How Trump Promotes the Republican Agenda in American Educational Institutions

For decades, leftist and progressive trends have dominated American universities, which have witnessed, after President Donald Trump’s victory in the 2024 elections, a state of acceptance of some conservative ideas with an increase in the number of members joining Republican clubs that had been almost suspended for a long time.

As Trump begins his first week in office, he wasted no time slashing critical protections for students across the country as well as ending programs uplifting underrepresented communities. 

Trump has ended White House programs focused on advancing educational equity and opportunities for Hispanic, Native American, and Black students. His administration also rolled back efforts supporting tribal colleges and Hispanic-serving institutions.

With Trump recently signing laws targeting students who support Palestine in particular, and curricula that indoctrinate students with ideologies about race and gender, it seems clear that these projects are beginning to enter into force early in Trump’s second term.

Republican Momentum

When Trump was first elected president in 2016, colleges offered milk and cookies to terrified students, while students wearing MAGA hats faced harsh criticism from their peers.

After the 2024 election, MAGA supporters are getting high fives and friendly nods, according to The Wall Street Journal, which reported that conservatives have not become mainstream on left-leaning campuses, but the social stigma surrounding them is beginning to disappear.

Trump-supporting students at 12 colleges said they now feel more comfortable expressing themselves publicly, citing a surge in membership in Republican clubs on campus, which had long been virtually nonexistent.

The Wall Street Journal credited the momentum to a group of conservatives who have recently come out in the open, noting that some of them trade cryptocurrencies and belong to student organizations, while others adhere to traditional conservative values, such as religious commitment and wearing formal suits instead of sportswear.

Several young Republicans indicated that they spent a lot of time during high school under the burden of the Coronavirus pandemic closures, expressing their boredom with the restrictions imposed on them regarding what they can say or think, but they seemed more bold in expressing their positions now.

Conservatives on American colleges considered the most serious challenge they face to be progressive professors who do not like to discuss or defend Trump.

Left-wing tendencies have dominated American universities for decades, through faculty, curriculum and administration.

In a survey of Harvard’s first-year students in 2025, only 5 percent identified as Republicans, while conservative professors were even lower.

The GOP’s standing across the country was so low that conservative students at the University of Maryland had to constantly replace their posters because some were being torn down.

In the spring of 2024, the pro-Trump movement began to shift from toxic to acceptable, according to Enzo de Oliveira, president of the Cornell University Republican Club.

Applications to join the Republican group surged after pro-Palestinian protests against Israel’s ongoing war on Gaza disrupted a job fair.

Harsh Penalties

On January 29, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order paving the way for the deportation of international students at US universities accused of anti-Semitic activities.

The order states that it is the policy of the U.S. to prosecute, expel, or otherwise hold accountable those who commit anti-Semitic harassment and unlawful violence.

US media say that international students who participated in protests against Israel’s offensive in the Gaza Strip could face deportation, while critics have expressed concerns that the measure could limit freedom of expression on college campuses.

Human rights groups and legal scholars have said the measure would violate constitutional free speech rights and is likely to lead to legal challenges.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) said it would consider challenging the expected order in court if Trump tries to implement it.

It’s not only students who are under threat. The president is conducting an all-out assault on liberal democracy—what Perry Bacon Jr. of The Washington Post called a full-scale war against modern liberalism.

“This executive order, in its attack on institutions of higher learning and on the constitutional right to free assembly, needs to be understood in that context,” he said.

In his first week in office, Trump also pardoned accused white supremacists and antisemites, including members of the neofascist Proud Boys, who were involved in storming the Capitol in Washington on January 6, 2021.

All this is to say that the president is not threatening college students to actually fight the very real problem of antisemitism or to protect Jews. He uses Jewish fear and the threat of antisemitism to attack civil rights, minorities, and democracy itself while allowing antisemitism in his own administration to fester. 

On the other hand, many colleges accused of tolerating antisemitism on their campuses have been settling with federal civil rights investigators in the weeks before Trump’s inauguration, who urged a tougher response to campus protests against the war in Gaza.

But other colleges at the center of the highest-profile cases — including Columbia and Cornell — face investigations that remain unresolved and could run the risk of harsher penalties after Trump takes office. 

Trump has not said what he would like to see come of the investigations, but he has threatened to revoke federal money for schools that fall short of his demands.

The flurry of recent deals has drawn outrage from Republicans in Congress who say the Biden administration is letting colleges off the hook.

Rep. Tim Walberg, a Michigan Republican, chair of the House Education and Workforce Committee, said the settlements are toothless and fail to hold woke higher education institutions accountable for permitting antisemitism. 

A December report coordinated by House Speaker Mike Johnson found that colleges across the U.S. failed to stop antisemitism amid last year’s demonstrations.

The report called for new legislation to support students and ensure accountability, and it endorsed legislation to cut off federal money at schools that support divestment from Israel. 

It called on the executive branch to aggressively enforce civil rights laws, saying universities that fail to curb antisemitism are unfit stewards of taxpayer dollars should be treated accordingly.

Race and Gender

Trump’s latest attack wasn’t limited to supporters of Palestine. Trump signed orders aimed at halting the teaching of what He sees as critical race theory and other subjects related to race and gender in American schools, or risk losing federal funding.

Trump and his allies throughout the campaign have accused public schools of teaching white children to be ashamed of themselves and their ancestors due to the country's history of slavery and discrimination against people of color.

He has also launched a campaign to reshape the Department of Education and suppress what conservatives describe as a left-leaning political climate in schools.

He has directed his education secretary to formulate a strategy within 90 days to end brainwashing in elementary and secondary education, sparking criticism that schools could be bullied. 

Trump had previously appointed billionaire professional wrestling mogul Linda McMahon to head the Department of Education, but a Senate confirmation hearing has not yet been scheduled.

Trump’s latest measures seek to fulfill some of the Republican president’s key education promises, though it’s unclear how far he can go in implementing them.

Trump has repeatedly promised to carry out Project 2025’s extreme plan to defund the Department of Education and has a long history of attacking funding for the Department of Education during his first term. 

Trump recently called for a $7.1 billion cut to funding at the Education Department with a proposed budget.

Political strategist Basil Smikle Jr. told Reuters that the executive order will have a chilling effect on subjects related to race and ethnicity in schools, noting that it would restrict the kind of reading materials that are even available to students outside of the classroom. 

“Trump is hellbent on defunding and sabotaging the Department of Education and other critical education programs, causing dangerous downstream effects on the quality of education for children all over the country,” DNC Senior Spokesperson Hannah Muldavin said.