The Trump administration’s push to end Harvard’s ability to enroll foreign students is predictably forcing those students to look into other options.
But it’s also pushing away some students from the United States.
In one case, an incoming U.S. student at Harvard Business School asked the institution if they could defer admission because the “educational experience would be different without any international students,” Maureen Martin, Harvard’s director of immigration services, said in a Wednesday court filing.
Dozens of incoming international Harvard students have also opted to defer admission or enroll elsewhere, Martin said in the filing.
A Harvard spokesperson declined to a request for additional comment.
The stories of students deferring admission comes from a court filing where Martin detailed the ways U.S. and international students are “reconsidering their futures at Harvard,” harming Harvard’s ability to attract and enroll students, she said.
These admission challenges are a direct reaction to the federal government attempting to revoke a key certification that allows Harvard to enroll international students.
Harvard subsequently sued and asked for a temporary restraining order, which a federal judge allowed. The judge has since allowed a preliminary injunction on Thursday, further delaying the Trump administration from being able to revoke Harvard’s certification.
Read more: Judge halts Trump plan to stop Harvard enrolling foreign students — again
On top of the revocation, President Donald Trump has also suggested a 15% cap on international students at Harvard University.
Will current students consider leaving?
Rachele Chung, a first year, stands on the right holding up a sign at a Tuesday rally in response to the Trump administration’s revocation of a key certification to enroll international students.(MassLive/Juliet Schulman-Hall)
Growing up in Mississippi where she was often the only Asian American person in a room, Rachele Chung, a first-year U.S. student at Harvard, said a key reason she chose Harvard was because of its diversity.
International students make up more than a quarter of the total student population.
Chung said she might have gone somewhere else if Harvard didn’t have international students.
Read more: Harvard commencement speaker says it’s fitting to ‘hear from an immigrant like me’
“What really drew me to Harvard was the diversity and also the potential to meet people from all over the U.S. but also all over the world and hear from different perspectives from that,” she said.
“I think if a different institution offered that, then, I might have leaned toward them,” she said.
Chung said she is unlikely to transfer now because she believes more institutions will also lose their certification after the Trump administration takes away Harvard’s.
However, that doesn’t mean she is any less concerned about the future of Harvard if international students and scholars aren’t allowed to come to the institution and domestic students opt out of attending.
She said that would affect Harvard and the state of research and science more than it would the federal government.
Nuriel Vera-DeGraff speaks at a Harvard rally on Tuesday evening in response to the Trump administration’s revocation of a key certification to enroll international students.(MassLive/Juliet Schulman-Hall)
Nuriel Vera-DeGraff, a junior at Harvard University, said he isn’t surprised that incoming students would change their minds on enrolling at the institution.
“Interntionals contribute so much to campus culture,” he said.
At this point, he said he is close to finishing his degree at Harvard and has created a community and wouldn’t want to leave the institution.
Vera-DeGraff said he hasn’t heard about current U.S. students considering transferring to other institutions and thinks it is “unlikely” to happen.
However, if he was an incoming student and had a choice between Harvard and another institution based in the U.S., he said he would consider doing the same thing.
“I’d definitely be very tempted to choose the other school because it’s definitely not the same experience — I really can’t imagine being here without the international students. It would just feel very different,” he said.
What is the certification the Trump admin is trying to revoke?
The Student and Exchange Visitor Program, also known as SEVP, allows higher education institutions to issue visa application forms to prospective international students after admitting them. The forms are used to apply for a visa to enter the United States.
The certification requirements include that the school is operational and instructing students, has the necessary facilities and adequate finances to operate, provides instruction to a degree or objective and meets state requirements to operate, according to the Department of Homeland Security website.
Read more: Here’s everything Trump has stripped from Harvard so far — and what is threatened
Institutions are recertified every two years, but can be evaluated at other points in time if federal regulators have information suggesting the school isn’t complying with regulations.
If the certification is taken away, an institution isn’t allowed to enroll international students. Current students would have to choose between transferring to another institution, leaving the U.S., or changing their immigration status, according to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) website.
An example of the certification being stripped occurred at Herguan University in California in 2016 after its CEO pleaded guilty to providing fraudulent documents to the Department of Homeland Security, according to East Bay Times.
What has happened at Harvard?
Harvard has been in a battle with the federal government since April.
There has been a wave of federal research grant terminations at Harvard University, in addition to $60 million in multi-year grants, a $450 million cut and a $2.2 billion freeze.
In addition to barring Harvard University from acquiring new federal grants, the Trump administration directed federal agencies to cut off existing contracts with Harvard or transfer them to other vendors on Tuesday.
Harvard President Alan Garber wrote in a letter to U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon that they share the same “common ground,” but the university “will not surrender its core, legally-protected principles out of fear.”
Read more: Shadow of Trump administration hangs over Harvard University commencement
Garber pushed back on the administration through a lawsuit in April. The institution argues that its constitutional rights had been violated by the government‘s threats to pull billions of dollars in funding if the school didn’t comply with demands for an overhaul. Following the $450 million announced cuts, the university amended its lawsuit.
“No government — regardless of which party is in power — should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue,” the suit reads.
Due to the federal cuts, Harvard announced that it was committing $250 million of “central funding” to support research impacted by suspended and canceled federal grants.
