Revoking all student visas, including those of Israeli students who are proud veterans of the Israel Defense Forces and forceful advocates for Israel on campus is neither focused nor measured, and stands to substantially harm the very Jewish students and scholars it purports to protect.
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PRISCILLA ALVAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This has massive implications. We're talking here about nearly 7000 students who -- foreign students who attend Harvard University. And this was something that the Wall Street Journal and their editorial came out and talked about calling this a quote, short sighted attack, because what you're doing here is, the U.S. is competitive for many reasons.
But one of them is because of its prestigious educational institutions, and the fact that students come from all around the world to study in the United States, and they attract talent that way. And so, this could hinder the United States on the global scale, and it could push these students to look elsewhere.
Now, this action in particular allows these international students to go to other universities in the United States. But amid this uncertainty, who's to say that any of those students want to stay in the United States? And I will also tell you that part of this is left over from the first Trump administration.
There was a cohort of people in the first Trump administration that really wanted to target the way that we handle international students. There was a push to slash some of the programs that are put in place for these students to get jobs in the United States after they graduate for a period of time. So, in some ways, this is sort of the aftermath of that, and then on top of that, at a much larger scale --
BASH: And I just want to add one thing, because what we heard in that sound bite that Kristen played was the president saying, well, we got to open up those spots for Americans. You're our numbers guy, or at least you do numbers better than I do. But basic numbers and basic math is that the tuition that comes from foreign students helps pay for scholarships for American students at Harvard.
MATTINGLY: Right. I think they -- this is being framed in a very binary way across several different fronts. None of those fronts are remotely binary. And I think you can have an argument about, well, money is fungible, or grants, everything kind of meshes together. It's not actually the case here, like people are funding trade schools. If they could shift money directly to trade schools, they would. That's not how these grant programs necessarily work. So, take that on one side.
And to your point as well on the students and what they actually represent. There are higher education problems, particularly as it pertains to the cost for anyone to go to any of these universities. I don't think eliminating a clear flow of funds as it relates to that is going to be helpful in any way, shape or form. I also don't think that they care to some degree, at least I haven't got any sense that they do.
KIM: Also, can I just point out that Donald Trump keeps complaining that Harvard is not giving him a list of these foreign students. The administration already has a list. These international students have student visas to study in the United States. That means the Department of Homeland Security has all their information, so that is their list.
BASH: OK. Everybody stand by. Coming up on Inside Politics, King Charles is visiting Canada. It's a not so subtle message to President Trump and the United States. Then new COVID vaccine guidelines have just been announced. Why a lot of children may no longer be eligible for the shot.
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BASH: America's neighbor to the north, Canada is still part of what's left of the British Empire.
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BASH: And today, Ottawa transformed into a scene out of the crown. King Charles was welcomed with a verse of the Canadian National Anthem as you heard there as he arrived at parliament to deliver remarks known as quote, speech from the throne. But while he's addressing Canadians, it's really an American audience. Well, an audience of one inside the White House that King Charles was really speaking to.
CNN's Paula Newton is live in Ottawa. So, Paula parts of the speech seem to be very clear. He was taking on President Trump's push to make Canada the 51st state.
PAULA NEWTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, 100 percent. Look, Dana, this was a bold invitation to the king, duly accepted by the king, and the speech itself was bold. Not that there's anything that President Trump should be taking offense to here.
But the fact that Mark Carney -- and again, a reminder, Mark Carney and his government wrote this speech. It is the king's speech in that he gives it in parliament that these are the words of this government going forward. And they wanted the White House and allies beyond to hear them loud and clear, Canada is sovereign and very distinct from the United States. Listen?
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KING CHARLES, KING OF THE UNITED KINGDOM: Today, Canada faces another critical moment, democracy, pluralism, the rule of law, self- determination and freedom are values which Canadians hold dear, and ones which the government is determined to protect. The system of open global trade that, while not perfect, has helped to deliver prosperity for Canadians for decades, is changing. Canada's relationships with partners are also changing.
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NEWTON: Changing, and again, in diplomatic language, Mark Carney's government, writing for the king that indeed President Trump is transformational, right? But Canada making it clear that it still believes in free trade. And going forward, it has some priorities. Again, like the free trade like, in fact, those distinct values that harken back to its policies on the environment or even an immigration system, all of those things very distinct in Canada, those were the king's words as written by Mark Carney's government.
I have to say, though, a couple of things that President Trump will like, too specifically, and that is reinforcement of the security of that northern border and a commitment to rearm the Canadian Armed Forces. Look, there was a lot said here that you could take, kind of read it between the lines, but I'm sure the White House will not take much offense to this. And again, they did point out that there is a lot that brings these countries closer together. King Charles speech certainly a commitment to, in his words, keeping Canada free and sovereign.
BASH: Before I let you go. Too much -- too details of much lesser importance, but I think they're fascinating because Isaac was asking, and I didn't know the answer, but you did, the throne and the carriage. Can you talk about those?
NEWTON: All in storage here, and they are kept here before for the queen, and now for the king and queen, they are kept here in Canada. They bring them out, they polish them specifically for these occasions. There aren't many of them, but even that royal carriage, right.
And also, the spectacular RCMP Musical Ride. They escorted the queen and the king. They have been practicing like mad. This was a quick visit, less than 24 hours, and put together in just a few weeks a tall order, the weather helped here, Dana, it was spectacular.
BASH: Well, that's a first for Canada, probably. Thank you so much.
NEWTON: Thank you for that. I love it.
