Trump bans Harvard from enrolling international students

WashingtonThe Donald Trump administration on Thursday suspended Harvard's ability to enroll international students. The move marks a further escalation in the culture war that the president is fighting against some of the country's universities and especially against Harvard, which is going stand up to their demands and has brought economic pressures to court.

"Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem has directed the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to revoke the certification of Harvard University's Student and Exchange Program (SEVP). This means that Harvard can no longer enroll international students and that international students already studying there will have to relocate," the Department of Homeland Security announced in a statement.

In addition, it also accuses Harvard's administration of "facilitating and participating in activities coordinated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), including hosting and training members of a CCP paramilitary group complicit in the genocide of the Uyghurs." Noem has expressed a similar opinion, saying that the prestigious center has encouraged "violence and antisemitism" and has coordinated "with the Chinese Communist Party on its campus," and did not rule out expanding the measure to other universities.

Last April, the US government suspended $60 million in federal contracts at the University and froze $2.2 billion in federal funding after the university refused to bow to the administration's demands to influence the academic curriculum. Accusing Trump of "anti-Semitism," he demanded that the school close all diversity, equity, and inclusion programs and review those areas with "egregious records of anti-Semitism." Regarding this last demand, he also urged the prestigious university to subject certain departments and programs to an external audit.

The institution refused to bow to pressure that it considered intended to influence its academic freedom, becoming the first university center by keeping the pulse of the Trump administrationWeeks earlier, Columbia University had caved in to similar demands under threat of having $400 million in government grants suspended. Shortly after Harvard decided to resist Trump's economic blackmail, Columbia also issued a statement qualifying its position and rejecting any agreement with the government that would erode its academic independence.

Harvard's defiance of Trump infuriated the president, who last month had already floated the idea of ​​denying visas to international students seeking to enroll at the prestigious university. "Denying visas is very serious and very stupid. It's the thing universities need to really stand up to, because if they do this, they are putting the essence of higher education in the United States at risk," Harvard professor Pol Antràs warned ARA at the time. Stopping the arrival of foreign students to the center is an indirect way of also attacking the University's financial capacity, since tuition and scholarships are other forms of income that educational centers have apart from funds, subsidies and donations.

Once hard on finances

Harvard is the richest and oldest university in the United States and has an endowment of more than $53 billion, a kind of reserve that would allow it to withstand any cuts the Trump administration wants to implement for a long time. Although the visa ban for American students could be a hard blow.

According to the New York TimesThis year, approximately 6,800 international students are enrolled at Harvard, a figure that represents approximately 27% of the total student body. Over the past fifteen years, the number of foreign students has grown by almost 20%. Tuition at Harvard is approximately €52,500 per year, but costs can rise to almost €77,000 when room and board are included. Furthermore, international students typically pay a larger share of educational costs compared to other students.

In a broader attack on all higher education institutions, Trump signed an executive order at the end of April that directly targeted the accreditation process for the country's universities and will serve to attack the indirect sources of income of those institutions that disobey the federal government. With this order, the president aims to exclude universities that do not align with his agenda from access to federal student loans.

The university accreditation system affects whether students at these schools can access government student loans—which have lower interest rates than private loans—and Piel scholarships. Typically, one of the criteria many prospective students consider when enrolling at these schools is the accreditation and the type of scholarships they will be eligible for, making universities that are excluded from these benefits less attractive. All of this would, in turn, affect student enrollment and the income they generate.