Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered the cancellation of Pentagon-funded attendance at 33+ colleges and universities, banning military personnel from graduate programs at institutions including Princeton, Columbia, MIT, Brown, Yale, Georgetown, Carnegie Mellon, Duke, and Harvard.
Hegseth called the universities “woke breeding grounds” and “factories of anti-American resentment and military disdain.” The ban covers all graduate-level professional military training, fellowships, and certificate programs starting fall 2026. He also ordered a “top to bottom” review of US war colleges.
The military has long sent its most promising officers to elite graduate programs to develop expertise in areas like cybersecurity, nuclear strategy, international relations, and advanced engineering. These are not vanity degrees — they build the expertise needed to fight modern wars and manage complex weapons systems.
Banning the military from the nation's top research institutions because the Defense Secretary considers them “woke” prioritizes culture war grievances over military readiness. America's adversaries would be thrilled to learn the US military will no longer train its officers at MIT or Carnegie Mellon.