University of Michigan named possible Defense Department partner amid federal probes

DETROIT — The federal Defense Department has named the University of Michigan as a potential partner institution for service members' higher education in a memorandum by Secretary Pete Hegseth despite multiple federal investigations into the university.

UM was named last month as a potential replacement for several institutions, the majority of them private, with which the military has long partnered for professional military education. Those institutions included Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Columbia University and Yale University.

These schools have come under fire by President Donald Trump for how they handled protests related to the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, alleged antisemitism on campus and other concerns, including their relationships with foreign governments.

UM leaders have embraced the opportunity.

"As a top-ranked public research university, the University of Michigan has a distinguished centuries-long history of educating some of the nation’s most elite active-duty military leaders and veterans," UM spokeswoman Kay Jarvis said in an emailed statement.

The university is also establishing an "expedited review process" for military applicants to UM who were previously admitted to Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, Jarvis said. This would allow "elite service members to have their credentials considered through a simplified application process that ensures applicants receive timely decisions," she added.

The U.S. military would no longer work with certain Ivy League institutions, Hegseth said, because they'd failed to "sharpen our leaders' warfighting capabilities" or had undermined "the very values they are sworn to defend.

Instead, he sought institutions that valued "intellectual freedom," had "minimal relationships with adversaries," had "minimal public expressions in opposition of the Department" and had "Graduate-level National Security, International Affairs, and/or Public Policy Programs," said Hegseth, who oversees the agency long known as the Department of Defense.

But UM has been named in at least two federal investigations by the Trump administration, including one into alleged antisemitism and another into foreign funding, particularly by the Chinese communist government, of university programs.

It's not clear if those investigations are ongoing. UM's Jarvis did not respond to inquiries about the status of the investigations. The federal Department of Education did not respond to an emailed request for comment.

A Defense Department spokesperson reached by phone declined to comment on why UM was named and referred The Detroit News back to the memo. The Trump administration refers to the Defense Department as the Department of War.

"Our Professional Military Education (PME) institutions are among our most sacred and essential means to restore and maintain the warrior ethos within the DoW," Hegseth said in the memo. "It is imperative that our warfighter education system forges strategic senior leaders who are trained to think critically, free of bias and influence."

UM Faculty Senate chair welcomes chance to educate service members

Faculty Senate Chair Derek Peterson said he welcomed the opportunity to educate active duty or veteran service members who chose to attend UM.

"Educating military officers is something we should do here," Peterson said. "They should have the opportunity to learn from those who may be critical of them and the opportunity to be on a campus with a lot of diversity."

The UM faculty government had previously been critical of some of former President Santa Ono's efforts to capitulate to the federal government's new demands for and heightened scrutiny of higher education institutions under President Donald Trump, he said.

The Democratic-led Board of Regents pressured Ono to confront the Trump administration about the president's executive orders on campus antisemitism, federal research spending cuts and so-called woke policies, but he balked. Ono left after being recruited for the University of Florida's presidency, but a political backlash resulted in a state board's rejection of Ono's nomination.

"I'm not sure whether this news shows (the University of) Michigan's favorable perception by the federal government," Peterson said. "But it's our job to educate the future military leaders of America."

What Department of Education is investigating at UM

The U.S. Department of Education, led by Secretary Linda McMahon, has opened two investigations into UM. In July, the university was accused of allegedly violating a federal disclosure law about foreign gifts after two Chinese researchers linked to the university were charged with smuggling biological materials into the country.

The letter from federal education officials to UM interim President Domenico Grasso accused UM of "incomplete, inaccurate and untimely" disclosures of foreign gifts and contracts valued at $250,000 or more connected to Chinese research.

Then-UM Assistant Vice President for Public Affairs Colleen Mastony didn't address the allegations directly at the time. Mastony said the university "is dedicated to advancing knowledge, solving challenging problems and improving nearly every facet of the human experience. Our research enterprise is united in this commitment to serving the people of Michigan and the world.

"The University of Michigan takes its responsibility to comply with the law extremely seriously, and we will cooperate fully with federal investigators. We strongly condemn any actions that seek to cause harm, threaten national security or undermine the university’s critical public mission."

In March 2025, the department announced an investigation into UM, along with 59 other institutions, for a potential violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act. The department threatened grant and contract cancellations for those universities that were found to have allowed "illegal protests" against and failed to protect Jewish students from antisemitic harassment amid campus protests against the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.

The university did not comment specifically on that investigation at the time, but Regent Sarah Hubbard, R-Okemos, said she felt the university made significant changes to address potential antisemitism.