From student op-eds at Columbia to castigatory CNN reports, American media is once again calling upon the Ivy League to stand up as the first line of defense against the Trump administration’s assault on national education. In one recent instance, UC Merced associate professor Charlie Eaton made a proposition to America’s Ivy League institutions: that “$15 Billion Is Enough to Fight a President.”
Eaton’s thinking, as laid out in his New York Times piece, is that the “wealthiest universities” should “carry the most responsibility … to push back against [the recent Trumpian] authoritarian creep” — and that they can afford to because of their massive endowments. This doesn’t only apply to Columbia, as Eaton primarily argues, but also to Princeton.
However, so far, many institutional responses from the Ivy League have been dissatisfying genuflection. Key to this is that, despite Ivies’ best institutional efforts to prepare for the challenges ahead, federal funding has tethered our institutions in ways that the public cannot fully perceive. Again and again, the Trump administration has weaponized federal funding as a leash, both to constrain the independence of higher education and to incentivize the implementation of its executive orders. In accordance with Eaton’s argument, Princeton should draw on its endowment to weather the storm from the government.
The University, including President Christopher Eisgruber ’83, has largely dismissed this idea. In his annual State of the University letter, Eisgruber argued that the endowment is “nothing like a savings account” and “more like a retirement annuity that must provide income every year for the remainder of the owner’s life.”
But drawing on the endowment would not, on its own, be a long-term threat to its health. After all, Columbia’s canceled $400 million in funding only represents about 1.2 percent of Princeton’s $34.1 billion endowment, as valued at the end of the 2024 fiscal year. The $175 million pulled from the University of Pennsylvania is even less, representing about 0.5 percent of our endowment. Princeton’s net assets at the same time were in excess of $36.3 billion.
The University has reported an increase in the institution’s $34.1 billion dollar endowment for the first time since 2021. To date, it spends the most per individual student and ranks as the fourth-largest university endowment in the nation, behind Stanford, Yale, and Harvard respectively.
Furthermore, there are many years in which the University spends more than it brings in in revenues. During the global financial crisis, the University ran deficits to sustain its operations.
In the medium-to-long term, the University’s endowment has generated solid returns, with an average of 9.2 percent in the last 10 years and 9.9 percent in the last 20. In the 2024 fiscal year, Princeton had $165 million in long-term gift and pledge revenue, as well as $95 million in immediately spendable gifts. Princeton received $455 million in government contracts in the same year. If Princeton’s endowment returns maintain their historical performance, we can expect gains of about $3.1 billion per year. Combined with alumni gifts, which would likely increase if the University had its federal grants withdrawn, these sources of funding could easily cover the gap in funding.
Admittedly, the University does have significant reliance on federal funding. From departmental research projects to the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, federal funding has permeated nearly every aspect of campus life. As demonstrated by the recent hiring freeze at Princeton, we are not immune to potential pressures.
Our ability to draw on the endowment doesn’t mean that we don’t also have to adjust in other ways. In a memo to staff and faculty, Provost Jennifer Rexford ’93 and Executive Vice President Katie Callow-Wright identified how Princeton would respond to the “budget realities” of the current administration, including avoiding staff growth and postponing faculty searches. Moving forward, both Princeton and other affluent universities across the nation should seek to undertake similar measures as a blueprint means of moving away from federal funding in the long run.
However, as Eaton previously identified, Princeton University, along with other institutions in the “Big Five,” is in the unique position to weather this storm. They might not even have to wait that long: under four years until the Democrats could retake the White House and under two until the balances of power in the House and Senate could change. There is also a chance that relief will arrive even sooner, as some spending cuts have been blocked in the courts before they have been implemented.
To be complacent in silence, or even worse compliant in action, is a disservice to the guiding mission of education that underpins us all. But in order to best position Ivy League universities to contest against the administration, it is essential that we take steps to ensure that federal funding does not constrain the ability of institutions to stand in defense of education across the nation.
Wynne Conger is a sophomore and prospective SPIA major from Bryn Mawr, Pa. She can be reached by email at wc2918[at]princeton.edu. Her column “Popping the Bubble” runs every three weeks on Monday. You can read all of her columns here.
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