A judge temporarily halted DHS’s ban on Harvard’s ability to enroll international students. Here’s what to know
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By Emma Tucker, Elizabeth Wolfe, CNN
(CNN) — The Trump administration’s now-paused revocation of Harvard University’s ability to enroll international students raises significant questions about how a ban would impact the school community and its academic research.
While a temporary restraining order by US District Court Judge Allison Burroughs blocks the implementation of the federal government’s order for now, the university’s future ability to enroll international students will depend on how the case plays out in court.
Here are answers to key questions about how the revocation could affect the school if allowed to go into effect and what comes next:
What is Harvard’s international student population?
The judge’s order came a day after the Department of Homeland Security ordered the termination of the university’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program certification.
If the directive is allowed to go into effect, it could drastically escalate the university’s dispute with the White House over federal funding. The Trump administration froze $2.2 billion in funds last month when Harvard said it would not concede to White House demands, including reforming its international student program.
In the 2024-2025 academic year, there were 6,793 international students enrolled at Harvard, making up roughly 27% of its total enrollment.
The decision by the Department of Homeland Security could impact a substantial portion of the university’s community, with its international academic population comprising 9,970 people, the school said.
Harvard said it is “committed to maintaining our ability to host our international students and scholars, who hail from more than 140 countries and enrich the University and this nation,” according to a statement on its website.
What’s next in the legal battle?
In issuing the temporary restraining order, Judge Burroughs said Harvard had shown “it will sustain immediate and irreparable injury” if the government were allowed to revoke the school’s certification before the court could consider the matter.
The order halting the ban should last about a week, unless the judge extends it indefinitely with a preliminary injunction – an order that would block the administration’s action until a final decision is made in the lawsuit.
“As of this moment, it’s back to the status quo. Harvard may continue to bring in international students,” CNN senior legal analyst Elie Honig said.
A remote conference in the legal case is set for Tuesday. Two days later, the judge is due to hear arguments at the federal courthouse in Boston over whether to issue a preliminary injunction.
If the judge lets the order expire, the government would be allowed to decertify Harvard’s international program again.
“For the moment, Harvard is free to continue admitting these students, but the larger issue still has to play out in the courts,” Honig said.
What are the options for current international students at Harvard?
For right now, the judge’s order means international students can continue at the university as normal, legal experts say.
But if the Trump administration’s directive is allowed to go into effect after the order expires, it could become complicated for current and incoming international students.
In a letter to Harvard, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said the revocation of the school’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program certification means it would be prohibited from enrolling any “aliens on F- or J- nonimmigrant status” for the upcoming academic school year.
It also would mean existing foreign students with that status “must transfer to another university in order to maintain their nonimmigrant status,” the letter said.
Educational institutions are required to have SEVP certification with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement in order to admit applicants who have an F-1 or M-1 student visa. Institutions are required to provide up-to-date basic information about each student to SEVP, including their address and academic status.
International students at institutions that have lost their SEVP certification are typically allowed to try to transfer to a different certified school before they must leave the country.
Guidelines set by ICE say that SEVP-certified schools have “serious legal obligations” to the student and the US government.
“SEVP will exercise the full authority of the U.S. government to protect you and to institute sanctions against any school that disregards its responsibilities,” according to the ICE fact sheet.
Hundreds of international students have had their student records – known as SEVIS records – canceled and later reinstated in the database DHS uses to track their immigration status and maintain information on SEVP.
Bradley Bruce Banias is an attorney who represents multiple of those students who sued the administration over the termination of their statuses.
“ICE continues to prioritize politics over the rule of law, apparently ignoring binding regulations and, again, terrorizing foreign national students,” he told CNN Thursday.
Banias, who does not represent any students at Harvard, suggested some students might opt to apply for tourist visas so they can remain in the US as the case plays out.
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.”
Was the revocation legal?
The latest move by the Trump administration has “gone so far in a way that will certainly draw a very strong legal challenge,” said Elliot Williams, CNN legal analyst and former counsel to the Senate Judiciary Committee.
There are well-established legal processes in place for revoking a school’s certification, according to Williams, who said it doesn’t appear the administration has complied with them.
Burroughs’ ruling to temporarily halt the administration’s ban came hours after Harvard filed a suit Friday.
The university argued revocation of its certification in the Student and Exchange Visitor Program was “clear retaliation” for its refusal of the government’s ideologically rooted policy demands. Harvard’s complaint argued the decision Thursday to drop the school from the Department of Homeland Security’s SEVP system violates the law.
“It is the latest act by the government in clear retaliation for Harvard exercising its First Amendment rights to reject the government’s demands to control Harvard’s governance, curriculum, and the ‘ideology’ of its faculty and students,” the complaint states.
It’s still unclear when and how the policy could be implemented if the federal judge doesn’t issue a preliminary injunction, but key stakeholders – the university’s leaders, students and faculty – have a “strong basis” for a legal challenge fighting against it, said Williams.
Separately, on Thursday, US District Judge Jeffrey White of the federal district court in San Francisco blocked the Trump administration from terminating the legal status allowing foreign students to study at colleges and universities nationwide.
The federal judge issued the preliminary injunction after the administration moved to tamper with students’ SEVIS records, putting them at risk of deportation.
