Judge Grants TRO Over Trump Administration’s Ban on International Students at Harvard

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As David wrote here, the Trump administration announced yesterday that it was putting an end to Harvard’s ability to enroll international students. That’s significant because about a quarter of Harvard’s total enrollment is international students. Those students also pay a higher tuition compared to others so it’s a big portion of the school’s tuition income. Harvard sued and this morning a federal judge issued a temporary restraining order in their favor.

Harvard University sued the Trump administration on Friday, less than 24 hours after the Department of Homeland Security said it would block international students from attending the nation’s oldest university and one of its most prestigious.

Later Friday morning, at the university’s request, a federal judge in Boston moved swiftly to block implementation of the federal government’s order.

The judge, Allison D. Burroughs issued a temporary restraining order against the federal edict, agreeing that Harvard had shown that its implementation would cause “immediate and irreparable injury” to the university.

The TRO will stand until at least Tuesday when a hearing is scheduled. But presumably, this could continue while the battle over international students plays out in court.

The backstory here is that Trump has been clamping down on Harvard for months at this point, with multiple rounds of funding cuts being met with multiple lawsuits from Harvard. 

Recently, the Trump administration had sent Harvard a letter demanding information on their foreign students, specifically their protest activity and misconduct records. It’s a safe bet they were trying to identify other students here on student visas who had participated in “pro-Palestinian” protests. (I put “pro-Palestinian in quotes because in many cases these groups are explicitly pro-Hamas and pro-violence. Calling them pro-Palestinian is selling them short.) Harvard claimed it had been trying to comply with that letter but the Trump administration got tired of waiting.

The administration said Harvard had not complied with a list of demands sent on April 16 that contained records of protest activity dating back five years, including videotapes of misconduct and records of disciplinary actions involving international students.

Harvard’s lawsuit also said that the university had been working to comply with the April 16 request, along with a letter attacking the university for failure to condemn antisemitism.

Despite the “unprecedented nature and scope” of the demands, calling for information on each student visa holder, about 7,000 students across Harvard’s 13 schools, within 10 business days, Harvard had submitted the required information on April 30, the lawsuit said, and also complied with a follow-up request.

“Yet on May 22, D.H.S. deemed Harvard’s response ‘insufficient,’ without explaining why or citing any regulation with which Harvard failed to comply,” the lawsuit said.

We’ve seen this game play out before. Way back in 2023 when the presidents of several schools, including Harvard, were called to testify before congress one of the complaints from Republicans was that the schools had not been handing out discipline for students who broke the rules and that the schools were not responsive to requests for information about discipline. All that to say, it’s hard to know if what they are claiming now is true or if they are still slow-walking the information precisely because they know it could result in some students losing their student visas.

As ever, Harvard is vowing to fight.

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.”

But the Trump administration is also happy to have this fight.

“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.”

This battle is probably going to continue until Harvard surrenders or the courts completely hold the administration back.