The Johns Hopkins University and the University of Maryland are seeking to join 16 other colleges in filing a friend-of-the-court brief that backs Harvard University in its legal battle with the Trump administration over federal funding.

The 18 colleges asked the U.S. District Court in Boston on Friday for permission to file the brief, and their request is so far unopposed. The filing comes after months of canceled grants and cuts to federal funding for dozens of universities, including in Maryland, by the Trump administration.

The other colleges signing onto the amicus brief are Boston University, Brown University, the California Institute of Technology, Colorado State University, Dartmouth College, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Michigan State University, Oregon State University, Princeton University, Rice University, Rutgers University, Tufts University, the University of Oregon, the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Pittsburgh and Yale University.

Each institution, according to the court document, has received “millions of dollars in federal investments in scientific research over the decades,” and conducted “fundamental research that has advanced scientific knowledge, safeguarded national security, strengthened the American economy and saved countless lives.”

The brief argued that the work done by universities with the federal funding is “vital to American competitiveness and leadership.” The elimination of federal funding for Harvard, the brief said, “negatively impacts the entire ecosystem.”

The Trump administration initially froze $2.2 billion in grants and contracts to Harvard in April. Trump then instructed government officials to sever all remaining federal contracts with the Ivy League university, worth an additional estimated $100 million.

In response, Harvard has filed a number of lawsuits against the Trump administration with help from Republican lawyers. Other universities with significant dependence on federal funding are now joining the fight.

“The cuts will disrupt ongoing research, ruin experiments and datasets, destroy the careers of aspiring scientists, and deter long-term investments at universities across the country,” the brief filed on Friday stated.

Hopkins announced on Monday it was freezing staff hiring, pausing pay increases and slowing capital projects due to the impacts of federal funding cuts. The university said in April that it would tap into its endowment earnings to help fund research that had been cut by the funding cancellations.

Since January, federal agencies have cut at least 90 grants for Hopkins, resulting in the loss of more than $50 million in research funding for the university. That’s on top of the loss of $800 million from the elimination of USAID grants, which led to 2,000 layoffs.

There are 600 National Institutes of Health-funded trials underway at the university with more than 3,000 patients enrolled. Every year since 1979, Hopkins has been the federal government’s top university research partner.

The University of Maryland, College Park has also seen losses in federal funding and state funding as the University System of Maryland grapples with a more than $150 million funding cut from the state. A hiring freeze was announced at the university in March.

Representatives for Hopkins and the University of Maryland did not immediately respond to requests for comments.

About the Education Hub

This reporting is part of The Banner’s Education Hub, community-funded journalism that provides parents with resources they need to make decisions about how their children learn. Read more.