U.S. Judge extends order suspending Trump’s block on Harvard’s incoming foreign students

Students walk through Harvard Yard, April 27, 2022, on the campus of Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa, File)

BOSTON — U.S. President Donald Trump’s order to block incoming foreign students from attending Harvard University will remain on hold temporarily following a hearing Monday, when a lawyer for the Ivy League school said its students were being used as “pawns.”

U.S. District Judge Allison Burroughs in Boston extended a temporary restraining order on Trump’s proclamation until June 23 while she weighs Harvard’s request for a preliminary injunction. Burroughs made the decision at a hearing over Harvard’s request, which Trump’s Republican administration opposed.

Burroughs granted the initial restraining order June 5, and it had been set to expire Thursday.

Trump moved to block foreign students from entering the U.S. to attend Harvard earlier this month, citing concerns over national security. It followed a previous attempt by the Department of Homeland Security to revoke Harvard’s ability to host foreign students on its campus in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Burroughs has temporarily blocked that action, too, and is weighing whether it should remain on hold until the case is decided.

Ian Gershengorn, a lawyer for Harvard, told Burroughs on Monday that Trump was “using Harvard’s international students as pawns” while arguing the administration has exceeded its authority in an attempt to retaliate against the school for not agreeing to the president’s demands.

Trump has been warring with Harvard for months after it rejected a series of government demands meant to address conservative complaints that the school has become too liberal and has tolerated anti-Jewish harassment. Trump officials have cut more than US$2.6 billion in research grants, ended federal contracts and threatened to revoke its tax-exempt status.

Foreign students were brought into the battle in April, when Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem demanded that Harvard turn over a trove of records related to any dangerous or illegal activity by foreign students. Harvard says it complied, but Noem said the response fell short, and on May 22 she revoked Harvard’s certification in the Student and Exchange Visitor Program.

The sanction immediately put Harvard at a disadvantage as it competed for the world’s top students and harmed Harvard’s reputation as a global research hub, the school said in its lawsuit. “Without its international students, Harvard is not Harvard,” the suit said.

The action would have upended some graduate schools that recruit heavily from abroad. Some schools overseas quickly offered invitations to Harvard’s students, including two universities in Hong Kong.

Harvard President Alan Garber previously said the university has made changes to combat antisemitism. But Harvard, he said, will not stray from its “core, legally-protected principles,” even after receiving federal ultimatums.

Binkley reported from Washington

Kimberlee Kruesi And Collin Binkley, The Associated Press