The dozen board members of the prestigious Fulbright program that promotes international educational exchanges resigned on Wednesday because of what they said was political interference by the Trump administration in their operations, according to people familiar with the issues and a board memo obtained by The New York Times.
The members are concerned that political appointees at the State Department, which manages the program, are acting illegally by canceling the awarding of Fulbright scholarships to almost 200 American professors and researchers who are prepared to go to universities and other research institutions overseas starting this summer, said the people, including Senator Jeanne Shaheen, Democrat of New Hampshire.
The board approved those scholars over the winter after a yearlong selection process, and the State Department was supposed to send acceptance letters by April, the people said. But instead, the board learned that the office of public diplomacy at the agency had begun sending rejection letters to the scholars based mainly on their research topics, they said.
In addition, the department is reviewing the applications of about 1,200 scholars from other countries who have already been approved by the board to come to the United States, the people said. Those foreign scholars were also supposed to receive acceptance letters around April.
The memo written by the board says that members are resigning “rather than endorse unprecedented actions that we believe are impermissible under the law, compromise U.S. national interests and integrity, and undermine the mission and mandates Congress established for the Fulbright program nearly 80 years ago,” according to a copy obtained by The Times.
The board posted the memo online on Wednesday morning, after sending a resignation letter to the White House.
The board is also concerned that the budget that Secretary of State Marco Rubio is requesting from Congress for the next fiscal year cuts spending for the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, which includes the Fulbright program, to $50 million from $691 million this fiscal year.
The State Department did not reply to a request for comment on Wednesday morning.
The actions come as President Trump and his top aides seek to bend academic institutions to their ideological beliefs. The State Department’s public diplomacy office is run by Darren Beattie, a political appointee who was fired from a job during the first Trump administration after he gave a talk at a conference attended by white nationalists. He has made social media posts on white grievances, including one saying “competent white men must be in charge if you want things to work,” and ones ridiculing Mr. Rubio.
The administration is trying to withhold federal funding, mainly for science research, from several universities and in some cases is demanding changes to departments. It has tried to stop foreign students and scholars from coming to Harvard University, but a court has temporarily barred the administration from acting on that order.
Mr. Rubio told the State Department last month to stop taking new appointments for foreign citizens applying for student or exchange visas while the agency expands scrutiny of social media posts by the applicants. American universities rely on tuition payments by foreign students for a major part of their revenue and value the research expertise of those students and visiting scholars.
Top Trump administration officials say many American universities are too liberal in their curricula and must insert more conservative ideas into their teaching, research and hiring practices. The administration has also dismantled research institutions established by Congress, including the Wilson Center and the United States Institute of Peace. A federal judge ruled last month that the administration’s gutting of USIP was illegal.
The Fulbright program was established in 1946 after legislation introduced by J. William Fulbright, a Democratic senator from Arkansas. The Fulbright-Hays Act of 1961 formalized legal statutes for the program. It says the selection of scholars, teachers and others falls under the authority of a 12-member board appointed by the president.
The nearly 200 scholars who are receiving rejection letters are part of a group of about 900 American scholars approved by the board over the winter.
“The bipartisan Fulbright Board was mandated by Congress to be a check on the executive and to ensure that students, researchers and educators are not subjected to the blatant political favoritism that this administration is known for,” Ms. Shaheen, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said in a statement.
“While I understand and respect the bipartisan Fulbright Board for resigning en masse rather than grant credibility to a politicized and unlawful process,” she added, “I am painfully aware that today’s move will change the quality of Fulbright programming and the independent research that has made our country a leader in so many fields.”
Ms. Shaheen and the board asserted that the State Department was violating the congressional statute by rejecting or reviewing the scholarship candidates already approved by the board, the people familiar with the issues said.
The selection process for the American scholars usually starts with career diplomats in overseas missions and U.S. educational institutions, and proceeds for months until the board gives essentially pro forma approval over the winter. Across Republican and Democratic administrations, the board has generally approved of the candidates submitted by the State Department because of the long and rigorous selection process and to avoid the appearance of political interference.
The United States has 49 bilateral commissions established by treaties with other nations, many American allies, to help with the selection process and match scholars with institutions. More than 35 countries contribute half or more of the funding for the scholarships.
The makeup of the board changes as members finish their three-year terms. The current board members are appointees of President Joseph R. Biden Jr. because those who began serving on it during the first Trump administration have rotated out.
The nearly 200 American scholars who are receiving rejection letters from the State Department are about a fifth of the total U.S. scholars approved by the board over the winter.
Mr. Beattie and his aides appear to be rejecting them based on their stated research topics, which include climate change, environmental resilience, migration, gender, race and ethnicity and homelessness, said the people familiar with the State Department’s actions. The topics also include ones in the sciences, such as biology, agriculture and animal studies, according to the board memo.
The Fulbright program encompasses about 8,000 scholars, students, teachers and researchers in different categories at any given time.
The board sent separate messages last month to Mr. Beattie and Christopher Landau, the deputy secretary of state, expressing concern over the undermining of the selection process for the American scholars, the people said.
Most of the American and foreign scholars approved by the board had gotten early signals from officials and commissions of their acceptances so they could arrange leaves from their universities and prepare to move overseas for about a year.
