Equal Protection Project files civil rights complaint against Drake University
An organization involved in litigation with universities across the U.S. has filed a federal complaint against Drake University in Des Moines, alleging one of its scholarship programs violates federal anti-discrimination law.
The Equal Protection Project, a branch of the Legal Insurrection Foundation, submitted a civil rights complaint Tuesday to the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights against the private university. The organization, which says it is 'devoted to the fair treatment of all persons without regard to race or ethnicity,' claims in the complaint Drake is violating Title IV by limiting eligibility of one of its scholarship programs, the Crew Scholars Program, to students of color.
'Drake is expanding DEI activities at a time when the State of Iowa and the federal government are scaling back,' said William Jacobson, founder of the Equal Protection Project, in an emailed statement. 'Regardless of where one stands on the DEI debate, discrimination based on race violates the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Iowa state law, and Drake's own non-discrimination rules. Drake should open up the scholarship to all students without regard to race.'
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Drake University spokesperson Ashton Hockman said in an email the university cannot comment at this time, as it has not received any communication from the U.S. Department of Education.
The Crew Scholars Program is described online as an 'academic excellence and leadership development program for incoming students with a passion for diversity' that provides $500 annual scholarships to participating students.
According to the civil rights complaint, the scholarship program limits participation to students of color. The complaint cites as evidence a university website link and screenshots showing the program description including the language 'The Crew Scholars Program at Drake University is open to incoming domestic students of color in any major.'
A different website describing the scholars program eliminates references to race in who is allowed to apply.
Title VI of the Civil Rights Act forbids 'intentional discrimination on the basis of race, color or national origin' in any program that receives federal support, the complaint stated, and as Drake University receives federal funding, it is in violation of the law. Referencing the U.S. Department of Education's Feb. 14 'Dear Colleague' letter, the complaint stated that regardless of its reasons for offering a 'discriminatory program,' Drake is still violating the law.
'Accordingly, we respectfully ask that the Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights promptly open a formal investigation, impose such remedial relief as the law permits for the benefit of those who have been illegally excluded from Drake's various programs based on discriminatory criteria, and ensure that all ongoing and future programming at Drake comports with the federal civil rights laws,' the complaint stated.
Drake has reiterated its commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion multiple times as state and federal actions have required universities to pull back on such programming, including implementing new programming to ensure all students feel like they belong and speaking out against decisions that negatively impact campus and Drake students.
Drake President Marty Martin published a letter in early March telling students they are all welcome at the university despite contrary messages such as legislation to repeal the inclusion of transgender and nonbinary people in civil rights protections. Martin called the law 'one among many current state and federal efforts that seek to turn our differences into division.'
'This is a moral failure against which we stand in opposition,' Martin said in the letter. 'It is our duty to respect, support, and affirm anyone in our community targeted by these actions.'
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Transcript: Ted Carter, The Ohio State University president, on "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan," July 27, 2025
The following is the transcript of an interview with Ted Carter, The Ohio State University president, that aired on "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan" on July 27, 2025. MARGARET BRENNAN: We go now to Columbus, Ohio and the president of The Ohio State University, Ted Carter. President Carter, welcome to 'Face The Nation.' OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT TED CARTER: Margaret, good to be with you on this Sunday from Columbus, Ohio. MARGARET BRENNAN: I wanted to ask you very directly about these Trump administration claims that Ohio State is one of 60 universities that they deemed may have antisemitic practices and policies on campus. They say you're being investigated for them and for failing to end diversity policies, which could be a violation of the Civil Rights Act. What's the status of the probes? And how much pressure are you under? CARTER: To be quite frank, I'm not feeling a lot of pressure. Our understanding is we're on those lists because we had been previously on those lists under the Biden administration. We had been working with the Office of Civil Rights during that administration, and I think mostly that was a holdover. We are more than happy to talk to anybody from the Office of Civil Rights. We stand behind our actions. We know how we acted during the time of the protests. We never had an encampment here at Ohio State. We had some attempted we didn't allow that, and that's our long-standing rules on the Oval, which is the centerpiece of our campus. So I'm confident that as this plays out forward, that we're going to be just fine. MARGARET BRENNAN: The Trump administration did publish Ohio State on the list of universities it's probing, and when you look at some of the issues they've raised at other places, you look at the result of freezing $3 billion in contracts at Harvard, $1 billion at Cornell, hundreds of millions of dollars of research funding at universities like Brown. Are you worried that