Justice Department Adds Education Department Investigation to Admissions Lawsuit

The Department of Justice broadened its admissions-records lawsuit against Harvard on Monday, adding allegations from a parallel Education Department probe after the University refused to turn over individualized admissions data sought by federal civil rights investigators.

The amended complaint escalates a months-long standoff over whether Harvard must provide individualized admissions data — including applicants’ race, grades, standardized test scores, admissions outcomes, and internal evaluations — to prove it is complying with the Supreme Court’s 2023 ruling striking down race-conscious admissions.

The new filing also made public a 15-page April 12 letter from Harvard to the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights, offering the University’s most detailed explanation yet for resisting the agency’s requests. In the letter, Harvard accused OCR of issuing demands that were “overbroad, unduly burdensome, and unnecessary.”

OCR had warned Harvard in March that it would refer the matter to the Justice Department for judicial proceedings if the University did not provide the requested records within 20 days. Harvard declined to do so and instead sent the April 12 letter, arguing the agency’s investigation exceeded its authority and duplicated issues already at issue in the DOJ’s pending lawsuit.

Less than two weeks later, the Education Department referred the dispute to the DOJ. The amended complaint folds OCR’s records dispute into DOJ’s existing February lawsuit, which had originally centered on Harvard’s alleged failure to comply with the Justice Department’s own April 2025 requests for admissions data.

Harvard filed its response brief in the DOJ lawsuit last month, writing that the University had cooperated with the inquiry by producing more than 2,000 pages of records. Its lawyers also accused the Justice Department of unilaterally cutting off talks last October before suing the University.

But the April 12 letter to OCR goes further, laying out Harvard’s objections to the Education Department’s separate investigation. Harvard argued that OCR failed to meaningfully pursue voluntary compliance, lacked authority to conduct what the University called “fishing expeditions,” and sought records already covered by the DOJ lawsuit.

The University also took issue with the scope of the records request which, according to the new legal filings, asked for far more than just applicant-level data.

In its May 2025 information request, OCR asked Harvard to describe all “race-conscious” offices, officials, practices, policies, initiatives, clubs, programs, events, orientations, trainings, awards, ceremonies, grants, contracts, scholarships, graduation requirements, housing, counseling, mentoring, and internships at the University since 2016.

The request defined “race-conscious” broadly, including programs that used terms such as “cultural engagement,” “belonging,” “advocacy,” and “social justice.”

Harvard said those requests were “untethered” to OCR’s stated purpose of investigating undergraduate admissions and argued that they encroached on the First Amendment rights of faculty, staff, and students.

The same request also sought faculty demographic surveys dating back to 2016 and documents related to antisemitism. Harvard pushed back on those demands as well, arguing that they were unrelated to whether the University discriminates in admissions.

The University also objected to OCR’s time frame. While DOJ’s April 2025 requests sought five years of admissions data from Harvard College, Harvard Medical School, and Harvard Law School, OCR asked for undergraduate admissions records dating back to Jan. 1, 2016 — more than seven years before the Supreme Court issued its decision in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard.

“Harvard’s admissions practices and admissions data for the years prior to the SFFA decision have no bearing on Harvard’s present compliance,” the University’s lawyers wrote. “At most, ED OCR would need only information sufficient to show that Harvard changed its practices following the SFFA decision, which Harvard has provided.”

Federal officials have argued that aggregated admissions statistics are not enough to determine whether Harvard continues to consider race in admissions, either directly or through proxies. In the amended complaint, DOJ wrote that Harvard “necessarily uses individual-level applicant data” to make admissions decisions.

The government emphasized that the lawsuit does not accuse Harvard of new discriminatory conduct, seek monetary damages, or ask the court to revoke federal funding. Instead, DOJ wrote, the case is “solely” about compelling Harvard to produce records.

Harvard, for its part, has cast the records fight as another form of “retaliation” against the University for not complying with a sweeping list of demands made by the Trump administration last April.

The federal government has pulled the University into a flurry of litigation this year. Harvard is due to respond in a separate DOJ lawsuit over its adherence to Title VI in the aftermath of Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel and is litigating its federal funding case in the First Circuit. The Department of Education is also investigating the University over allegations of campus antisemitism.

Even as Harvard challenged the premise and scope of OCR’s investigation, the University said in its April 12 letter that it would provide additional materials to supplement its July 31, 2025 production.

“Despite these objections and concerns about the true nature of the Department’s requests, Harvard is committed to demonstrating its compliance with Title VI and all civil rights laws,” the letter concludes.

—Staff writer Hugo C. Chiasson can be reached at [email protected] or on Signal at hcc.35. Follow him on X @HugoChiassonn.

—Staff writer Elise A. Spenner can be reached at [email protected] or on Signal at elisespenner.82. Follow her on X @EliseSpenner.