The United States government has threatened to ban Harvard University from enrolling international students unless the institute submits the students’ disciplinary records and information about their participation in protests, The Harvard Crimson reported on Thursday.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said in her request that Harvard would lose the “privilege of enrolling foreign students” if it did not comply with the Donald Trump administration’s demands for the records by April 30, BBC reported.

A Harvard spokesperson told Reuters on Thursday that the university was aware of the letter by Noem “regarding grant cancellations and scrutiny of foreign student visas”. Harvard will stand by the statement it had issued earlier this week, the spokesperson was quoted as saying.

Alan Garber, the university president, had said on Monday that the institute “will not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights”.

Trump said on Wednesday that Harvard was a “joke, teaches hate and stupidity” and that the university should no longer receive federal funds.

“Harvard can no longer be considered even a decent place of learning, and should not be considered on any list of the world’s great universities or colleges,” the US president wrote on social media.

On Tuesday, the Trump administration froze more than $2.2 billion in grants and $60 million in contracts to Harvard University after the institution said it would defy demands to overhaul its policies and curb activism on campus.

The action came hours after Harvard rejected a sweeping list of requirements from the White House ostensibly aimed at combating antisemitism and reforming university governance, admissions and hiring practices.

The government had said that nearly $9 billion in total grants and contracts are at stake if Harvard did not comply.

Among the demands were that the university should report students to federal authorities who are “hostile” to American values, ensure departments are “viewpoint diverse” and allow an external, government-approved party to audit programmes that “fuel antisemitic harassment”.

Other measures included banning face masks on campus, ending diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, and withdrawing recognition from student clubs accused of promoting criminal activity, violence or harassment.

The White House has argued that universities have allowed antisemitism to flourish during protests against Israel’s war on Gaza and US support for it. “Harvard had in recent years failed to live up to both the intellectual and civil rights conditions that justify federal investment,” the administration said in a letter on April 11.

Since taking office in January, Trump has repeatedly targeted elite universities over campus protests, diversity programmes and free speech issues. Harvard is the seventh major institution whose funding has been paused by his administration. The others are Columbia, the University of Pennsylvania, Brown, Princeton, Cornell and Northwestern.

Columbia was the first to be targeted and later agreed to several government demands after $400 million in federal funding was pulled. Education Secretary Linda McMahon had said then that “universities must comply with all federal anti-discrimination laws if they are going to receive federal funding”.

Also read: US campus protests: History has shown repeatedly that the young have always been right