(NewsNation) — Harvard University has sued the Trump administration for its move to ban the school from enrolling foreign students over accused tolerance of “pro-terrorist agitators.”
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem ordered her agency to terminate Harvard’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program (SEVP) certification on Thursday, effectively preventing the Ivy League school from enrolling any more foreign students.
Under the DHS order, current foreign students must transfer schools or lose legal status.
Harvard said the government’s action violates the First Amendment and will have an “immediate and devastating effect for Harvard and more than 7,000 visa holders,” according to a lawsuit filed Friday in federal court in Boston.
Harvard enrolls almost 6,800 foreign students at its campus in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Most are graduate students and they come from more than 100 countries, the Associated Press reports.
On Friday, White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson told NewsNation: “If only Harvard cared this much about ending the scourge of anti-American, anti-Semitic, pro-terrorist agitators on their campus they wouldn’t be in this situation to begin with. Harvard should spend their time and resources on creating a safe campus environment instead of filing frivolous lawsuits.”
Harvard maintains the order is punishment for defying the White House’s political demands.
The university’s president, Alan M. Garber, condemned the administration’s actions in a statement released Friday.
“The revocation continues a series of government actions to retaliate against Harvard for our refusal to surrender our academic independence and to submit to the federal government’s illegal assertion of control over our curriculum, our faculty, and our student body,” Garber said.
NewsNation’s Kellie Meyer and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
