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Harvard to seek preliminary injunction blocking ban on

foreign

student enrollment

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Judge previously issued a temporary order ahead of

Thursday

hearing

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Harvard alleges its First Amendment rights were violated

By Nate Raymond

BOSTON, May 29 (Reuters) - A federal judge will consider

on Thursday whether to further block U.S. President Donald

Trump's administration from revoking Harvard University's

ability to enroll international students, a move the Ivy League

school said would impact about a quarter of its student body and

devastate the school.

At a hearing in Boston, U.S. District Judge Allison

Burroughs will weigh whether to extend a temporary order she

issued on Friday that blocked the U.S. Department of Homeland

Security from carrying out the revocation it issued a day

earlier.

The department's move was an escalation of the Trump

administration's attack on Harvard. It has accused the

Cambridge, Massachusetts-based university of bias against

conservatives and of fostering antisemitism on its campus.

The school's lawyers argued the agency's action was part of

an "unprecedented and retaliatory attack on academic freedom at

Harvard," which is pursuing a separate lawsuit challenging the

administration's decision to terminate nearly $3 billion in

federal research funding.

Harvard argues the Trump administration is retaliating

against it for refusing to cede to its demands to control the

school's governance, curriculum and the "ideology" of its

faculty and students.

The case before Burroughs, an appointee of Democratic

President Barack Obama, was filed after Homeland Security

Secretary Kristi Noem last week revoked the school's

certification in the Student and Exchange Visitor Program, which

gives it the ability to allow enrollment of non-U.S. students.

In announcing the decision, Noem, without providing

evidence, accused the university of "fostering violence,

antisemitism, and coordinating with the Chinese Communist

Party."

In a letter that day, she accused the school of refusing to

comply with wide-ranging requests for information on its student

visa holders, including about any activity they engaged in that

was illegal or violent or that would subject them to discipline.

"As I explained to you in my April letter, it is a privilege

to enroll foreign students, and it is also a privilege to employ

aliens on campus," she said.

Harvard said the decision was "devastating" for the school

and its student body. The university, the nation's oldest and

wealthiest, enrolled nearly 6,800 international students in its

current school year, about 27% of its total enrollment.

The department's move would prevent Harvard from enrolling

new international students and require existing ones to transfer

to other schools or lose their legal status.

Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Wednesday that

Harvard University should have a 15% cap on the number of

non-U.S. students it admits. "Harvard has got to behave

themselves," he said.

Harvard argues that the revocation of its ability to enroll

international students violated its free speech and due process

rights under the U.S. Constitution as well as the Administrative

Procedure Act, which governs agency actions.

Its lawyers say Harvard's certification was revoked abruptly

without complying with federal regulations requiring the

department to provide a legitimate reason for its actions and

advance notice and an opportunity to address any issues.

Under DHS regulations, the department was required to

provide it at least 30 days to present evidence to challenge the

agency's allegations and provide the school an opportunity to

pursue an administrative appeal, they said.