your federal funds could be in jeopardy because of this? CARTER: Well, like I always say to my staff and my people, if we do the right things for the right reasons, everything will play out. And we've been doing it that way since I've been here since 1 January of 2024. Our research funding here at Ohio State has grown leaps and bounds over the last couple years. We're actually ranked number 11 in the country, ahead of Harvard, ahead of UNC Chapel Hill. Our revenues last year were $1.6 billion, 775 million of that came from the federal government, largely in NIH and NSF. As we sit here today, we've had some research grants impacted, but in the tens of millions of dollars, nothing like you're seeing at our Ivy League colleagues, and a lot of that is still in litigation. So I can't even tell you what the number of dollars that we may lose, but against the $1.6 billion it's pretty small, even though it's had some impact on some of our researchers. Unlike some of our counterparts, we have a significant research arm here, 14,000 faculty, post doc students, that do the research here. And it is significant. It goes way beyond the numbers and the dollars. It's what it's what it's doing for the community, what it's doing to extend and save and change lives, and what it's doing in agriculture, what it's doing for our police force. So what I would tell you is, at this moment today- even compared to where we were last year, we're still up in our research revenue about 7% from where we were last year, and we're- we're- we're proceeding to ask for more grants so that we can be a cancer free world here in our lifetime. MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, we all hope for that future, sir, but you sound not to be concerned. But I did read that earlier when you had the buckeyes football team at the White House earlier in the year- and that was well covered, the Wall Street Journal said you told President Trump and Vice President Vance that quote, Ohio State is not the enemy. Why did you feel you had to say that? What did you mean? CARTER: Well, that might have been taken a little bit out of context. I kind of said that in jest, a little bit to the vice president when I had a chance to meet with him, and we had a long conversation. It was a very productive conversation. I won't go into all the details, but the point is, they know that Ohio State is doing the right things for the right reasons. I have said publicly that I believe the future of higher education is going to go through the large public land grant flagship institutions like the Ohio State University, I look at what we're doing today, and yes, like many other universities, there's a lot of concern about the future, what's coming out of the federal government, even what's coming out of our state government here in Ohio. But right now, I feel like we can still play defense, still understand how to adjust, kind of make sure that we're getting our bat on the ball, so to speak, in playing defense and protecting the plate, but we're also looking at how we can play offense. This is a time where institutions like Ohio State, we are very financially secure. We're actually looking to invest in ourselves. I just reflect on the graduation ceremony that we just had this past May. We produce about 18,000 In graduates a year. But at that ceremony, we graduated 12,400- all of them, by the way, got their diploma that day that they earned. And 90% of those students- 90% already had a job or they were going to another higher academic endeavor. And 70% of those undergraduate students are staying in the state of Ohio. 66% of the PhD and masters are staying in the state of Ohio. This is a wonderful workforce development program. That is what is raising the confidence of Ohioans and the American public in higher education, and that is starting to change. MARGARET BRENNAN: Vice President Vance was on this program a number of times- and one of them when he was still a senator. I spoke to him about his views on higher education. He's an Ohio State alum, undergrad, and he said he believes universities- he wasn't speaking of yours, but he said universities are 'controlled by left wing foundations,' and they're going in the wrong direction. Do you think he has a point? CARTER: I think higher education has started to build that reputation. And you can even see that in the Gallup-Lumina polls. You know, I was the superintendent of the Naval Academy from 2014 to 2019 you know, and that Gallup poll in 2015 said that nearly 60% of Americans had high confidence in post-secondary education. Now go ahead and just move that needle nine years forward, and yet, two in three Americans said they did not have confidence in higher education. That's a really bad mark. Americans were saying higher education costs too much. They were saying that the return on investment was difficult to prove. They even were saying some of the research being done may not impact them or their families. And yes, there was this conversation about the potential indoctrination of students, or that institutions were leaning very liberal. You know, we as administrators of higher education maybe ought to listen to the American public and say, maybe we haven't always gotten it right. So I'm here to say, here at the Ohio State University, we have paid attention to that. We are making efforts to make affordability a key issue for students. I mentioned that graduating class, 57% of those undergraduates left with zero debt. Zero debt. And the other 43% that left with debt was less than $24,000. And as we look across our hiring practices, I have 8,500 faculty. It is the best group of faculty I have ever worked with in my 12 years of leading in higher and that's saying quite a bit. I will tell you that as we hire the future, we're looking across the entire political spectrum for who we hire. MARGARET BRENNAN: On that point, you talked about what happened at the state level. The Republican controlled state legislature passed a law that eliminates the diversity programs, it does a number of things. But it also requires professors to post their course syllabus- syllabi online and their contact information. Do you think that this