Trump's Bid to Ban Foreign Students from Harvard Halted
A federal judge in Boston blocked on Monday, June 23, another effort by the US President Donald Trump's administration to ban international students from attending Harvard University.
The judge said that the Trump administration's officials' "misplaced efforts to control a reputable academic institution' threatened freedom of speech.
The order from the U.S. District Court Judge Allison Burroughs preserves the ability of international students to apply and study at Harvard University while the case is decided.
President Trump has sought to cut off enrollment of foreign students as part of his campaign to change the governance and policies of the Ivy League school.
The administrations officials have also cut over $2.6 billion in research grants, cancelled federal contracts, and threatened to revoke the tax-exempt status of the university .
Harvard University sued the Department of Homeland Security in May, after the department retracted the school's certification to host international students and issue paperwork for their visas.
Burroughs temporarily halted the action hours after Harvard sued and then provided an initial injunction on June 20.
The latest injunction came on June 23 in response to the Trump administration's move, citing a legal justification when he issued a proclamation on June 4, banning foreign students from entering the US to attend Harvard University.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Khaleej Times
an hour ago
- Khaleej Times
Immigrants scramble for clarity after US Supreme Court's birthright citizenship ruling
The US Supreme Court's ruling tied to birthright citizenship prompted confusion and phone calls to lawyers as people who could be affected tried to process a convoluted legal decision with major humanitarian implications. The court's conservative majority on Friday granted President Donald Trump his request to curb federal judges' power but did not decide the legality of his bid to restrict birthright citizenship. That outcome has raised more questions than answers about a right long understood to be guaranteed under the US Constitution: that anyone born in the United States is considered a citizen at birth, regardless of their parents' citizenship or legal status. Lorena, a 24-year-old Colombian asylum seeker who lives in Houston and is due to give birth in September, pored over media reports on Friday morning. She was looking for details about how her baby might be affected, but said she was left confused and worried. "There are not many specifics," said Lorena, who like others interviewed by Reuters asked to be identified by her first name out of fear for her safety. "I don't understand it well." She is concerned that her baby could end up with no nationality. "I don't know if I can give her mine," she said. "I also don't know how it would work, if I can add her to my asylum case. I don't want her to be adrift with no nationality." Trump, a Republican, issued an order after taking office in January that directed US agencies to refuse to recognize the citizenship of children born in the US who do not have at least one parent who is an American citizen or lawful permanent resident. The order was blocked by three separate US district court judges, sending the case on a path to the Supreme Court. The resulting decision said Trump's policy could go into effect in 30 days but appeared to leave open the possibility of further proceedings in the lower courts that could keep the policy blocked. On Friday afternoon, plaintiffs filed an amended lawsuit in federal court in Maryland seeking to establish a nationwide class of people whose children could be denied citizenship. If they are not blocked nationwide, the restrictions could be applied in the 28 states that did not contest them in court, creating "an extremely confusing patchwork" across the country, according to Kathleen Bush-Joseph, a policy analyst for the non-partisan Migration Policy Institute. "Would individual doctors, individual hospitals be having to try to figure out how to determine the citizenship of babies and their parents?" she said. The drive to restrict birthright citizenship is part of Trump's broader immigration crackdown, and he has framed automatic citizenship as a magnet for people to come to give birth. "Hundreds of thousands of people are pouring into our country under birthright citizenship, and it wasn't meant for that reason," he said during a White House press briefing on Friday. Worried calls Immigration advocates and lawyers in some Republican-led states said they received calls from a wide range of pregnant immigrants and their partners following the ruling. They were grappling with how to explain it to clients who could be dramatically affected, given all the unknowns of how future litigation would play out or how the executive order