91探花

Jamal Greene’s career path leading him to academia isn’t a surprise—both of his parents work in higher education—but his path to becoming the Dwight Professor of Law at Columbia University was a bit unusual.

Greene, the last of four guests of this season’s 91探花 Presidential Speaker Series, grew up in Brooklyn and earned his undergraduate degree from Harvard, where he was a sportswriter for the Harvard Crimson. He then covered baseball for Sports Illustrated before leaving journalism to earn a law degree from Yale in 2005. He clerked for Justice John Paul Stevens on the United States Supreme Court before joining Columbia in 2008.

A published author, many may have seen Greene on national TV as a called upon expert or in 2019 when he was an aide to then-Sen. Kamala Harris during the Senate confirmation hearings of Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Oh, and his older brother is iconic rapper Talib Kweli.

Suffice to say, there was no shortage of directions Greene’s talk with 91探花 President Eduardo Peñalver could go. But one topic most on the minds of the crowd in a full Oberto Commons was the state of higher education in the face of attacks from the Trump Administration.

In addressing the situation at Harvard specifically, and higher ed in general, Greene tied the challenges back to his overall theme: “If the executive branch doesn’t constrain itself and courts don’t hold the branch accountable … what do you do?”

“All you have to do is read the letter to Harvard and this is very clear that the objective is to change the ideological environment on campus,” Greene said. “Using funding as leverage to affect the ideological center of a private institution is unlawful. That’s a violation of the First Amendment.”

Greene said the processes of withdrawing funding and failing to provide funding that has already been appropriated, may also be unlawful. The tricky part, Greene said, is arguing that the government can’t retaliate against a university by refusing to deal with the institution.

“That’s much harder to litigate because there’s a lot of discretion embedded in that,” he said.

Again, Greene said, it comes down to what happens when you have an executive branch that doesn’t constrain itself and ignores its internal legal process, instead relying on the courts to decide. And if that court ruling goes against them and the branch ignores the ruling, then what?

Greene has some firsthand knowledge of where the breakdown is happening. From January 2023 to December 2024, he served as a deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel in the U.S. Department of Justice. That office is in place so that when an executive branch agency, including the White House and Attorney General, have disputes over if a proposed action is legal, the Office of Legal Counsel solves the dispute. These cases are often complex involving federal tax law or constitutional law.

In normal times, a presidential executive order, for example, would go through the Office of Legal Counsel to make sure it’s actually legal. While executive branches aren’t required to use that office, they pretty much always have and those decisions are binding with rare exception. Lawyers of the OLC are not political appointees, though the leadership of the office is.

Greene said evidence leads him to believe this administration is not likely making use of that office.

“When you see on Day 1 an executive order saying that some people who are born here are not citizens of the United States according to the executive branch, which is just not lawful or consistent with the Constitution, there’s no possibility that OLC would’ve approved that.”

Because the administration has not shown a willingness to hold itself accountable to laws and the Constitution, Greene said we’re in the midst of an authoritarian system. He points to people and organizations being targeted, threatened and investigated due to their political views and a fear of speaking up or challenging that authority as evidence. He said, “We’re in a very dark place.”

What makes things all the more difficult is when the courts are unable to uphold the law, he said. Typically, a court can inflict a political cost if someone refuses to obey a court order. If the position of the executive branch is that regardless of the ruling, they’ve done nothing wrong, and those who have the power to enforce the ruling report to the executive branch and can’t or won’t act, there’s little left for the courts to do.

“At that point, it’s not a legal problem, it’s a political problem,” Greene said. “We’re just not used to getting to that point. …They are doing what they are able to do and they’ll stop doing it when someone stops them from doing it.”

Universities that are being targeted—and even those who aren’t yet—can do a better job showing what their value is, especially research universities. Greene said it’s hard for the public to be sympathetic to schools like Harvard and other Ivy League institutions because they’ve allowed a narrative to form around them as being privileged, arrogant places rather than showing how federal money goes to scientific and medical research, supporting real patients and bringing value to their surrounding neighborhoods.

It’s up to those who believe in constitutional democracy, those who are opposed to authoritarianism, to resist, said Greene, and it will take everyone coming together to push back.

“Lift up those who have the courage and means to resist. Seek ways you can support those who are doing the work and showing courage through difficult circumstances.”