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    Trump Administration Halts Interviews for Student and Exchange Visas

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    Secretary of State Marco Rubio issued a cable ordering a pause as the department expands its review of applicants’ social media accounts.The State Department is temporarily halting interviews abroad with foreign citizens applying for student and exchange visas as it expands scrutiny of applicants’ social media posts.The order was issued by Secretary of State Marco Rubio in a cable dated Tuesday that went out to U.S. embassies and consulates. A State Department official confirmed on Tuesday that Mr. Rubio had given the order to pause new interview appointments until further guidance.“We use all available information in our visa screening and vetting,” the State Department said in a statement, without specifying what could flag an applicant for rejection under a new social media policy. The statement noted that visa applicants have been asked to provide social media account information on forms since 2019.The secretary of state’s order comes as President Trump is trying to coerce Harvard University and other institutions to restrict what can be said on campuses, with a particular focus on anti-Israel speech.Mr. Trump this month said the U.S. government would no longer grant Harvard the right to enroll international students. On Friday, a federal judge issued a temporary restraining order blocking Mr. Trump from moving forward with the action against Harvard and foreign students.Many universities in the United States rely on foreign students to pay full tuition. Those students are responsible for a substantial portion of the annual revenues of many American universities. On some campuses, foreign students make up the majority of researchers in certain disciplines, mainly in the sciences.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump Seeks Extensive Student Data in Pressure Campaign to Control Harvard

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      Harvard and the federal government are locked in a battle that boils down to turning over records on international students. But Harvard says it is also about the First Amendment.The latest confrontation between Harvard University and the Trump administration began last month with a far-reaching demand for data on international students.Kristi Noem, the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, sent a letter to Harvard requesting, among other things, coursework for every international student and information on any student visa holder involved in misconduct or illegal activity.Harvard rebuffed parts of the request, and the Trump administration retaliated on Thursday. In one of its most aggressive moves so far against the university, the government said Harvard could no longer enroll any international students, who account for about one-fourth of its total enrollment.It also expanded its request for records to include any videos of international students, on campus or off, involved in protests or illegal or dangerous activity.The conflict has only further raised the stakes over the future of America’s oldest and most powerful university.The administration’s attempt to vacuum up vast amounts of private student data opens a new front in Mr. Trump’s crackdown on dissent from his political agenda. The strategy is aimed at realigning a higher education system the president sees as hostile to conservatives by stamping out what it says is antisemitism on campus and the transgender and diversity policies it says are rooted in “woke” ideology.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Afrikaner Granted Refugee Status by Trump Is Linked to Antisemitic Posts

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      The Trump administration has tried to deport foreign-born protesters for what it calls antisemitic speech. On Monday, the administration resettled an Afrikaner who had a track record of it.One of the first white South African refugees to arrive in the United States on Monday appears to have made antisemitic comments on social media — grounds the Trump administration has tried to use to deport foreign-born pro-Palestinian activists and deny immigration requests.The refugee, Charl Kleinhaus, 46, formerly of Limpopo, South Africa, landed in Washington on a chartered jet on Monday with dozens of other Afrikaners, the white ethnic minority that ruled during apartheid. They were given safe haven in the United States by an administration that has made it virtually impossible for any other group to become refugees, including Afghans who helped American forces in their country.“We just packed our bags and left,” Mr. Kleinhaus said after landing, for “safety reasons.”White South Africans say they have been discriminated against, including being denied job opportunities and suffering racial violence, though the specifics of the refugees’ cases are unclear. Mr. Kleinhaus and his family traveled onward from Washington to Buffalo, N.Y.In April 2023, the X account @charlkleinhaus wrote in a now-deleted post that Jews were “untrustworthy” and “a dangerous group” and that “they are not Gods chosen.”The bio in the account sharing Mr. Kleinhaus’s name says it belongs to an Afrikaner. The account also reshared posts praising President Trump and calling for the beating of a U.S. citizen. It also shared a mix of pro- and anti-Israel posts.In October 2023, the account shared a video of Christian worshipers clashing with Israeli police that had been posted on a Facebook account called “Israel is a terrorist state.” @charlkleinhaus captioned the video “Jews attacking Christians!”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      International Students Worry Even as Trump Temporarily Restores Some Legal Statuses

