Last week, the Gairdner Foundation announced its 2025 awards to some of the world’s best biomedical scientists. The Gairdners are Canada’s top international prize, and one in four awardees goes on to win the Nobel Prize. This year, in addition to the first Gairdner in its 68 years going to a nurse practitioner, there was talk by the eight awardees and Gairdner head Dr. Janet Rossant about the threats to science by the Trump administration.
Make no mistake, those threats are existential; they threaten science’s very existence.
With an anti-vaxxer in charge of the US Department of Health and Human Services, asnake-oil surgeon running Medicare and Medicaid, and an anti-masker in charge of the National Institutes of Health, which allocates $35 billion in research grants across America and internationally each year, the risk to free and independent enquiry is dire.
I doubt science has met a pathogen as deadly as Donald Trump. Indeed, it is metastasizing to every area of advanced inquiry, the kind housed in America’s great universities. Along the way, it has laid waste to the legal profession, bringing its top firms to heel with the simple proposition of: “Your money or your life.”
Those same five words have also been applied to universities deemed too ‘woke’, an idea first put forth by J.D. Vance three years ago.
Last month, the White House came for America’s elite universities, ‘reviewing’ their federal funding — $9 billion for Harvard, $1 billion each for Yale and Cornell, $750 million for Northwestern, $400 million for Columbia, and $175 million for the University of Pennsylvania, insisting they oust faculty, suspend programs, and end partnerships with people and ideas Washington doesn’t like. (*All figures USD except where noted.)
The White House also cut $210 million in research grants to Princeton.
It is one of two universities that aren’t going to roll over, at least this week.
A century ago, on March 19, Princeton’s president, Christopher Eisgruber (who has an interesting backstory and a new book on free speech), said no, loudly in The Atlantic.
Then, last week, he told The New York Times that Princeton would take the $210 million hit to its revenues and not make a deal with the devil.
Then, on Monday, Harvard also stepped up, saying they’re going to resist Washington freezing $2 billion in grants, claiming the White House’s demands are “unmoored from the law.” This prompted the White House to up the ante and threaten Harvard’s tax status.
And thus begins the biggest fight over academic freedom in American history.
It is so consequential that Canadian academics are wiping their research of any DEI connection in work they do with elite American universities, and on Tuesday, the Canadian Association of University Teachers issued a travel advisory urging its members to “only travel to the U.S. only if essential and necessary.”
Said Princeton’s Eisgruber about American universities and America’s government: “When you ask about things like, why does the United States win so many more Nobel prizes than other places? Why is it that we have the set of discoveries here that over time lead to things like the internet and artificial intelligence, or GLP-1s, or new immunological cancer treatments? Those things are happening because of this partnership.”
“It’s not our job to reflect the political ideology of the country. We’re not a Sunday morning talk show that has ideological balance on it. We need to be open to conservative views. We need to be a place where conservatives feel they can flourish.”
“But we’re supposed to be doing something different than just reflecting what’s going on in the country.”
“We’re supposed to be having arguments that get at truth and knowledge, and that’s different from a political debating society. It’s different from what goes on in Congress. And it’s different from what goes on in a lot of journalism or from the political distribution in the country.”
“I’m not considering any concessions…But I believe it is essential for us to protect academic freedom.”
At this point in his interview, The Times jumps in:
“OK, so let me just ask you specifically. Let’s just say that tomorrow the Trump administration says we want to put one of your departments under academic receivership or you don’t get your money. What do you do?”
Replies Eisgruber: “We would not do that. We believe that would be unlawful, and we would contest that in court.”
It must have been hard for him to say this, knowing what wrath lies ahead for doing so. Others have quickly caved after raising their fist, and time will tell if he does.
But Princeton may have a better chance than even Harvard.
One reason is, it has no medical school and, unlike most other elite universities which do, it’s not dependent on NIH funding.
Another reason is, it’s rich. While its endowment is ‘only’ $33 billion (compared to Harvard’s $51 billion (and the UofT’s CAD$3.3 billion), Princeton is also small.
Actually, it’s tiny. It has just 8,600 undergraduate and graduate students, compared to Harvard’s 25,000 and Cornell’s 16,000 (and UofT’s 100,000).
Its budget is $3.1 billion, compared to Harvard’s $6.5 billion (and UofT’s CAD$3.5 billion).
So it’s cushioned better than most to withstand a loss of $210 million in US government funding when Harvard stands to lose $2 billion.
It also has alumni like Jeff Bezos who, wondering what his loyalty to Donald Trump actually got him, may just decide to share part of his own $209 billion fortune with a more reliable friend, his alma mater.