would be implemented state by state. Lynn Tramonte, director of the Ohio Immigrant Alliance said she got a call on Friday from an East Asian temporary visa holder with a pregnant wife. He was anxious because Ohio is not one of the plaintiff states and wanted to know how he could protect his child's rights. "He kept stressing that he was very interested in the rights included in the Constitution," she said. Advocates underscored the gravity of Trump's restrictions, which would block an estimated 150,000 children born in the U.S. annually from receiving automatic citizenship. "It really creates different classes of people in the country with different types of rights," said Juliana Macedo do Nascimento, a spokesperson for the immigrant rights organization United We Dream. "That is really chaotic." Adding uncertainty, the Supreme Court ruled that members of two plaintiff groups in the litigation - CASA, an immigrant advocacy service in Maryland, and the Asylum Seeker Advocacy Project - would still be covered by lower court blocks on the policy. Whether someone in a state where Trump's policy could go into effect could join one of the organizations to avoid the restrictions or how state or federal officials would check for membership remained unclear. Betsy, a US citizen who recently graduated from high school in Virginia and a CASA member, said both of her parents came to the US from El Salvador two decades ago and lacked legal status when she was born. "I feel like it targets these innocent kids who haven't even been born," she said, declining to give her last name for concerns over her family's safety. Nivida, a Honduran asylum seeker in Louisiana, is a member of the Asylum Seeker Advocacy Project and recently gave birth. She heard on Friday from a friend without legal status who is pregnant and wonders about the situation under Louisiana's Republican governor, since the state is not one of those fighting Trump's order. "She called me very worried and asked what's going to happen," she said. "If her child is born in Louisiana … is the baby going to be a citizen?"
Gulf Today
3 hours ago
- Gulf Today
California residents fearful amid immigration raids
Jackie Ramirez has always been aware of the colour of her skin. There was the school crossing guard who nicknamed her 'morenita,' little brown girl. The uncle who affectionately called her 'paisita,' a country girl. But never has skin colour felt so top of mind than this month, as immigration agents have descended on Southern California, conducting hundreds of arrests. Videos and stories have circulated of people arrested at car washes. Agents picking up street vendors without warrants. A Latino US citizen was asked what hospital he was born in. The heightened fear that kicks in for those 'driving while Black' is widely known. But the recent immigration sweeps have underscored how much of an issue skin colour — and all the circumstances that attach to it — is for Latinos as well. Ramirez was born and raised in East Los Angeles. Her mother was born in Mexico; her father is of Mexican descent. 'You're scared to be brown,' said Ramirez, a Los Angeles radio host for 'The Cruz Show' on Real 92.3. 'You're scared to look a certain way right now.' The Department of Homeland Security has denied that agents are racially profiling. Agency spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin has called claims of people being targeted because of skin colour 'disgusting and categorically FALSE.' But that hasn't quelled concerns that darker-skinned people will be more likely to be stopped by immigration enforcement agents. Latino parents are warning their US citizen children to be careful when they leave the house. Some have taken to carrying their passports in their pockets. Workers at a coffee shop in Santa Ana tell customers, 'Se cuiden' — take care of yourselves — and ask loved ones to text when they get home. Even light-skinned Latinos have expressed concerns. Franchesca Olivas, 24, recently drove two hours from Hemet, in Riverside County, for a protest in downtown LA. She said she drives her dad around 'because he's full Mexican, and I'm half-white,' and he's fearful of getting stopped. 'I'm a white-passing, third-generation Latina and I'm scared,' Taylor Tieman, a lawyer from Los Angeles' South Bay area posted on Instagram Threads. 'To my brothers and sisters — I'm so sorry. This country is failing you.' In another post that has since garnered more than 8,000 likes, Nico Blitz, Ramirez's fiance, who is Filipino American, stressed the impact of the raids across racial and ethnic lines. 'Filipinos — your legal status doesn't mean you're not brown, especially in the eyes of ICE,' Blitz, a DJ host on 'The Cruz Show,' posted. 