President Donald Trump’s campaign to pressure elite universities into making a wide range of policy changes met its first major resistance when Harvard University sued the US government for freezing billions of dollars in federal funding.

Harvard isn’t the only school the Trump administration is fighting. Other institutions are facing similar circumstances – starting with New York City's Columbia University.

The Trump administration will respond in court to Harvard University's lawsuit seeking to block a federal funding freeze imposed after the institution rejected a list of White House demands that it said would undermine its independence,