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Donald Trump has suspended the entry of foreign students for the first time seeking to study or participate in exchange programs at Harvard University.
The American president published the proclamation on Wednesday, citing concerns of “national security” and declaring it “prejudicial” to American interests to continue to authorize foreign students in the establishment.
Harvard responded by qualifying the order of “reprisals” and stressed that she would continue to protect her international students, according to the news agency Reuters.
Trump’s announcement is a new escalation of an ongoing legal row with one of the most prestigious universities in the United States after Harvard refused to give in to a series of white house requests in April.
Wednesday’s order comes after a judge blocked the Ministry of Internal Security (DHS) from banning international students at Harvard in a decision last week.
Trump’s proclamation accused Harvard of having developed “extended tangles” with foreign countries and continuing to “flout the civil rights of his students and his teachers”.
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“Given these facts, I determined that it is necessary to restrict the entry of foreign nationals who seek to enter the United States only or mainly to participate in a study program at Harvard University,” he said.
The prescription also suspends visas for international students looking for exchange programs and orders the Secretary of State to consider revoking existing students who are currently studying at university.
The suspension can be extended beyond six months.
The White House said that Harvard had not provided enough information to the DHS on “illegal or dangerous activities known to foreign students” and reported “disadvantaged data on only three students”.
Harvard published a declaration calling for the order “yet another measure of illegal reprisals taken by the administration in violation of the rights of the first Harvard amendment,” reported Reuters.
The richest university in the world was involved in a legal battle with the Trump administration after having frozen billions of dollars in federal funding and accused the institution of not eliminating anti -Semitism on the campus.
Last month, the secretary of the DHS, Kristi Noem, revoked the certification that Harvard needed to register foreign students on the campus, a decision which was quickly blocked by a judge.
Another federal judge confirmed this decision last Thursday, saying that it issued a longer term taking which would allow international students to continue their studies at Harvard while the legal battle takes place.
However, Wednesday’s proclamation once again throws the future of thousands of international students in limbo.
For the 2024-2025 school year, Harvard has scored nearly 7,000 foreign students, who represented 27% of its population.
Last week, a Chinese student at Harvard called to the unit during the University graduation ceremony, just days after Trump promised to “aggressively” revise visas for Chinese students.
In recent months, the Trump administration has increased its repression against higher education in the United States, accusing universities of not having fought against anti-Semitism in the midst of protests against the war in Gaza through campuses.
Earlier Wednesday, the White House threatened to strip Columbia University of her accreditation on the affirmations that she violated the civil rights of her Jewish students.
