The Trump administration is investigating Harvard University's hiring practices to determine whether the Ivy League school discriminated against male, heterosexual, white, or Asian workers when hiring employees or in promotions.
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission acting chair Andrea Lucas, who opened the investigation, pointed to documents that have been deleted on the university's website that tracked the school's progress in diversifying its faculty over the past 10 years, reports The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday.
Lucas' allegations point out that the white male tenured faculty members dropped from 64% to 56% between 2013 and 2023, and the school's tenure-track faculty who are white men dropped from 46% to 32%.
She said the data signals that there is "reason to believe" that discrimination is continuing at the university and claimed that the information signals an "underlying pattern or practice of discrimination" based on race and sex.
A Harvard spokesperson, responding to a question about the investigation, pointed to a letter the school's president, Alan Garber, sent to the Education Department in connection with its own investigation of the university.
In it, Garber insisted that employment at Harvard is "based on merit and achievement. We seek the best educators, researchers, and scholars at our schools. We do not have quotas, whether based on race or ethnicity or any other characteristic."
The investigation, which opened on April 25 and was reported earlier on Monday by The Washington Free Beacon, includes allegations that student employees also faced discrimination from Harvard.
Lucas cited training and fellowship programs for people from underrepresented minorities in scientific research or in the university's medical program, and includes partner institutions, including the Kenneth C. Griffin Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and Massachusetts General Hospital.
The investigation comes as President Donald Trump has targeted Harvard and other top universities by pausing or freezing federal grants and contracts, while his administration continues its probe into schools it says did not protect Jewish students during campus pro-Palestinian protests last year.
The administration is also pushing for further control over Harvard and other schools to eliminate diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies.