- Stephanie Wang | Staff
- May 1, 2025 (DailyCal.org)
Following funding cuts, international student status revocations and investigations into campus undertaken by the federal government in the first 100 days of President Donald Trump’s term, UC Berkeley faculty are expressing dismay, concern and resoluteness when considering how federal developments have affected them.
Since Inauguration Day, some members of campus faculty have signed open letters and participated in campus protests to push back against measures enacted by the federal government.
UC Berkeley School of Law professor and director of the Environmental Law Clinic Claudia Polsky is pursuinganother approach to respond to federal actions: assembling a class-action lawsuit on behalf of campus researchers whose federal grants have been terminated under the Trump administration.
Polsky and Berkeley Law Dean Erwin Chemerinsky began preparing the lawsuit six weeks ago and expect to file it soon.Considering how other institutions have “had trouble getting their bureaucratic apparatus to commit to a strategy quickly,” Polsky emphasized the importance of taking rapid legal action against “fast fascism.”
“I wanted to be really sure that ideally before Trump ever issued a demand to UC Berkeley, (or) moments after, we would be ready with a lawsuit, and that’s why I and now others on this team have been working at this breakneck pace — because we don’t want to be in a reactive posture,” Polsky said.
Although the lawsuit is limited to campus researchers due to timing urgency and challenges with coordinating across different groups,Polsky highlighted the symbolic importance of centering the case around UC Berkeley due to its historical significance within the Free Speech Movement and its prestige as a research university.
Polsky hopes a court would find that the termination of federal grants “based on a variety of unconstitutional executive orders and through unlawful administrative procedures” is illegal.
She added that the court would ideally require the federal government to immediately reinstate the terminated grants. Further, it would bar the administration from terminating any existing grants involving congressionally-appropriated funds in the future.
Moreover, Polsky hopes that a lawsuit victory would allow other parties to file similar cases.
While the lawsuit seeks to address funding losses faced by campus researchers, the preparation of the case comes at a time when the effects of the federal government’s actions have resounded among campus faculty more broadly.
“I have never been more afraid or ashamed or saddened about my country than in the last 100 days,” said Berkeley Law professor Christopher Kutz.
Kutz helped assemble an open letter signed by more than 90 Berkeley Law faculty and recalled that some colleagues who did not sign expressed fear of retaliation, even though they agreed with its content.
“The fears that people have, fears I have, range from alienation of donors — I think that’s at the mild end of fear — to worries that you’ll find yourself the target of an IRS audit … that you’ll find yourself the target of an FBI investigation,” Kutz said.
Additionally, Kutz said the high level of fear among faculty and objection to certain content led them to “water down” the letter to garner more signatories.
Beyond contributing to an environment of “extreme anxiety and concern” for the well-being of campus community members, professor of philosophy R. Jay Wallace — who co-authored an open letter defending free expression at universities signed by more than 190 campus faculty — identified campus’s “ability to maintain our academic programs and distinction” as another source of unease.
Hiring freezes implemented by the UC system and other U.S. universities will create a scarcity of academic positions and affect academics looking to advance in their careers — a development that would greatly impact the “pipeline into higher education,” according to Wallace.
He added that these cuts, paired with the placement of conditions on federal funding and the broader political climate, have also lessened the appeal of the university and other U.S. universities for students and faculty from abroad.
“In my own department, we were recruiting a very distinguished senior scholar from Canada, and I think the combination of the Trump election and the immediate attacks on Canada played a decisive role in her decision to remain at the University of Toronto,” Wallace said. “The attraction of American universities like ours for foreign scholars and students has diminished significantly overnight.”
Although all three professors shared their dismay at the adverse effects of federal actions over the course of Trump’s first 100 days as president, each highlighted the importance of taking an active role to “fight” back.
Polsky, in particular, expressed optimism in the forthcoming lawsuit, providing three words when asked to reflect upon how she felt about the case amid the current political situation.
“Wait and see,” she said.
