Hyderabad: International students across the United States are discovering that their legal status and student visas are being terminated or revoked with little notice.
The US State Department and Immigration & Customs Enforcement is steadfast in its aggressive approach towards international students.
Without much shock or surprise, the impacted students are mostly from India, constituting half of the overall numbers, indicate studies.
The American Immigration Lawyers Association has put together over 327 reports of Visa revocations and SEVIS terminations from attorneys, students and university employees and found that Indian students make up 50 per cent from those.
Students from China fall in the second place with 14 per cent.
An Associated Press review of university statements, correspondence with school officials and court records has, as of Thursday, tallied at least 1024 students at 160 colleges who have been affected by these changes to status.
Students who come from other countries to study in the U.S. must obtain a visa, which requires them to demonstrate they have enough financial support to complete their course of study. They must first be admitted to a school that is approved by the U.S. government, and then generally interview at a consulate abroad to obtain their entry visa.
Once in the country, international students must remain in good standing with their academic program, and are generally limited in their ability to work off-campus. After they graduate, they can work in the U.S. for 12 months, and up to 36 months for STEM majors, before they must seek a longer-term employment visa.
International students' status is maintained in a system called SEVIS, or the Student and Exchange Visitor Information System. Generally, students' status is terminated in SEVIS when they fail to maintain standing with their program, or when they graduate or transition to a different visa. Terminations, until now, have largely been initiated by schools doing routine data updates.
In recent weeks, colleges have discovered their students' status terminated by the government, a significant shift from past practices. The terminations often have minimal written justification or notice from the government, leaving students with little information on why they are now out of status.
Students have begun to file lawsuits across the country, with a number of temporary restraining orders granted in lawsuits from New Hampshire, Montana and Wisconsin.
International students are also caught in the crosshairs of a standoff between Harvard and the Trump administration, which has made various threats against the Ivy League institution after learning of its defiance against demands related to activism on campus, antisemitism and diversity. One of those threats involves a restriction on Harvard's ability to host international students.