is meant to intimidate? Are you concerned? Is your faculty concerned about the focus on what they're doing? CARTER: Yes, I have talked to our faculty through our faculty senate and our leadership. There are some concerns, of course, because we've not done that before. We've got some time before we implement that. We have put all the pieces of Senate Bill 1 which is the General Assembly's bill here in the state of Ohio, into the implementation phase. We're still working through some of the details, but let me tell you the principles of academic freedom, what is taught in the classroom, the move towards scholarly pursuit, the research that we do here at Ohio State, those are things that we are still very passionate about, and I know that we're going to continue that work, and yet we'll still follow the law. We'll still follow some of the federal policies that are coming out. We're ready and prepared to do all of that. MARGARET BRENNAN: To that point, you saw what Columbia University did this week in paying the $200 million fine to settle their dispute with the Trump administration, they also agreed to an outside monitor to assure the school complies with stamping out diversity programs. Does this precedent trouble you? I mean- would you take a deal like that? CARTER: Well, I can't speak to those institutions because I'm not leading them. I know both President Shipman and some of the other Ivy League presidents are colleagues, and they're having to do I think what I would call be in survival mode. Quite frankly, we're not going through any of that here at Ohio State, and nor do I think that we will. I mean, obviously we have a new state law. We're a public institution, so that means we're going to be transparent and put out everything that we do so the state of Ohio, the people and the entire country can see it. MARGARET BRENNAN: We will watch to see what happens. Good luck to you, sir. 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Transcript: Ted Carter, The Ohio State University president, on "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan," July 27, 2025
The following is the transcript of an interview with Ted Carter, The Ohio State University president, that aired on "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan" on July 27, 2025. MARGARET BRENNAN: We go now to Columbus, Ohio and the president of The Ohio State University, Ted Carter. President Carter, welcome to 'Face The Nation.' OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT TED CARTER: Margaret, good to be with you on this Sunday from Columbus, Ohio. MARGARET BRENNAN: I wanted to ask you very directly about these Trump administration claims that Ohio State is one of 60 universities that they deemed may have antisemitic practices and policies on campus. They say you're being investigated for them and for failing to end diversity policies, which could be a violation of the Civil Rights Act. What's the status of the probes? And how much pressure are you under? CARTER: To be quite frank, I'm not feeling a lot of pressure. Our understanding is we're on those lists because we had been previously on those lists under the Biden administration. We had been working with the Office of Civil Rights during that administration, and I think mostly that was a holdover. We are more than happy to talk to anybody from the Office of Civil Rights. We stand behind our actions. We know how we acted during the time of the protests. We never had an encampment here at Ohio State. We had some attempted we didn't allow that, and that's our long-standing rules on the Oval, which is the centerpiece of our campus. So I'm confident that as this plays out forward, that we're going to be just fine. MARGARET BRENNAN: The Trump administration did publish Ohio State on the list of universities it's probing, and when you look at some of the issues they've raised at other places, you look at the result of freezing $3 billion in contracts at Harvard, 1 billion at Cornell, hundreds of millions of dollars of research funding at universities like Brown. Are you worried that your federal funds could be in jeopardy because of this? CARTER: Well, like I always say to my staff and my people, if we do the right things for the right reasons, everything will play out. And we've been doing it that way since I've been here since one. January of 2024. Our research funding here at Ohio State has grown leaps and bounds over the last couple years. We're actually ranked number 11 in the country, ahead of Harvard, ahead of UNC Chapel Hill. Our revenues last year were $1.6 billion, 775 million of that came from the federal government, largely in NIH and NSF. As we sit here today, we've had some research grants impacted, but in the tens of millions of dollars, nothing like you're seeing at our Ivy League colleagues, and a lot of that is still in litigation. So I can't even tell you what the number of dollars that we may lose, but against the $1.6 billion it's pretty small, even though it's had some impact on some of our researchers. Unlike some of our counterparts, we have a significant research arm here, 14,000 faculty, post doc students, that do the research here. And it is significant. It goes way beyond the numbers and the dollars. It's what it's what it's doing for the community, what it's doing to extend and save and change lives, and what it's doing in agriculture, what it's doing for our police force. So what I would tell you is, at this moment today- even compared to where we were last year, we're still up in our research revenue about 7% from where we were last year, and we're- we're- we're proceeding to ask for more grants so that we can be a cancer free world here in our lifetime. MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, we all hope for that future, sir, but you sound not to be concerned. But I did read that earlier when you had the buckeyes football team at the White House earlier in the year- and that was well covered, the Wall Street Journal said you told President Trump and Vice President Vance that quote, Ohio State is not the enemy. Why did you feel you had to say that? What did you mean? CARTER: Well, that might have been taken a little bit out of context. I kind of said that in jest, a little bit to the vice president when I had a chance to meet with him, and we had a long conversation. It was a very productive conversation. I won't go into all the details, but the point is, they know that Ohio State is doing the right things for the right reasons. I have said publicly that I believe the future of higher education is going to go through the large public land grant flagship institutions like the Ohio State University, I look at what we're doing today, and yes, like many other universities, there's a lot of concern about the future, what's coming out of the federal government, even what's coming out of our state government here in Ohio. But right now, I feel like we can still play defense, still understand how to adjust, kind of make sure that we're getting our bat on the ball, so to speak, in playing defense and protecting the plate, but we're also looking at how we can play offense. This is a time where institutions like Ohio State, we are very financially secure. We're actually looking to invest in ourselves. I just reflect on the graduation ceremony that we just had this past May. We produce about 18,000 In graduates a year. But at that ceremony, we graduated 12,400- all of them, by the way, got their diploma that day that they earned. And 90% of those students- 90% already had a job or they were going to another higher academic endeavor. And 70% of those undergraduate students are staying in the state of Ohio. 66% of the PhD and masters are staying in the state of Ohio. This is a wonderful workforce development program. That is what is raising the confidence of Ohioans and the American public in higher education, and that is starting to change. MARGARET BRENNAN: Vice President Vance was on this program a number of times- and one of them when he was still a senator. I spoke to him about his views on higher education. He's an Ohio State alum, undergrad, and he said he believes universities- he wasn't speaking of yours, but he said universities are 'controlled by left wing foundations,' and they're going in the wrong direction. Do you think he has a point? CARTER: I think higher education has started to build that reputation. And you can even see that in the Gallup-Lumina polls. You know, I was the superintendent of the Naval Academy from 2014 to 2019 you know, and that Gallup poll in 2015 said that nearly 60% of Americans had high confidence in post-secondary education. Now go ahead and just move that needle nine years forward, and yet, two in three Americans said they did not have confidence in higher education. That's a really bad mark. Americans were saying higher education costs too much. They were saying that the return on investment was difficult to prove. They even were saying some of the research being done may not impact them or their families. And yes, there was this conversation about the potential indoctrination of students, or that institutions were leaning very liberal. You know, we as administrators of higher education maybe ought to listen to the American public and say, maybe we haven't always gotten it right. So I'm here to say, here at the Ohio State University, we have paid attention to that. We are making efforts to make affordability a key issue for students. I mentioned that graduating class, 57% of those undergraduates left with zero debt. Zero debt. And the other 43% that left with debt was less than $24,000. And as we look across our hiring practices, I have 8,500 faculty. It is the best group of faculty I have ever worked with in my 12 years of leading in higher and that's saying quite a bit. I will tell you that as we hire the future, we're looking across the entire political spectrum for who we hire. MARGARET BRENNAN: On that point, you talked about what happened at the state level. The Republican controlled state legislature passed a law that eliminates the diversity programs, it does a number of things. But it also requires professors to post their course syllabus- syllabi online and their contact information. Do you think that this is meant to intimidate? Are you concerned? Is your faculty concerned about the focus on what they're doing? CARTER: Yes, I have talked to our faculty through our faculty senate and our leadership. There are some concerns, of course, because we've not done that before. We've got some time before we implement that. We have put all the pieces of Senate Bill 1 which is the General Assembly's bill here in the state of Ohio, into the implementation phase. We're still working through some of the details, but let me tell you the principles of academic freedom, what is taught in the classroom, the move towards scholarly pursuit, the research that we do here at Ohio State, those are things that we are still very passionate about, and I know that we're going to continue that work, and yet we'll still follow the law. We'll still follow some of the federal policies that are coming out. We're ready and prepared to do all of that. MARGARET BRENNAN: To that point, you saw what Columbia University did this week in paying the $200 million fine to settle their dispute with the Trump administration, they also agreed to an outside monitor to assure the school complies with stamping out diversity programs. Does this precedent trouble you? I mean- would you take a deal like that? CARTER: Well, I can't speak to those institutions because I'm not leading them. I know both President Shipman and some of the other Ivy League presidents are colleagues, and they're having to do I think what I would call be in survival mode. Quite frankly, we're not going through any of that here at Ohio State, and nor do I think that we will. I mean, obviously we have a new state law. We're a public institution, so that means we're going to be transparent and put out everything that we do so the state of Ohio, the people and the entire country can see it. MARGARET BRENNAN: We will watch to see what happens. Good luck to you, sir. We'll be right back.
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Cornell Law professor discusses Sen. Adam Schiff's mortgage fraud investigation
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