Foreign students panic as Harvard barred from enrolling internationals

May 26, 2025 (MLN): Panic is setting in for foreign students at Harvard University, a highly ranked institution in the United States, as they scramble to find another university after the Trump administration announced that Harvard can no longer enroll foreign students.

"We condemn this unlawful and unwarranted action," Harvard President Alan Garber said in a letter about the administration’s move

This is the latest in the ongoing battle between the White House and Harvard, sparked by a series of on-campus protests and rallies, as per APP.

Meanwhile, a judge has issued a temporary restraining order blocking the Trump administration's plan to strip Harvard University of its ability to enroll foreign students.

The ruling came after Harvard filed a lawsuit - the latest escalation of a dispute between the White House and one of America's most prestigious institutions.

The university said the administration's decision to bar international students was a "blatant violation" of the law and free speech rights.

The Trump administration says Harvard has not done enough to fight antisemitism, and change its hiring and admissions practices – allegations that the university has strongly denied.

US District Judge Allison Burroughs issued a temporary restraining order in a short ruling issued on Friday.

The order pauses a move that the Department of Homeland Security made on Thursday to revoke Harvard's access to the Student and Exchange Visitor Programme (SEVP) - a government database that manages foreign students.

The next hearing will occur on 29 May in Boston.

"With the stroke of a pen, the government has sought to erase a quarter of Harvard's student body, international students who contribute significantly to the University and its mission," Harvard argued in the lawsuit.

"The revocation continues a series of government actions to retaliate against Harvard for our refusal to surrender our academic independence and to submit to the federal government's illegal assertion of control over our curriculum, our faculty, and our student body."

In response, White House deputy press secretary Abigail Jackson said: "If only Harvard cared this much about ending the scourge of anti-American, anti-Semitic, pro-terrorist agitators on their campus, they wouldn't be in this situation to begin with."

After the restraining order was issued, Ms Jackson accused the judge in the case of having a "liberal agenda".

"These unelected judges have no right to stop the Trump Administration from exercising their rightful control over immigration policy and national security policy," she said.

It was quiet at Harvard over the weekend. Classes have finished for the year, and preparations are being made for commencements, APP further added.

For those graduating, it should be a week of celebration. But for foreign students hoping to remain in the US, it's been a 24-hour whirlwind, the reports said.

At the moment, Harvard's international student body scrambled to find out what was going to happen. Would they have to leave the US immediately? Were they now under the threat of deportation?

Cornell William Brooks, a professor at the Harvard Kennedy School, said, "The amount of uncertainty here injected into the lives of real people is just absolutely extraordinary."

Brooks calls this latest move in the months-long back-and-forth an unfounded attack in the name of xenophobia.

"We are literally rendering international students kind of intellectual pariah," Brooks said. 

"It smacks of political retaliation and raises constitutional red flags," Massachusetts State Congressman Tram Nguyen said. "It's not just an immigration issue. It's a First Amendment issue."

Congressman Nguyen graduated from the Harvard Kennedy School last year and calls the move "un-American."

"It sends the message that talent is not welcome here if it comes from abroad. We are an economic driver here in Massachusetts, and a lot of this work comes from international students and international workers," Nguyen said.

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