'This fight isn't exclusive to Latinos and Black people.' Studies show that skin colour has long affected the lives of Latinos — and others — in the US. Among the disadvantages linked to having darker skin are less income, lower socioeconomic status and more health problems. A majority of US Latinos — 62% — surveyed by Pew Research Center in 2021 said they felt having a darker skin colour hurt their ability to get ahead. And 57% said skin colour shapes their daily life experiences a lot or some, with about half saying discrimination based on race or skin colour is a 'very big problem' in the US. But amid President Donald Trump's immigration crackdown, skin colour has added another layer of fear. In January, Native Americans alleged that Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were harassing tribal members. A letter sent by nine congressional Democrats to Trump stated they had heard 'several concerning reports' regarding the detention and harassment. 'Native American Tribal members are United States citizens. Stopping people because of what they look like — with dark skin, Asian, Latino or Native American characteristics is never acceptable,' the letter stated. 'ICE's dangerous behavior of harassing American citizens, seemingly only due to the way they look, is unconstitutional and un-American.' This year, ICE agents mistakenly detained a deputy US marshal in Tucson, Arizona, because he 'fit the general description of a subject being sought by ICE,' according to a statement from a US Marshals Service spokesperson. The agency did not identify the deputy US marshal or what description he fit. The deputy US marshal's identity was confirmed by other law enforcement officers 'and he exited the building without incident,' the statement read. As immigration agents increased the pace of arrests across Southern California in early June, LA County Supervisor Hilda Solis released a statement informing constituents that people were being targeted 'based on their skin colour and the type of work they do.' Solis, whose mother immigrated from Nicaragua and her father from Mexico, said she's 'never felt so under siege.' 'It is an attack, not just on our immigrant community, but (on) people of colour,' Solis said in an interview. 'I know there are many people, including folks I'm associated with, friends, colleagues, who have families who are mixed status, and people are petrified to even show up to work, to send their kids to school. And this is harming our economy.' Solis noted that during the height of the COVID pandemic, Asians were being targeted based on how they looked. 'Now it's Latinos,' she said. On a recent weekday, Martin Chairez, a minister at a church in Santa Ana, was walking with his sons when he stopped to take photos of the National Guard troops posted outside the Ronald Reagan Federal Building and Courthouse in Orange County. He had taken his sons there to pray for the community. Chairez was born in the Mexican state of Nayarit and came to the US when he was 9. He was a so-called Dreamer, one of millions of immigrants brought to this country before they turned 16. And he benefited from the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which allowed such young people, who were undocumented, to work, travel and get higher education legally. Chairez has been married for 20 years, but he said his wife couldn't petition for him to obtain legal status until their 11th wedding anniversary. He's now a lawful permanent resident. While working as a director at a border programme in Tijuana, Chairez said, he saw asylum-seekers and refugees coming from Haiti, Ukraine, South America and Central America. 'It's quite revealing that no one from Ukraine, no one from Russia is being detained and deported — and they shouldn't be. They also came here fleeing war and seeking opportunity,' Chairez said, his hands on his hips. 'I think it's revealing that people from Central and South America are being targeted but people from Europe are not,' he said. 'And again, they shouldn't be, but neither should the people from South and Central America.' Chairez's wife is Black and his 14- and 12-year-old sons are biracial. When they get older and learn how to drive, he said, he'll have to have those conversations with them 'of what it means to drive while being a Black man.' 'Now that has extended, not just to those situations, but it's applying to almost every aspect of our lives,' he said. 'When we go to the grocery store, when we go shopping, when we're out here taking a walk, are we going to be targeted? It seems like we're now in a permanent posture of vulnerability, and that shouldn't be. That's not just.'
The National
7 hours ago
- The National
Best photos of June 28: From World Rowing Cup in Switzerland to Jean-Michel Jarre performing in Budapest
Mourners pay their respects as US Democratic assemblywoman Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark lie in state at the Minnesota Capitol, in St Paul. The couple were shot dead at their home on June 14. Reuters
