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Court Dismisses Government's Title VI Anti-Semitism Lawsuit Against Harvard

The decision turns on the particulars of the scheme for federal enforcement of Title VI.

Eugene Volokh | 8.13.2026 12:43 PM

From Judge Richard Stearns (D. Mass.) today in U.S. v. President & Fellows of Harvard College:

[T]he Government has not sufficiently pled an ongoing violation of Title VI. The Amended Complaint [filed March 20, 2026] focuses almost entirely on incidents that took place during the 2023-2024 school year. {Because the factual allegations pertaining to the 2023-2024 school year have been well fleshed out in prior cases, see, e.g., Kestenbaum v. President & Fellows of Harvard Coll. (D. Mass. 2024); President & Fellows of Harvard Coll. v. United States Dep't of Health & Hum. Servs. (D. Mass. 2025), the court does not further rehearse them here.} Only three incidents are alleged to have occurred after this period, all of which took place nearly a full year later (and more........

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