The Trump administration backed down on the initiative last month amid numerous legal challenges after cancelling the records of thousands of international students.
Judge White said in his ruling he “does not find it speculative to conclude that, in the absence of an injunction (the administration) would abruptly re-terminate SEVIS records without notice.”
However, Thursday’s ruling only applies to individual cases, and not at the university level.
How could a ban impact the university’s research?
Some Harvard staff worry draining the university of its foreign students would debilitate the academic prowess of both the institution and, potentially, American academia as a whole.
“We are working quickly to provide guidance and support to members of our community. This retaliatory action threatens serious harm to the Harvard community and our country, and undermines Harvard’s academic and research mission,” university spokesperson Jason Newton said.
Harvard economics professor and former Obama administration official Jason Furman called the measure “horrendous on every level.”
“It is impossible to imagine Harvard without our amazing international students. They are a huge benefit to everyone here, to innovation and the United States more broadly,” Furman said. “Higher education is one of America’s great exports and a key source of our soft power. I hope this is stopped quickly before the damage gets any worse.”
Another professor familiar with the situation told CNN that if the policy goes into effect, he fears “many labs will empty out.”
Some Harvard research is already facing direct impacts from last month’s federal funding freeze: Harvard Medical School is preparing for possible layoffs and the School of Public Health, which subsequently received three stop-work orders on research, is winding down two leases in off-campus buildings.
Who else could a ban impact?
If the ban is allowed to stand, Harvard would not be allowed to accept any students whose permanent residence is outside the United States, meaning no country would be exempted from the ban.
The decision wouldn’t only impact students. Harvard says it sponsors visas for over 300 people who are not enrolled in the university, but are spouses and children of international students living in the US. When an international student loses their visa, any dependents living with them also lose their visas.
It could also impact the university’s various programs and activities. If the Ivy League school with the nation’s largest athletic program becomes ineligible for international student visas, some of Harvard’s sports teams would be virtually wiped out.
“With the stroke of a pen, the government has sought to erase a quarter of Harvard’s student body,” Harvard’s lawsuit says.
How would it impact Harvard financially?
International students are more likely to pay full tuition at US colleges, in part because most aren’t eligible for federal financial aid, bringing significant funding to colleges.
More than three-quarters of international students primarily fund their education themselves, through their family or through current employment, the Institute of International Education found. Less than one-fifth received primary funding from their US college or university.
Noem said in April that Harvard “relies heavily on foreign student funding … to build and maintain their substantial endowment.”
While Harvard is the nation’s oldest and richest university with a massive $53.2 billion endowment that could help supplement any cuts, experts and a review of Harvard’s financials show the challenges with tapping into that endowment, CNN previously reported.
Endowments can’t be accessed at any time like bank accounts. They must be maintained in perpetuity and are largely legally restricted.
Harvard says it has been funding two-thirds of its operating expenses from other sources, including federal research grants and student tuition.
Roughly 80% of Harvard’s endowment is earmarked for financial aid, scholarships, faculty chairs, academic programs or other projects, according to the school. The remaining 20% is intended to sustain the institution for years to come.
Some of the unrestricted money is tied up in illiquid assets, such as in hedge funds, private equity and real estate that can’t be easily sold.
What options did DHS give the university?
If the judge doesn’t issue a preliminary injunction to halt the ban indefinitely, the only way Harvard can regain its ability to enroll international students would be to submit detailed records of such students participating in activities deemed “illegal,” “dangerous” and threatening from over the past five years to DHS. The school was given 72 hours to do so, according to Noem’s letter Thursday.
Noem specified that records should include any disciplinary actions, as well as audio and video footage of “any protest activity” involving foreign students on campus.
“Providing materially false, fictitious or fraudulent information may subject you to criminal prosecution,” the secretary wrote. “Other criminal and civil sanctions may also apply.”
How did key stakeholders react?
Harvard student body co-president Abdullah Shahid Sial, a rising junior, had flown to Tokyo for a conference when the news broke. When he regained internet access, he was flooded with messages – including apologies from friends.
International students, he said in a statement, “happen to represent the best of the best in their own respective countries and them being treated in such a dehumanized and disrespectful manner… is very sad to see.”
Sial told CNN he’s working with Harvard’s administration to actively support affected students, including helping them explore transfer options if needed.
Harvard’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors said in a statement after the announcement it “condemns in the strongest possible terms the Trump administration’s unconstitutional assault on our international students.”
The group of professors said the decision “expands the Trump administration’s terrorizing assault on international students and scholars in the United States.”
“International students are essential members of the Harvard community,” the statement continued.
Australia’s ambassador to the US, Kevin Rudd, said the move “will be distressing for Harvard’s many Australian students” and is offering them consular advice as they closely monitor the situation.
“We also intend to engage the administration more broadly on the impact of this decision for Australian students and their families both at Harvard and at other campuses across the United States,” Rudd said.
Correction: An earlier version of this story misattributed a quote about how Harvard relies heavily on international student funding. It was said by DHS Secretary Kristi Noem in April.
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CNN’s Andy Rose, Matt Egan, Meg Tirrell, Celina Tebor, Kara Scannell, Eric Levenson and Shimon Prokupecz contributed to this report.
