The university filed a lawsuit against the administration in federal court Friday morning, alleging the international students ban is a “blatant violation of the First Amendment.”
Harvard filed a second lawsuit against the Trump administration Friday. (Photo by Maddie Meyer/Getty Images)
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Key facts
- Federal judge Allison Burroughs granted Harvard’s motion for a temporary restraining order that blocks the Trump administration from revoking the school’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program, which allows it to host international students on student visas, late Friday morning.
- Earlier Friday, Harvard filed a lawsuit in Boston federal court alleging the Trump administration’s move to bar international students is a “blatant violation of the First Amendment, the Due Process clause, and the Administrative Procedure Act.”
- The university called the move an act of retaliation against Harvard exercising its First Amendment rights to “reject the government’s demands to control Harvard’s governance,” after it resisted a list of demands the Trump administration sent last month.
- On Thursday, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem sent a letter to Harvard stating the department revoked the school’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program certification, meaning international students must “transfer or lose their legal status” and that Harvard could no longer enroll international students.
- Harvard said in its lawsuit this would “erase a quarter of Harvard’s student body,” which it says would amount to “immediate chaos” as graduation and the summer term loom.
- The lawsuit follows an earlier action Harvard filed against the government in federal court, alleging its attempt to freeze more than $2 billion in grants was illegal.
- The legal battle began after the Trump administration issued a list of demands in April, including that the school must abandon DEI hiring and admissions practices, admit students with diverse viewpoints, crack down on protests and avoid admitting international students that are “hostile to the American values.”
- Harvard President Alan Garber wrote in response to the Trump administration’s demands, “No government—regardless of which party is in power—should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue.”
Why did the Trump administration target international students at Harvard?
In Noem’s letter to Harvard, which she posted to her X account Thursday, she accused the school of refusing to comply with DHS requests for information on illegal or violent acts committed by international students. Noem said Harvard could regain its ability to admit international students if it provides the requested information within 72 hours.
In her letter, Noem accused Harvard of fostering an “unsafe campus environment that is hostile to Jewish students, promotes pro-Hamas sympathies, and employs racist ‘diversity, equity and inclusion’ policies.” Noem’s request also demands audio or visual evidence of international students participating in protests on campus, as the administration has moved to crack down on pro-Palestinian protests on university campuses. In her post, Noem also accused Harvard of “coordinating with the Chinese Communist Party on its campus.” Noem, in a Fox News appearance Thursday, said the move to ban international students at Harvard should serve as a “warning” to other universities.
Chief critics
The Chinese Foreign Ministry slammed the Trump administration’s decision to ban international students at Harvard in a statement Friday: “China has consistently opposed the politicization of educational collaboration,” it said, adding the move will “only tarnish its own image and reputation in the world.”
Former Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers, who served as Harvard’s president from 2001 to 2006, called the Trump administration’s decision “vicious” and “illegal” in an interview with Bloomberg: ”Why does it make any sense at all to stop 6,000 enormously talented young people who want to come to the United States to study from having that opportunity?”
Big number
6,793. That’s how many international students Harvard has as of the 2024-2025 academic year, which represents 27.2% of its student body, according to the school’s data.
Key background
Trump has targeted elite universities since early in his second term over allegations they foster cultures of antisemitism, though he has sparred specifically with Havard since April over threats to block federal funding. Harvard publicly responded to the Trump administration’s demands by outlining steps it says it has already taken to combat antisemitism while accusing the federal government of overreaching its authority.
The Trump administration then announced it would freeze more than $2 billion in federal grants to Harvard, prompting the university to sue the administration the following week. On April 25, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission opened an investigation into Harvard for allegedly discriminating against white, male, Asian and heterosexual employees, citing statistics showing the percentage of white and male professors had dropped over the past decade.
On May 2, Trump said on Truth Social: “We are going to be taking away Harvard’s Tax Exempt Status. It’s what they deserve!” Education Secretary Linda McMahon told Harvard on May 5 it would cut off the institution from new research grants from the federal government, which Garber again criticized as “overreach into the constitutional freedoms of private universities.”
A federal antisemitism task force said on May 13 Harvard would lose an additional $450 million in federal funding, calling the school a “breeding ground for virtue signaling and discrimination.
