The Donald Trump administration on Thursday cancelled Harvard University’s eligibility to teach foreign students.
“Harvard can no longer teach international students, and existing international students must transfer or lose their legal status,” the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said in a statement.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem ordered her agency to stop certifying Harvard University’s undergraduate and exchange student programme, fulfilling a promise when she demanded that the university hand over detailed records of “illegal and violent activity” by its international students by April 30 or it could lose its certification.
The ministry’s statement alleges that Harvard’s leadership has created “a dangerous environment on campus by allowing anti-American and pro-terrorist agitators to harass and physically assault individuals, particularly many Jewish students, and otherwise disrupt a once-respectful learning environment.”
Harvard has not yet responded to the message.
As SNN writes, this could affect a significant portion of Harvard’s student body, as the university claims to have 9,970 students in its international academic contingent, and data shows that 6,793 international students make up 27.2 per cent of the total student body for the 2024-25 academic year.
Harvard University sued on 21 April over US President Donald Trump’s freeze on billions of dollars in federal funding after the university rejected a list of White House demands it said undermined its independence.
Harvard became the first elite university to openly refuse to comply with the demands of the Trump administration, which has frozen hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding for numerous universities, forcing the institutions to make policy changes. US authorities have also begun deportation proceedings for some detained foreign students who participated in pro-Palestinian demonstrations, and cancelled visas for hundreds of other students.