Bob Schwartz

At this moment, six of the nine universities who were offered the White House deal to get money in exchange for losing control of their schools have turned it down. Only the University of Arizona, Vanderbilt University and the University of Texas are still considering it. Today is a deadline, so by the time you read this, there may be more decisions made.

Strategically, while the White House would be happy with all or most of the schools accepting the agreement, Trump can be okay if only one university accepts. Here’s why:

The accepting school or schools will be showered—flooded—with federal money in ridiculous amounts. Meanwhile, the schools that rejected the offer will see funds dry up. This will serve as a terrorizing demonstration, a tactic that Trump continues to use in a variety of domains, global and domestic. Not just a high-powered version of carrot and stick. A threat, a warning, of what could happen to those who don’t comply with whatever the latest demand is.

To use the coarse language that Trump sometimes uses in public, and probably uses frequently in private, he wants to show resistant universities that he is not fucking around. He isn’t.