Harvard Bets on Conservative Lawyer to Fight Trump on Funds (1)

Harvard University is tapping a white-hot lawyer with conservative bona fides to fight the Trump administration’s threat to withhold billions in funding, betting his ties to the president and experience guiding billionaires through legal thickets can win the school a reprieve.

William Burck of Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan was hired to help Harvard President Alan Garber repel Donald Trump’s demands for the college to overhaul governance, admissions and hiring practices to be more in line with the president’s priorities. On Monday, Harvard rejected those terms, with Burck writing that Harvard won’t “surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional ...