BOSTON — A federal judge on Monday blocked the Trump administration from implementing a new rule that would limit how long foreign students and journalists can remain in the US without applying for extensions.
US District Judge F. Dennis Saylor in Boston ruled in favor of a coalition of unions and higher education advocacy groups a day before the Department of Homeland Security’s rule was set to take effect.
The decision granted nationwide preliminary relief in the lawsuit challenging the DHS rule ending the duration of status policy for international students, exchange visitors, and representatives of foreign media.
The sector has acted collectively to try and stop new limiting rules establishing fixed time limits on study visas that will not allow for any additional time to complete a course, and create a situation whereby international students who do have a break in studies are required to file and pay for a visa extension of stay with the government if their studies surpass four years.
The uncertainty around being in-country for the duration, and risk of subsequent visa denial, was such that industry leaders felt it would be a sucker punch for the country’s appeal as a study destination. The rule amendment had been announced in July and due to come into force this month.
Saylor said DHS adopted the policy based on “exceptionally weak” rationales. The agency had cited national security and the need to prevent fraud in the visa program, but the judge found it had not adhered to its legal obligations to engage with concerns about a policy change or consider less burdensome alternatives.
The judge, an appointee of Republican President George W. Bush, wrote that the rule upended a system through which the US for nearly five decades had issued visas to foreign students for their “duration of status.”
That system, he said, has permitted tens of millions of foreign students and researchers to come to the US, leading to “groundbreaking research in science, medicine, and technology, substantial economic growth, and a host of other benefits, often on a vast scale.”
Saylor said the rule DHS adopted in July seeks to replace that system with one that would substantially restrict the overall number of foreign students, professors and journalists in the country.
Under the rule, F visas for international students and J visas that allow visitors on cultural exchange programs to work in the US would be capped at four years, while I visas for journalists, which currently can last years, would be up to 240 days.
About 1.6 million people currently have F visas and another 500,000 have J visas. Major research universities like Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard have large percentages of foreign students, particularly at the graduate level, the judge noted.
If the rule took effect, such universities would likely suffer hundreds of millions of dollars in costs and enrollment would decline, Saylor said.
“The damage to the higher education system and to the economy of the United States is likely to be catastrophic,” Saylor wrote.
Source: Saudi Gazette