A federal judge has temporarily halted the Trump administration’s
ban on Harvard University’s ability to enroll international students.
US District Judge
Allison Burroughs ruled hours after the nation’s oldest and wealthiest college filed suit Friday. Harvard argued revocation of its certification in the Student and Exchange Visitor Program was “clear retaliation” for its refusal of the government’s ideologically rooted policy demands.
Burroughs is the same judge considering a separate lawsuit from Harvard challenging the administration’s freeze of $2.65 billion in federal funding.
The latest complaint by the nation’s oldest and wealthiest institution of higher education argues the decision Thursday to
drop the school from the Department of Homeland Security’s SEVP system violates the law.
“It is the latest act by the government in clear retaliation for Harvard exercising its First Amendment rights to reject the government’s demands to control Harvard’s governance, curriculum, and the ‘ideology’ of its faculty and students,” the complaint states.
“Effective immediately, countless academic programs, research laboratories, clinics, and courses supported by Harvard’s F-1 and J-1 visa students have been thrown into disarray,” the motion says. “Immediate relief is necessary.”
The Trump administration’s
revocation of Harvard’s ability to enroll international students came as sharp punishment to the elite institution for refusing to bow to White House policy demands. Rooted in political ideology, the requirements – such as handing over student disciplinary records and killing equity initiatives – also have been placed on other US colleges.
“Harvard can no longer enroll foreign students and existing foreign students must transfer or lose their legal status,” the US Department of Homeland Security said in
a statement.
“With the stroke of a pen, the government has sought to erase a quarter of Harvard’s student body,” Harvard’s lawsuit says.
The university will fight for its international students, its president, Alan Garber, promised the Harvard community.
“You are our classmates and friends, our colleagues and mentors, our partners in the work of this great institution,” he said Friday in a statement. “Thanks to you, we know more and understand more, and our country and our world are more enlightened and more resilient. We will support you as we do our utmost to ensure that Harvard remains open to the world.”
Harvard’s new lawsuit was filed against the Departments of Homeland Security, Justice and State, as well as Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, Attorney General Pam Bondi and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
“This lawsuit seeks to kneecap the President’s constitutionally vested powers under Article II. It is a privilege, not a right, for universities to enroll foreign students and benefit from their higher tuition payments to help pad their multibillion-dollar endowments,” said Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin in a statement.
“The Trump administration is committed to restoring common sense to our student visa system; no lawsuit, this or any other, is going to change that. We have the law, the facts, and common sense on our side.”
Government attacks threaten Harvard finances
Harvard already is fighting the White House in court over its freeze in recent weeks of $2.65 billion in federal grants and contracts. In that lawsuit, the university chose not to request an immediate court order blocking the decision, meaning the freeze is likely to stay in place at least until late July, when both sides will present their arguments in front of
Burroughs.
The
Obama appointee coincidentally was assigned Friday to hear Harvard’s new lawsuit over its international student certification.
“There is simply no replacing the presence and contributions of these individuals and future generations of international students who will feel that entrusting their education and their future to Harvard is too risky, unless the court immediately steps in to reverse the government’s decision and confirm that this highly disruptive action is unlawful,” Harvard international affairs vice provost Mark Elliott said in an affidavit.
Although the two lawsuits are separate legal matters, Harvard cites freezing funding and blocking international students as part of a pattern – what it calls a government “campaign to coerce Harvard into surrendering its First Amendment rights.”
On yet another front challenging the institution’s finances, the Internal Revenue Service is
making plans to rescind Harvard’s tax-exempt status.
The bombshell over foreign scholars’ enrollment comes as students from around the world were preparing to attend one of the nation’s most prestigious universities. One would-be incoming freshman from New Zealand described hearing the news as a “heart drop” moment.
Noem said she ordered her department to terminate Harvard’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program (SEVP) certification, citing the university’s refusal to
turn over the conduct records of foreign students requested by the DHS last month.
Harvard’s suit says it did provide requested information to the department, but “DHS deemed Harvard’s responses ‘insufficient’ – without explaining why or citing any regulation with which Harvard failed to comply.”
The university accuses the government of failing to follow its own requirements for removing a university from the Student and Exchange Visitor program.
“The Revocation Notice offered Harvard no opportunity to defend itself against the withdrawal of its certification, including to present evidence or be heard on its argument that it has complied with the law.”
Harvard can regain its ability to enroll international students if it submits five years’ worth of records related international students’ conduct “within 72 hours,” according to Noem’s
letter to Harvard.
In its Friday lawsuit, Harvard says the new statement from the government adds to its original requirements, noting the government “cited no statutory or regulatory authority for these additional demands.”
The termination could impact nearly 7,000 Harvard students who are now flung into anxiety and confusion. Professors warn a mass exodus of foreign students threatens to stifle Harvard’s academic prowess, even as it battles against the government for its ideological autonomy.
The White House on Thursday accused Harvard leadership of turning “their once-great institution into a hot-bed of anti-American, anti-Semitic, pro-terrorist agitators” and said, “enrolling foreign students is a privilege, not a right.”
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“They have repeatedly failed to take action to address the widespread problems negatively impacting American students and now they must face the consequences of their actions,” White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said in a statement to CNN.
Harvard and Trump officials have been locked in conflict for months as the administration demands the university make changes to campus programming, policies, hiring and admissions to root out on-campus antisemitism and eliminate what it calls “racist ‘diversity, equity and inclusion’ practices.” The White House has homed in on foreign students and staff it believes participated in contentious campus protests over the Israel-Hamas war.
