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Judge indefinitely bars Trump from fining UC over alleged discrimination
Students walk past Royce Hall on the University of California, Los Angeles campus on Aug. 15, 2024.
Damian Dovarganes/AP
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Damian Dovarganes/AP
The Trump administration cannot fine the University of California or summarily cut the school system’s federal funding over claims it allows antisemitism or other forms of discrimination, a federal judge ruled late Friday in a sharply worded decision.

U.S. District Judge Rita Lin in San Francisco issued a preliminary injunction barring the administration from cancelling funding to UC based on alleged discrimination without giving notice to affected faculty and conducting a hearing, among other requirements.
The administration over the summer demanded the University of California, Los Angeles pay $1.2 billion to restore frozen research funding and ensure eligibility for future funding after accusing the school of allowing antisemitism on campus. UCLA was the first public university to be targeted by the administration over allegations of civil rights violations.
It has also frozen or paused federal funding over similar claims against private colleges, including Columbia University.
In her ruling, Lin said labor unions and other groups representing UC faculty, students and employees had provided “overwhelming evidence” that the Trump administration was “engaged in a concerted campaign to purge ‘woke,’ ‘left,’ and ‘socialist’ viewpoints from our country’s leading universities.”
“Agency officials, as well as the President and Vice President, have repeatedly and publicly announced a playbook of initiating civil rights investigations of preeminent universities to justify cutting off federal funding, with the goal of bringing universities to their knees and forcing them to change their ideological tune,” Lin wrote.
She added, “It is undisputed that this precise playbook is now being executed at the University of California.”
At UC, which is facing a series of civil rights probes, she found the administration had engaged in “coercive and retaliatory conduct in violation of the First Amendment and Tenth Amendment.”

Messages sent to the White House and the U.S. Department of Justice after hours Friday were not immediately returned. Lin’s order will remain in effect indefinitely.
University of California President James B. Milliken has said the size of the UCLA fine would devastate the UC system, whose campuses are viewed as some of the top public colleges in the nation.
UC is in settlement talks with the administration and is not a party to the lawsuit before Lin, who was nominated to the bench by President Joe Biden, a Democrat. In a statement, the university system said it “remains committed to protecting the mission, governance, and academic freedom of the University.”
The administration has demanded UCLA comply with its views on gender identity and establish a process to make sure foreign students are not admitted if they are likely to engage in anti-American, anti-Western or antisemitic “disruptions or harassment,” among other requirements outlined in a settlement proposal made public in October.
The administration has previously struck deals with Brown University for $50 million and Columbia University for $221 million.
Lin cited declarations by UC faculty and staff that the administration’s moves were prompting them to stop teaching or researching topics they were “afraid were too ‘left’ or ‘woke.’”
Her injunction also blocks the administration from “conditioning the grant or continuance of federal funding on the UC’s agreement to any measures that would violate the rights of Plaintiffs’ members under the First Amendment.”

She cited efforts to force the UCs to screen international students based on “‘anti-Western” or “‘anti-American’” views, restrict research and teaching, or adopt specific definitions of “male” and “female” as examples of such measures.
President Donald Trump has decried elite colleges as overrun by liberalism and antisemitism.
His administration has launched investigations of dozens of universities, claiming they have failed to end the use of racial preferences in violation of civil rights law. The Republican administration says diversity, equity and inclusion efforts discriminate against white and Asian American students.
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Videos show rebels on the move in eastern DRC city Uvirapublished at 12:49 GMT
Peter Mwai
BBC Verify senior journalist
We have verified video showing fighters belonging to the Rwandan-backed M23 rebel group on the move in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), after M23 announced a withdrawal from the city of Uvira in South Kivu province which it seized a week ago.
The M23 had taken contorl of Uvira despite a ceasefire deal agreed between the governments of Rwanda and DRC and had come under increasing diplomatic pressure to withdraw its forces from the city.
The DRC government has reacted with scepticism, with a spokesperson asking on XL “Where are they going? How many were there? What are they leaving behind in the city? Mass graves? Soldiers disguised as civilians?”
We can’t tell where they are heading, but in the footage we have verified the fighters, together with vehicles, move north past the Uvira police headquarters.
We confirmed where the clips were filmed by matching the distinctively painted road kerbs, buildings and trees to satellite imagery.
The leader of the Alliance Fleuve Congo (AFC), a coalition of rebel groups which includes the M23 group, had announced on Monday that the group would withdraw from the city as a “trust-building measure”.
It followed a request from the US which has been mediating between the governments of Rwanda and DRC.
The rebels remained present in the city after the announcement but on Wednesday M23 spokesperson Willy Ngoma announced the group had begun withdrawing troops. The group said it intends to complete the withdrawal today, but has warned against militarisation.
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