Trump admin restores thousands of foreign student visa registrations -- for now
FILE-Students walk out of class in protest of President Donald Trump's immigration policies on Tuesday, February 4, 2025 at Los Angeles City Hall. (Photo by Sarah Reingewirtz/MediaNews Group/Los Angeles Daily News via Getty Images)
The Trump administration is reversing the termination of legal status for international students after many of the students filed court challenges.
According to the Associated Press, judges nationwide issued temporary orders restoring the students’ records in a federal database of international students managed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
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How were the student visa registrations terminated?
Dig deeper:
Students whose records were terminated were told that their legal status was eliminated due to a criminal records check or that their visa had been revoked. This resulted in the termination of students’ records, according to the Associated Press.
These terminations were uncovered when school officials performed checks of the international student database of when they inspected specifically after learning of the terminations.
ICE restoring student visa registrations
Big picture view:
The Associated Press obtained a statement from a lawyer for the federal government stating that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is manually restoring the student status for individuals whose records were ended recently.
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The statement reads, "ICE is developing a policy that will provide a framework for SEVIS record terminations. Until such a policy is issued, the SEVIS records for plaintiff(s) in this case (and other similarly situated plaintiffs) will remain Active or shall be re-activated if not currently active and ICE will not modify the record solely based on the NCIC finding that resulted in the recent SEVIS record termination."
According to the AP, SEVIS is the Student and Exchange Visitor Information Systems database that monitors foreign students' compliance with their visa status. And the NCIC is the National Crime Information Center, which is maintained by the FBI.
The Source: Information for this story was provided by the Associated Press, which obtained a letter from a lawyer confirming that student visa registrations are being restored. This story was reported from Washington, D.C.