Harvard, meanwhile, has
acknowledged antisemitism on its campus, particularly last academic year, and said it has begun taking concrete steps to address it.
The government’s decision will effectively kick a lot of Jewish students out of the university, said Harvard’s former president, Lawrence Summers.
“The president and his administration have made a big deal – and they’ve been right – about Israel and antisemitism,” Summers told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on Friday. “Sending every Israeli student out of Harvard is much more discriminatory against Israelis and is much more discriminatory against Jews than anything they have complained about.”
The university’s leadership
argues many of the government’s requests, including an “audit” of the “viewpoint” of its students and staff, go far beyond the role of the federal government and may violate Harvard’s constitutional rights.
Harvard is among dozens of US universities facing harsh demands from the Trump administration, but it has emerged as the fiercest defender of its academic independence.
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The university swiftly condemned the SEVP revocation as “unlawful,” saying in a statement it is “fully committed to maintaining Harvard’s ability to host international students and scholars, who hail from more than 140 countries and enrich the University – and this nation – immeasurably.”
“We are working quickly to provide guidance and support to members of our community. This retaliatory action threatens serious harm to the Harvard community and our country, and undermines Harvard’s academic and research mission,” university spokesperson Jason Newton said.
The university has an enormous foreign student population that could be impacted. It
says it has 9,970 people in its international academic population, and
data shows 6,793 international students comprise 27.2% of its enrollment in the 2024-25 academic year.
Like many other colleges and universities, Harvard drew intense criticism last year for its handling of pro-Palestinian protests and encampments following the start of the Israel-Hamas war, as well as complaints from Jewish alumni and students about antisemitism on campus.
Reports released by two Harvard task forces last month concluded that
both Jewish and Muslim students feared for their safety during the 2023-24 academic year and had deep feelings of alienation and academic censorship on campus. They included broad recommendations and policy changes as remedies, some of which Harvard has already made.
Harvard has also implemented some changes to comply with the Trump administration’s requests, including changing the name of its Office of Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging to
Community and Campus Life.
But Noem, in a letter to Harvard on Thursday, accused the university of “perpetuating an unsafe campus environment that is hostile to Jewish students, promotes-pro-Hamas sympathies, and employs racist “diversity, equity and inclusion’ practices.” She did not mention Muslim or Arab students.
The Trump administration appears poised to make an example of Harvard as it threatens similar punishment to other institutions if they don’t cooperate.
“This should be a warning to every other university to get your act together,” Noem said on Fox News.
Students and staff are horrified
Some of Harvard’s students and staff were stunned by the announcement, which has left thousands of international students in limbo as they mourn their connection to a university that many of them fought tooth and nail to attend.
“This is extortion,” said Summers, who also served as Secretary of the Treasury under President Bill Clinton. “It’s a vendetta using all the powers of the government because of a political argument with Harvard.”
Jared, an 18-year-old in New Zealand, told CNN it was a “heart drop” moment when he learned he may not be able to start his undergraduate degree at the Ivy League school this fall.
“To me, it’s one of, if not the best school in the world,” Jared said, contrasting the news with the “really special moment” for him and his family when he learned in March he’d been accepted to Harvard to study Sociology.
Jared was in the process of applying for his student visa and preparing to move the 9,000 miles to Boston when he learned of the Trump administration’s announcement.
Now he’s in limbo and looking at other resources the university may offer, such as online learning.
“There’s really no use for me getting too worked up over something that I can’t control, you know. I’m just focused on doing what I can control,” he said.
Existing international students at Harvard are likewise faced with an uncertain future. Rising junior Karl Molden, from Austria, is traveling abroad and says he’s terrified he won’t be allowed to return to campus. International students have been nervously messaging each other, he said.
“Many of us have worked our entire lives to get to a university like Harvard, and now we need to wait around and see if we might have to transfer out and face difficulties with visas,” Molden said.
The Austrian junior said other international students he’s been in touch with are wondering if they will be able to complete summer internships – others worry they won’t get the same generous financial aid Harvard offers from another college.
Molden said international students are being used as a “play ball in this larger fight between democracy and authoritarianism.”
“Coming from Austria, I’m a little bit more familiar … with the authoritarian playbook and how authoritarians can kill democracies,” he said. “What I’ve been seeing in the US in the past few months is that.”
Some Harvard staff worry draining the university of its foreign students would debilitate the academic power of both the institution and, potentially, American academia as a whole.
Harvard economics professor and former Obama administration official Jason Furman called the measure “horrendous on every level.”
“It is impossible to imagine Harvard without our amazing international students. They are a huge benefit to everyone here, to innovation and the United States more broadly,” Furman said. “Higher education is one of America’s great exports and a key source of our soft power. I hope this is stopped quickly before the damage gets any worse.”
Another professor familiar with the situation told CNN that if the policy goes into effect, he fears “many labs will empty out.”
Australia’s ambassador to the US, Kevin Rudd, said the move “will be distressing for Harvard’s many Australian students” and is offering them consular advice as they closely monitor the situation.
Harvard’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors said in a statement it “condemns in the strongest possible terms the Trump administration’s unconstitutional assault on our international students.”
The group of professors said the decision “expands the Trump administration’s terrorizing assault on international students and scholars in the United States.”
“International students are essential members of the Harvard community,” the statement continued.
It is a sentiment echoed Friday by the statement from Harvard’s president.
“For those international students and scholars affected by today’s action, know that you are vital members of our community,” Garber said. “You are our classmates and friends, our colleagues and mentors, our partners in the work of this great institution.”
This story has been updated with additional information.