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      Students and their immigration lawyers say they were relieved for the temporary reprieve, but emphasized that it was just that — temporary.When Karl Molden, a sophomore at Harvard University from Vienna, learned that the Trump administration had abruptly restored thousands of international students’ ability to legally study in the United States, he said he did not feel reassured.After all, immigration officials have insisted that they could still terminate students’ legal status, even in the face of legal challenges, and the administration has characterized the matter as only a temporary reprieve.“They shouldn’t tempt us into thinking that the administration will stop harassing us,” Mr. Molden said. “They will try to find other ways.”Mr. Molden is not alone in his worry.The dramatic shift from the administration on Friday came after scores of international students filed lawsuits saying that their legal right to study in the United States had been rescinded, often with minimal explanation. In some cases, students had minor traffic violations or other infractions. In others, there appeared to be no obvious reason for the revocations.After learning that Immigration and Customs Enforcement had deleted their records from the Student and Exchange Visitor Information System, or SEVIS, many students sued to try to save their status. That prompted a flurry of emergency orders by judges that blocked the changes.Students and their immigration lawyers said on Saturday that they were relieved for the temporary reprieve, but emphasized that it was just that — temporary.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Protesters Chain Themselves to Columbia Gates, Calling for Activists’ Release

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      About 10 demonstrators chained themselves to Columbia University’s campus gates at 116th Street and Amsterdam Avenue in New York on Monday afternoon, protesting the detention of two Palestinian student activists by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. They were part of a larger contingent that sat down outside the gate.The protest followed the detention last week of Mohsen Mahdawi, who is finishing undergraduate studies in philosophy at Columbia’s School of General Studies. Mr. Mahdawi was taken into ICE custody during his naturalization appointment in Vermont.Federal immigration officials detained Mahmoud Khalil, a graduate of the School of International and Public Affairs, last month. Both were organizers of pro-Palestinian demonstrations at Columbia.Demonstrators on Monday called for the immediate release of Mr. Mahdawi and Mr. Khalil. They held signs reading, “Free all our political prisoners” and chanted, “We want justice, you say how? Free Mohsen Mahdawi now!” They also read aloud Mr. Khalil’s writings from the detention center in Jena, La., where he is being held.A Columbia spokesperson said Monday that the university was “monitoring a disruption” and that its public safety officers had cut the locks of about 10 demonstrators.“We will follow all applicable policies and procedures for addressing potential violations,” the Columbia spokesperson said. “This small disruption has not impeded the ability of our students to attend classes as normal; all scheduled campus activities have proceeded as planned.”The New York Police Department said Monday evening that an unspecified number of people had been taken into custody and were being processed. It was unclear what charges they would face. One of those who was detained had been trying to pitch a tent, the police said.It was the second protest this month in which demonstrators attached themselves to Columbia’s gates. More

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      Inside Trump’s Pressure Campaign on Universities

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      As he finished lunch in the private dining room outside the Oval Office on April 1, President Trump floated an astounding proposal: What if the government simply canceled every dollar of the nearly $9 billion promised to Harvard University?The administration’s campaign to expunge “woke” ideology from college campuses had already forced Columbia University to strike a deal. Now, the White House was eyeing the nation’s oldest and wealthiest university.“What if we never pay them?” Mr. Trump casually asked, according to a person familiar with the conversation, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the private discussion. “Wouldn’t that be cool?”The moment underscored the aggressive, ad hoc approach continuing to shape one of the new administration’s most consequential policies.Mr. Trump and his top aides are exerting control of huge sums of federal research money to shift the ideological tilt of the higher education system, which they see as hostile to conservatives and intent on perpetuating liberalism.Their effort was energized by the campus protests against Israel’s response to the October 2023 terrorist attack by Hamas, demonstrations during which Jewish students were sometimes harassed. Soon after taking office, Mr. Trump opened the Task Force to Combat Antisemitism, which is scrutinizing leading universities for potential civil rights violations and serving as an entry point to pressure schools to reassess their policies.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Caution and Courage on Campus Speech

