According to the Department of Homeland Security, US President Donald Trump’s administration has prevented Harvard University from enrolling international students.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem claimed that the Trump administration was “holding Harvard accountable for fostering violence, antisemitism, and coordination with the Chinese Communist Party on its campus” in a post on X on Thursday.
Universities can enrol foreign students and benefit from their higher tuition costs to help pad their multibillion-dollar endowments, she said. “It is a privilege, not a right. “Harvard had plenty of opportunities to do what was right. It turned down.”
Noem claimed that the university’s Student Exchange Visitor Program certification had been suspended in a letter to the administration. The US Homeland Security Investigations unit, which Noem leads, is in charge of the program.
The decision means that current students must “transfer to another university in order to maintain their non-immigrant status,” according to the letter.
Harvard described the action as “retaliatory action” and “unlawful” in a statement.
The university stated in a statement that “we are fully committed to maintaining Harvard’s ability to host our international students and scholars, who come from more than 140 countries, and greatly enhance the university and this country.”
The university, which has refused to accept a list of demands related to its diversity programs and response to pro-Palestine protests, and the Trump administration are at odds with each other.
The administration’s response to the administration’s $2.6 billion grant and funding cuts totaled three rounds. The most recent one occurred on Monday. The administration is currently suing Harvard for violating the US Constitution with its conduct.
Alan Garber, president of Harvard, urged alumni to show their support and donations for the university earlier this week.
In an email where he launched the Presidential Priorities Fund and Presidential Fund for Research, Garber wrote, “The institution entrusted to us now faces challenges unlike any other challenges in our long history.” The funding cuts are intended to close any gaps left by the funding cuts.
earlier threat
Noem threatened to revoke Harvard’s Student Exchange Visitor Program certification in April, which is required by educational institutions to accept students on a variety of visa types.
She cited a federal law that mandates disclosures of academic records, enrollment, and disciplinary action for the administration on April 30 to give the administration a deadline of April 30 to provide detailed information about what she called the “illegal and violent activities” of foreign students on campus.
The university later told the agency it had the requested information, according to the Harvard Crimson, but they declined to provide any further details.
The threat came as a result of the Trump administration’s wider crackdown on pro-Palestine demonstrations at US universities, which federal officials have generally deemed to be “anti-Semitic,” according to Al Jazeera’s Kimberly Halkett.
According to Halkett, a journalist from Washington, DC, “The Trump administration has been clamping down heavily on Harvard and other colleges, including Columbia University,” over what the administration claims are “anti-Semitism” that exists on the campuses.
At the beginning of his presidency, the president established a joint task force to address this, according to her. But opponents claim that it expanded to include everything from changing university curriculum to stricter hiring standards. Trump has accused universities of instigatorating “anti-Trump” ideology.
According to federal data, in the US, in the year 2023, there were 7, 417 schools overall that were eligible for the Student Exchange Visitor Program.
Source: Aljazeera
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