Harvard University has become the latest target in the Trump administration’s approach to fight campus antisemitism, with the announcement of a new “comprehensive review” that could jeopardize billions of dollars for the Ivy League college.

A federal antisemitism task force is reviewing more than $255 million in contracts between Harvard and the federal government to make sure the school is following civil rights laws, the administration announced Monday. The government also will examine $8.7 billion in grant commitments to Harvard and its affiliates.

The same task force cut $400 million from Columbia University and threatened to slash billions more if it refused a list of demands from President Donald Trump’s administration. Columbia agreed to many of the changes this month, drawing praise from some Jewish groups and condemnation from free speech groups, who see it as an intrusion by the federal government.

Dozens of other universities have been put on notice by the Trump administration that they could face similar treatment over allegations of antisemitism. The federal government is a major provider of revenue for American universities through grants for scientific research.

Education Secretary Linda McMahon said Harvard symbolizes the American Dream but has jeopardized its reputation by “promoting divisive ideologies over free inquiry.”

White House: ‘Case closed’ on Signal leak

Press secretary Karoline Leavitt said National Security Adviser Mike Waltz continues to have President Donald Trump’s confidence and that the White House was done discussing the embarrassing matter of senior officials communicating about plans for an airstrike against the Houthis in Yemen on a commercial messaging app.

“This case has been closed here at the White House as far as we are concerned,” Leavitt said.

Waltz added a journalist to the sensitive group chat on the platform Signal, where Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth divulged operational details on the strike and Vice President JD Vance discussed his reservations about the operation.

Leavitt said “there have been steps made to ensure that something like that can, obviously, not happen again,” but did not provide any clarity on what those steps were. Lawmakers on Capitol Hill have called for an investigation into the sensitive conversation playing out on Signal.

Judge pauses TPS action on Venezuelans

A federal judge on Monday paused plans by the Trump administration to end temporary legal protections for hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans, a week before the protections were scheduled to expire.

The order by U.S. District Judge Edward Chen in San Francisco is a relief for 350,000 Venezuelans. The lawsuit was filed by lawyers for the National TPS Alliance and TPS holders across the country.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has also announced the end of TPS for an estimated 250,000 additional Venezuelans in September.

Chen said in his ruling that the government had failed to identify any “real countervailing harm in continuing TPS for Venezuelan beneficiaries” and said plaintiffs will likely succeed in showing that Noem’s actions “are unauthorized by law, arbitrary and capricious, and motivated by unconstitutional animus.”

Chen, who was appointed to the bench by President Barack Obama, a Democrat, said his order applies nationally.

The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to a request for comment.

Dems, rights groups sue over voting changes

President Donald Trump’s sweeping executive order directing major changes to the way America registers voters and counts mail-in ballots was challenged as unconstitutional in separate lawsuits filed by the Democratic National Committee and a group of nonprofits.

Trump’s directive, which for the first time would require proof of citizenship to register to vote and ban the counting of lawful mail-in ballot that arrive after Election Day, threatens to disenfranchise voters and upend an election system that has “stood the test of time,” the DNC said in its complaint.

The suit was filed in Washington federal court by Democrats including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, House Minority Hakeem Jeffries and other groups, escalating a growing battle between the party and the 78-year-old Republican president over his efforts to expand his power over the U.S. government.

Trump has argued that the unprecedented changes, which could have a big impact on the next election, are necessary to prevent the kind of voter fraud that he falsely blames for his 2020 loss to Joe Biden.

DOGE gains access to federal payroll system

Members of Elon Musk’s cost-cutting Department of Government Efficiency gained access over the weekend to a payroll system that processes salaries for about 276,000 federal employees across dozens of agencies, according to two people familiar with the matter.

The move overruled objections from senior IT staff who feared it could compromise highly sensitive government personnel information, including by making it more vulnerable to terrorist cyberattacks, these people said.

By accessing the system, which is housed at the Interior Department, the DOGE workers now have visibility into sensitive employee information, such as Social Security numbers, and the ability to more easily hire and fire workers, according to the two people, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they feared retribution.

The move follows other efforts by DOGE to gain entry to federal systems and databases, some of which have encountered resistance in the courts.

Executive order targets ticket scalping

President Donald Trump signed an executive order Monday that he says will help curb ticket scalping and bring “commonsense” changes to the way live entertainment events are priced.

Designed to stop “price-gouging by middlemen,” the order directs Attorney General Pam Bondi and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to ensure that scalpers offering tickets at higher prices than their face value comply with all Internal Revenue Service rules, according to a fact sheet released by the White House.

It also orders the Federal Trade Commission to ensure “price transparency at all stages of the ticket-purchase process” and to “take enforcement action to prevent unfair, deceptive, and anti-competitive conduct in the secondary ticketing market,” which the Trump administration argues can restore sensibility and order to the ticket market.

Hunter Biden associate sentence commuted

President Donald Trump last week commuted the lengthy fraud sentence of a former business associate of Hunter Biden’s who assisted a Republican investigation into the Biden family.

Jason Galanis was sentenced in 2020 to 189 months in prison and ordered to pay nearly $162 million in forfeiture and restitution after pleading guilty to his role in two securities fraud schemes. One of the schemes, which defrauded investors and a Native American tribal entity of tens of millions of dollars, involved a company for which Biden was listed as vice chair, according to documents introduced at trial.

Last year, Galanis testified from a federal prison in Alabama before two Republican-controlled House committees investigating Biden’s foreign business dealings and their intersection with the then-vice presidency of his father, Joe Biden, who later became president.

“The entire value add of Hunter Biden to our business was his family name and his access to his father,” Galanis said in a prepared statement.

— From news services