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      More from our inbox:Fired in a Quake Zone Rachel Stern for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Universities Like the One I Run Aren’t Afraid to Let People Argue,” by Michael I. Kotlikoff, the president of Cornell (Opinion guest essay, nytimes.com, March 31):As the father of a high school senior currently deciding where to attend college, I agreed with much of what Dr. Kotlikoff had to say. But I was troubled by what he didn’t say. Right now, the greatest threat to academic freedom is the Trump administration.Foreign students are being detained and threatened with deportation for constitutionally protected speech. The independence of academic departments is being threatened by the White House. Universities are scrubbing their official documents of words the administration deems unacceptable. Defending free speech on campus while not calling this out by name can have only one explanation: fear.I sympathize. Putting your institution in this administration’s cross hairs risks devastating punishment. But when those who ought to be the greatest defenders of intellectual freedom stay silent or address such threats obliquely, we should all be scared.When I was a college student, I got to live out the idyllic fantasy that elite schools have marketed for generations: stimulating classes, extracurriculars and lazy afternoons in the quad. My daughter might have a very different experience. Her school might face devastating budget cuts for daring to defy the president. She’ll likely see research disrupted, graduate students’ and professors’ lives upended. She might witness international students being apprehended by masked law enforcement officers for speaking freely.I’m sorry she won’t get my carefree experience. But I hope the leadership of her school shows her something far more valuable: courage.Michael HandelmanBrooklynTo the Editor:Michael I. Kotlikoff’s essay rang true to me — not as theory, but as lived experience. I was a Cornell undergraduate when Donald Trump was first elected in 2016. I sat in a class where a professor asked if any students were Republican. Nobody raised a hand.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Senate Panel Demands Information About Gaza Protest Group at Columbia

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      Lawmakers want the university to turn over all its records about Students for Justice in Palestine. At Northwestern University, two professors sued over a separate request.A Senate committee asked Columbia University to provide extensive information about Students for Justice in Palestine, a group that had been at the center of protests on campus over Israel and Gaza.Information sought by the committee, including “all records in the university’s possession related to SJP and its on-campus activities,” was requested by Wednesday in a letter signed by Senator Bill Cassidy, a Republican of Louisiana and the chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions.After a judge directed the university late Wednesday to say what materials it intended to disclose and to wait to produce them until Friday, the school acknowledged that order and said it planned to turn over “policies and guidance,” but that it would not identify individual students.The Senate committee’s demand was disclosed in a court filing this week connected to a lawsuit filed by seven anonymous students at Columbia and Barnard, its affiliated women’s college, along with Mahmoud Khalil, a former Columbia student whom the Trump administration is trying to deport.The suit had asked a judge to bar school officials from handing over confidential disciplinary records to lawmakers. On Wednesday, two clinical professors of law at Northwestern University in Illinois filed a similar suit.Republican lawmakers have said they are investigating an epidemic of antisemitism within higher education, but critics have said the Trump administration and its allies are conducting a broad crackdown on political speech.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Obama Calls for Universities to Stand Up to Trump Administration Threats

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      Former President Barack Obama urged universities to resist attacks from the federal government that violate their academic freedom in a campus speech on Thursday.He also said schools and students should engage in self-reflection about speech environments on their campuses.“If you are a university, you may have to figure out, are we in fact doing things right?,” he said during a conversation at Hamilton College in upstate New York. “Have we in fact violated our own values, our own code, violated the law in some fashion?”“If not, and you’re just being intimidated, well, you should be able to say, that’s why we got this big endowment.”Mr. Obama’s comments came as the Trump administration has threatened universities with major cuts. It took away $400 million in grants and contracts from Columbia University in March. It later suspended $175 million to the University of Pennsylvania, and said this week that it was reviewing about $9 billion in arrangements with Harvard and its affiliates.At Harvard, where the university has made efforts to respond to Republican criticism and concerns from Jewish students and faculty, more than 800 faculty members have signed a letter urging their leadership to more forcefully resist the administration and defend higher education more broadly. We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More