Federal judge blocks immigration authorities from revoking international students' legal status
A judge in California blocked the Trump administration Thursday from terminating the legal status of international students nationwide while a court case challenging previous terminations is pending.
The order by U.S. District Judge Jeffrey S. White in Oakland bars the government from arresting, incarcerating or moving students elsewhere based on their legal status until the case is resolved. Students could still be arrested for other reasons and their legal status can still be revoked if they are convicted of a violent crime carrying a prison term of more than a year.
Most courts hearing these types of cases have granted protections to the person suing, but White said the government's actions 'wreaked havoc" not only on the lives of plaintiffs but other nonimmigrants in the U.S. on student visas.
White, who was nominated by President George W. Bush, a Republican, issued the nationwide injunction sought by attorneys for about two dozen students who sued after their legal status was abruptly terminated in early April by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
More than 4,700 international students had their permission to study in the U.S. canceled this spring, with little notice or explanation, as part of President Donald Trump's crackdown on immigrants and foreign nationals. In court hearings, Department of Homeland Security officials said they ran the names of student visa holders through an FBI-run database that contains the names of suspects and people who have been arrested, even if the charges were dropped or they were never charged with a crime.
Some students left the U.S. rather than risk being deported to a third country.
Government lawyers say the administration is exercising its prerogative to administer the Immigration and Nationality Act. They say students do not need the court's protections because ICE reinstated legal status and was mailing status reactivation letters to affected students.
But White found those actions insufficient. He said that the erroneous revocation remained in the students' record, impacting their ability to obtain a new visa or change their nonimmigrant status. Some students are still dealing with fallout from the previous terminations and there is no guarantee they won't have their legal status revoked again on a whim.
He also chastised the administration for unveiling new policies or new actions in an apparent attempt to satisfy the courts' concerns.
'It is unclear how this game of whack-a-mole will end unless Defendants are enjoined from skirting their own mandatory regulations,' White wrote.
A survey by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs research found that even the visa revocations for students who participated in pro-Palestinian protests are more unpopular than popular. About half of U.S. adults oppose this policy, and only 3 in 10 are in support. Among college educated adults, 6 in 10 strongly oppose, compared with 4 in 10 who aren't college graduates.
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The Independent
40 minutes ago
- The Independent
EPA employees put names to 'declaration of dissent' over agency moves under Trump
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"Since the Agency's founding in 1970, EPA has accomplished (its) mission by leveraging science, funding, and expert staff in service to the American people. Today, we stand together in dissent against the current administration's focus on harmful deregulation, mischaracterization of previous EPA actions, and disregard for scientific expertise," the letter read. Agency spokespeople did not immediately respond Monday to messages seeking comment. Employees want the EPA get back to its mission 'I'm really sad. This agency, that was a superhero for me in my youth, we're not living up to our ideals under this administration. And I really want us to,' said Amelia Hertzberg, an environmental protection specialist at the EPA who has been on administrative leave since February from the Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights, while the administration works to close down her department. Hertzberg's work focused on the most vulnerable groups impacted by pollution: pregnant and nursing people, young children and babies, the elderly, people with preexisting and chronic health conditions and people living in communities exposed to higher levels of pollution. That wasn't supposed to be controversial, but it's become so in this political climate, she said. ' Americans should be able to drink their water and breathe their air without being poisoned. And if they aren't, then our government is failing,' she said. Berg, who also directed the National Institute of General Medical Sciences at NIH from 2003-2011, said the dissent isn't motivated by partisan criticism. He said the employees hope it will help the EPA get back to the mission for which it was established — which 'only matters if you breathe air and drink water." The letter outlines what the EPA employees see as five main concerns: undermining public trust; ignoring scientific consensus to benefit polluters; reversing EPA's progress in America's most vulnerable communities; dismantling the Office of Research and Development; and promoting a culture of fear, forcing staff to choose between their livelihood and well-being. EPA has cut funding and rolled back federal regulations Under Administrator Lee Zeldin, EPA has cut funding for environmental improvements in minority communities, vowed to roll back federal regulations that lower air pollution in national parks and tribal reservations, wants to undo a ban on a type of asbestos and proposed repealing rules that limit planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions from power plants fueled by coal and natural gas. Zeldin began reorganizing the EPA's research and development office as part of his push to slash their budget and gut their study of climate change and environmental justice. And he's seeking to roll back pollution rules that an Associated Press examination found were estimated to save 30,000 lives and $275 billion every year. 'People are going to die,' said Carol Greider, a Nobel laureate and professor of molecular and cellular biology at the University of California, Santa Cruz, who also signed the letter. She described last week's East Coast heat wave as evidence of the ways people are feeling the effects of climate change. 'And if we don't have scientists at the EPA to understand how what we do that goes into the air affects our health, more people are going to die,' she added. Berg said the declarations of dissent from both the NIH and EPA employees are noteworthy because they represent scientists speaking out as their careers are on the line. Even non-agency employees have to consider whether the government will withdraw research funding. Greider, asked about fears of repercussions or retaliation, said she's 'living the repercussions of everything.' She regularly meets with graduate students who are worried about pursuing scientific careers as labs lose funding. It's a long-term problem if we aren't supporting the next generation of scientists, she said: "That's decades worth of loss.' Follow Melina Walling on X @MelinaWalling and Bluesky @ ___ The Associated Press' climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP's standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at
The Guardian
an hour ago
- The Guardian
Zohran Mamdani won by being himself – and his victory has revealed the Islamophobic ugliness of others
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Because the idea that Mamdani, whose style is, above anything else, wide-grinned earnestness, was some sinister Islamist sleeper agent is so clearly a joke. But it's not a joke, and if it is then it's on me for still, after all these years, underestimating what Muslims in the public sphere do to people's brains. And how utterly comfortable many are with anti-Muslim hate. And why shouldn't they be? To date, the most senior figures in Mamdani's own party, Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries, have not called out this onslaught, and those politicians and public figures who made them will suffer no censure or consequence. Because, fundamentally, anti-Muslim hate, like all racism when it becomes normalised, thrives when there is a systemic blessing of it through not even registering its offensiveness. But the apathy towards assaults against Mamdani is because he is an outsider in more meaningful ways, not just in his religious background. 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And in drawing out such naked and explicit anti-Muslim hate, Mamdani has inadvertently revealed the ugliness and weakness not just of his opponents, but of the wider political establishment, as well as their anti-democratic impulses. In drawing them out, Mamdani has shown how prejudice is rarely about individuals, but the fear that marginalised minority views could ever become powerful majority ones. In this mayoral race, from Palestine to local policing, anti-Muslim hate is not just a repellent phenomenon confined to Mamdani, it is a barricade against the desires of the voting public. Once people start making that connection, it really is over. Nesrine Malik is a Guardian columnist Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.
The Independent
an hour ago
- The Independent
Trump's ICE raids on farms risk U.S. food supply, economists warn
Recent raids carried out by agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in California 's agricultural heartland are causing a widespread exodus of workers, threatening the harvest of billions of dollars worth of produce. Farmers say the raids earlier this month, as part of President Donald Trump 's migration crackdown, have frightened off workers and left fields in Ventura County and beyond critically understaffed. Ventura County produces billions of dollars worth of fruit and vegetables each year, much of it hand-picked by immigrants in the U.S. illegally. Lisa Tate, a sixth-generation farmer in the area, has observed the immediate and chilling effect of the ICE operations. "In the fields, I would say 70 percent of the workers are gone," she said. "If 70 percent of your workforce doesn't show up, 70 percent of your crop doesn't get picked and can go bad in one day. Most Americans don't want to do this work. Most farmers here are barely breaking even. I fear this has created a tipping point where many will go bust." The agricultural lands north of Los Angeles, stretching from Ventura County into the state's central valley, two farmers, two field supervisors and four immigrant farmworkers told Reuters this month that the ICE raids have led a majority of workers to stop showing up. That means crops are not being picked and fruit and vegetables are rotting at peak harvest time, they said. One Mexican farm supervisor, who asked not to be named, was overseeing a field being prepared for planting strawberries last week. Usually, he would have 300 workers, he said. On this day, he had just 80. Another supervisor at a different farm said he usually has 80 workers in a field, but today just 17. Bad for business Most economists and politicians acknowledge that many of America's agricultural workers are in the country illegally, but say a sharp reduction in their numbers could have devastating impacts on the food supply chain and farm-belt economies. Douglas Holtz-Eakin, a Republican and former director of the Congressional Budget Office, said an estimated 80 percent of farmworkers in the U.S. were foreign-born, with nearly half of them in the country illegally. Losing them will cause price hikes for consumers, he said. "This is bad for supply chains, bad for the agricultural industry," Holtz-Eakin said. Over a third of U.S. vegetables and over three-quarters of the country's fruits and nuts are grown in California, according to the California Department of Food and Agriculture. The state's farms and ranches generated nearly $60 billion in agricultural sales in 2023. Of the four immigrant farmworkers Reuters spoke to, two are in the country illegally. These two spoke on the condition of anonymity, out of fear of being arrested by ICE. One, aged 54, has worked in U.S. agricultural fields for 30 years and has a wife and children in the country. He said most of his colleagues have stopped showing up for work. "If they show up to work, they don't know if they will ever see their family again," he said. The other worker in the country illegally said, "Basically, we wake up in the morning scared. We worry about the sun, the heat, and now a much bigger problem - many not returning home. I try not to get into trouble on the street. Now, whoever gets arrested for any reason gets deported." To be sure, some farmworker community groups said many workers were still returning to the fields, despite the raids, out of economic necessity. The days following a raid may see decreased attendance in the field, but the workers soon return because they have no other sources of income, five groups told Reuters. Workers are also taking other steps to reduce their exposure to immigration agents, like carpooling with people with legal status to work or sending U.S. citizen children to the grocery store, the groups said. Trump conceded in a post on his Truth Social account this month that ICE raids on farm workers - and also hotel workers - were "taking very good, long-time workers away" from those sectors, "with those jobs being almost impossible to replace." Trump later told reporters, "Our farmers are being hurt badly. They have very good workers." He added, "They're not citizens, but they've turned out to be great." He pledged to issue an order to address the impact, but no policy change has yet been enacted. Trump has always stood up for farmers, said White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly in response to a request for comment on the impact of the ICE raids on farms. "He will continue to strengthen our agricultural industry and boost exports while keeping his promise to enforce our immigration laws," she said. Bernard Yaros, Lead U.S. Economist at Oxford Economics, a nonpartisan global economics advisory firm, said in a report published on June 26 that native-born workers tend not to fill the void left by immigrant workers who have left. "Unauthorized immigrants tend to work in different occupations than those who are native-born," he said. ICE operations in California's farmland were scaring even those who are authorized, said Greg Tesch, who runs a farm in central California. "Nobody feels safe when they hear the word ICE, even the documented people. We know that the neighborhood is full of a combination of those with and without documents," Tesch said. "If things are ripe, such as our neighbors have bell peppers here, (if) they don't harvest within two or three days, the crop is sunburned or over mature," said Tesch. "We need the labor."
