Trump Wants $1 Billion Payout From UCLA

The Trump administration is ratcheting up pressure on the University of California, Los Angeles, and seeking a $1 billion settlement, following concessions from other institutions, CNN reported.

University of California president James B. Milliken said in a statement Friday that “a payment of this scale would completely devastate our country’s greatest public university system as well as inflict great harm on our students and all Californians.”

Demands for a settlement come as the federal government has accused UCLA of violating civil rights law by allegedly failing to protect students from antisemitism as pro-Palestinian protests surged on campus last spring. The National Science Foundation and other agencies have since suspended $584 million in federal research funding, according to UCLA chancellor Julio Frenk. The New York Times reported that the administration also wants UCLA to put $172 million in a fund for victims of civil rights violations.

Gov. Gavin Newsom called the payout demand ”extortion” and pledged to sue, the Los Angeles Times reported.

UC system officials announced Wednesday they would negotiate with the federal government in the hope of reaching a “voluntary resolution agreement” over the charges.

“Our immediate goal is to see the $584 million in suspended and at-risk federal funding restored to the university as soon as possible,” Milliken wrote in a Wednesday statement, adding that cuts to federal research funding “do nothing to address antisemitism.”

UCLA was one of several institutions whose executives were hauled before Congress over the last two years to address pro-Palestinian encampments and alleged antisemitism and harassment tied to such protests.

Should UCLA reach a settlement with the Trump administration, it would be the first public university to do so but the third institution to strike a deal with the federal government over the course of several weeks. Last month, Columbia University reached an unprecedented settlement with the Trump administration, agreeing to changes to admissions and academic programs and paying $221 million to close investigations into alleged antisemitism and restore some frozen research funding. The deal will be overseen by a third-party resolution monitor.

Brown University also struck a deal with the federal government in July that did not include a payout to the Trump administration, but officials did agree to provide admissions data to the federal government and bar transgender athletes from competing, among other concessions.

Federal officials didn’t respond to a request for comment Friday.