BASH: Paula, appreciate it. And just a reminder, the scene in the Oval Office three weeks ago when President Trump repeatedly floated Canada becoming the 51st U.S. state during his meeting with Canada's new prime minister.
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TRUMP: It would really be a wonderful marriage, because it's two places that get along very well. They like each other a lot.
MARK CARNEY, CANADIAN PRIME MINISTER: Well, if I may. As you know, from real estate, there are some places that are never for sale. Having met with the owners of Canada over the course of the campaign last several months, it's not for sale, won't be for sale ever.
TRUMP: But never say, never. Ever say never.
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BASH: My panel is back. So, Isaac, since you asked that great question, which we got the answer.
DOVERE: I don't think he has --
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BASH: I have to say that I have been mildly obsessed with this, you know, slightly small detail, that the reason why Canada -- one of the main reasons why, as Mark Carney said, Canada is not for sale, is because it is part of the former -- or, I guess, what is left, as I said, of the British Empire, that he's going to have to go through King Charles first to get Canada.
And the fact that the king came had this event in Ottawa just, you know, an hour ago. As Paula said, did it on short notice, clearly with a message. It's so fascinating, particularly because we know how President Trump loves the British monarchy.
DOVERE: Yeah. And like part of when the British prime minister was there, a couple of weeks before Carney, what he did is he brought a letter from King Charles inviting him. There's all that to get into Trump's head that way. Look, I'm hesitant to quote a headline from another network, but the BBC, the British Broadcasting Corporation, in this case. I think that they led with a quote from King Charles saying, the true north is indeed strong and free.
There is no question here that this is Canada and the British monarch saying, get out of here. This is not a real conversation. And look, this is one of these many things where Donald Trump says things, and we go through this debate of, is he joking around? Does he mean it?
And in this case -- as in other cases, and what's going on to Harvard, we were talking about the last segment, the reaction from the world is not -- hey, that's just something you're tweeting about, but is, no, we are not playing around with this.
ALVAREZ: And Carney talked about Canada's owners and that moment in the Oval Office, and we're actually seeing the way that Canadians are reacting to this, and the way Americans are reacting along the U.S. northern border, and how that is affecting their own trade, how that is affecting their own travel. So, while we talk about this in a macro sense, and the relationship between these countries, there's also a very micro relationship that is being disrupted in the middle of all this dialog.
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BASH: They're pissed. They are. The Canadians are pissed. And let me show you some data on that. Canadians boycotting U.S. goods, 76 percent -- 76 percent. So, three quarters of Canadians say that they're not buying U.S. goods, American goods.
Now here's another stat, Canadian travel from the U.S., which is kind of a big deal for a lot of American hospitality, U.S. hospitality, by plane down 20 percent, by car down 35 percent. And these are actual statistics taken by Canada as they clock who comes back into their country.
KIM: That's really fascinating. And also, just putting that, those numbers in context. I was really interested by a trip that a bipartisan group of senators took to Ottawa in the last several days. I mean, you know, senators always do these types of codels (Ph), but this was kind of a little mini diplomatic mission to show Canada that U.S. is still your friend and still your neighbor.
And in the words of our friend, Isaac Dovere, that is where we're at, where we have to reassure Canada that we are still friends with him. But the business statistic was really interesting because the one Republican on the trip, Senator Kevin Cramer of North Dakota, said, we want to make sure we want to do business with our friend Canada.
I mean, this isn't just a Trump spat that he's, you know, perpetuating. I mean, this affects, like Priscilla said, the economy trade, it is very important that U.S. and Canada have a working, vital relationship.
BASH: I'm glad you mentioned Kevin Cramer, because I too have a quote from --
KIM: Very quotable man.
BASH: I don't want to get in Donald Trump's way. There is no trade deal that happens without his involvement. But at the same time, I want to be an encourager to Canada that their officials -- and their officials and try to be a partner in some way, as you mentioned. Hopefully I navigated it OK, but I'll find out on Truth Social.
I mean, all of that, which you kind of mentioned at the beginning, but that last part is just so perfect, because they know that if they get cross wise with the president. They're going to hear about it, not in private, but they'll get blasted in public.
MATTINGLY: Well, potentially both. Kevin Cramer, because I assume he would also get a phone call from the president as well. I see this with literally no snark. Kevin Cramer is probably the best diplomat that you could send in this situation, in the sense that he was one of the first people to endorse President Trump back in 2016.
He's always had a good, I think, candid relationship with him and he gets along with Democrats. He's very quotable. When you talk to him in the press, so we like him a lot. But I think more importantly, he understands the deeply integrated economic realities, given his state and the border in North Dakota. And I think that matters a lot.
The other thing too, I would just keep an eye on, you mentioned King Charles and how the president and the invite to the second state visit was so critical and really pitched out by the prime minister when he came to the White House. The president's relationship with Mark Carney is very, very different than it was with Justin Trudeau.
I cannot overstate how personally people inside the White House, the president on down, viscerally loathed on a personal level, Justin Trudeau, for whatever the reasons we're going back to the first term, parties different, and they are trying to --
BASH: Even though they're the same party.
MATTINGLY: Even though they're the same party. They are trying to establish a relationship, both sides. I think they're actually making a good faith effort at this point. It'll be interesting to see how that plays out.
BASH: OK. Don't go anywhere. The big Apple, is there a comeback coming? Well, Andrew Cuomo, hopes he is on the fast track to the New York mayor's office. We'll talk about that after a break.
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