Elie Honig Stunned When White House Admits It Sent Menacing Letter to Harvard by Mistake – But Blamed Harvard Anyway: ‘I Mean…’
The White House admitted on Friday that it mistakenly sent Harvard University a threatening letter that the school’s attorneys subsequently ripped apart in a public rebuke.
The New York Times published a wild report on Friday evening, stating that the rejection prompted “a frantic phone call from a Trump official.”
“The April 11 letter from the White House’s task force on antisemitism, this official told Harvard, should not have been sent and was ‘unauthorized,'” two sources told the Times. The letter included a list of demands, including the elimination of diversity, equity, and inclusion programs and the expulsion of pro-Palestine protestors. It also demanded that Harvard guarantee “viewpoint diversity.”
President Donald Trump threatened to rescind the institution’s tax-exempt status after the university rejected his administration’s demands.
The Times report included quite the comment from a Trump official, who said Harvard should have called the White House after receiving the letter instead of responding with a letter of its own that it made public.
“It was malpractice on the side of Harvard’s lawyers not to pick up the phone and call the members of the antisemitism task force who they had been talking to for weeks,” said May Mailman, the White House senior policy strategist. “Instead, Harvard went on a victimhood campaign.”
On Friday’s edition of The Source, CNN Senior Legal Analyst Elie Honig phoned in to discuss the Times report about the errant letter, which he called “outrageous” and “obviously unconstitutional.” He was also in awe of the administration placing the blame on Harvard:
Ok, so the White House’s position is, it was malpractice by Harvard to not realize that this letter was so outrageous, it probably wasn’t true. I mean, [inaudible] I think that statement actually just sort of gives away the whole game. Essentially, the argument that we’re hearing there from May Mailman at the White House is, “They should’ve known. They should’ve known there was something wrong. They should’ve picked up the phone and said to us at the White House, ‘Hey guys, this looks like a mistake.'”
I think it’s pretty obvious where the fault lies, though.
Honig concluded by wondering what’s next.
“Now, does the White House withdraw this?” he said. “Or do they sort of decide, ‘Whoops, we’re pot-committed now, and we’re gonna have to have this fight through to the end’?”
Watch above via CNN.