But there’s another factor that may see Princeton not only endure the Trump regime, but prevail. That is Chris Eisgruber’s character, which saw before others that “once you make concessions once, it’s hard not to make them again.”
Meanwhile…
1. Mr. Maher goes to Washington. Bill Maher has had a hate-on for Donald Trump since forever. Last week he was invited to the White House to dine with the President. Here’s his report.
Mr. Carney goes to Europe. Bits of a Substack post written by a German branding consultant, Bjorn Ogibeni are claiming heroism on a silent subtle scale by Mark Carney in forcing Donald Trump to pause his latest round of tariffs. Then a longer version appeared.It sounds credible, though the author, Dean Blundell, is not usually associated with gravid economic analysis from the left. A bit of a mystery.
The future comes to the present. The annual AXA Report on the Future puts you in charge of picking the best one.
2. Hewers of wood, drawers of water – and performers of live music. Itgenerates $11 billion in GDP and creates 100,000 jobs. And it’s just a small part of Canada’s arts industry. Both deserve more respect.
But of course, being Canadian is complicated. Especially when we stand on guard for immigration.
3. The Great Gatsby turns 100. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel about rich, careless peoplewas ignored by readers when it came out. The author would soon die at age 44 ofdissipation and the 1929 Depression put an end to années folles. But as we endure yet another Gilded Age of wretched excess and political corruption, Gatsby is a perennial bestseller. Indeed, last week The Library of Congress hosted a 5-hour live reading of the entire novel.
4. Are ‘adulting courses’ a polite way to say “Just Grow Up!”? Adulting coursesare growing as fast as happiness courses. Everything from Adulting: A Crash Course, to Ambitious Adulting, and How to be an Adult.
As The Economist tells it: “Raffi Grinberg, an author, created and taught “Adulting 101” for two years at Boston College. The inspiration for his class came from his first day working at Bain & Company, a management consultancy, soon after leaving university. He and his cohort had to decide which health insurance plan to choose, how much of his salary to devote to saving for retirement and other financial details. ‘Every one of us went out into the hallway and called our parents,’ he admits. ‘We were graduates of really elite schools, and we still didn’t know what to do.’”
P.S. Growing up may be hard; but going up can be harder. And being a limerent doesn’t mean looking over your dear love’s shoulder. Plus, mothers rul. And what a stroke can teach you.
5. Not for the birds. But rather, for us and by the birds. Plus, the gorilla my dreams and going ape with a mirror. Plus owls who run silent, run deep. And how to massage your dog.
6. The end of roadside attractions. Like UFO parks and dinosaur parks, and if your parents drove you up the 40l, The Big Apple. They’re going, going, almost gone. Also fading are real colours in the onslaught of AI creativity, and for the same reason, the incidence of coincidental photos...Not to mention, signs like these.
7. Trains, planes and nautomobiles. First, trains as very big worms, then as ‘dreaded transfers’. Next, airports as destinations and cultural arenas and happiness landings. And Aussie ferries as storm petrels.
8. Behaving badly. First, the concert-goer of the year award. Next, the battle of the sexes. And AI pretending to be a robot. Plus, the economic imperative is the moron risk premium.
9. Male, stale and pale. Last weekend, a group of corporate leaders took out a full-page ad in The Globe and Mail explaining why they are supporting Pierre Poilievre for Prime Minister. Two things queered the pitch: one, of the 32 leaders who signed it, 31 were men. At the bottom, it said they signed in their personal capacities as “Individual Canadians”; if that’s true, why did every name have a title and corporate affiliation? Mr. Poilievre really does have a women problem.
10. What I’m liking. Ian Leslie’s biography of half The Beatles, John and Paul, A Love Story in Songs, delves wide and deep into their personal and professional lives together. Each depended on the other and fled when the other got too close. Still crazy after all these years.
Also, I first fell across the dazzling British historian and co-host of the Empire podcast, William Dalrymple when he spoke at a festival in Greece in 2023. He’s coming to Toronto on May 6 to discuss his big new book, The Golden Road, a sweeping history of South Asia’s profound influence on the world, at the Toronto International Festival of Authors. Tickets are just $15 here.
And finally, Dr. James Orbinski was installed as the Principal of Massey College last week. Most remarks at these events are florid and ceremonial. His were not: “There are many issues of contemporary concern, but none are more pressing than what has been imposed upon us by a populist American authoritarian president, who is wreaking havoc domestically, and who is hell bent on remaking the world.”