The Trump administration is taking significant steps to restore the legal status of international students whose records were recently terminated. This announcement was made by Elizabeth D. Kurlan, an attorney with the Justice Department, during a hearing held on Friday in the Northern District of California, located in Oakland. Kurlan confirmed that the records for these international students will be reactivated temporarily as the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency develops a new policy aimed at establishing a framework for the termination of status records.
This decision comes shortly after the Trump administration initiated the revocation of visas for thousands of international students, along with their legal statuses and records. This action appeared to target students engaged in political activism or those with prior legal issues, such as driving under the influence (DUI) charges. Kurlan emphasized during the hearing that while ICE retains the authority to terminate a SEVIS record for various reasons, the current policy will not allow for status termination based solely on findings from the National Crime Information Center, which includes criminal history data. This change aims to prevent the arbitrary termination of student records based on past infractions.
Many international students affected by the recent terminations were surprised to find their records reinstated on Thursday afternoon. Immigration attorneys and universities across the United States reported these abrupt restorations to NBC News, revealing that the process occurred with little to no explanation. Jath Shao, a Cleveland-based immigration attorney, noted that it felt as if “somebody flipped a light switch on” when his client experienced the sudden reversal in status.
The reinstatement of records has varied by institution. For example, at the University of California, Berkeley, out of 23 international students whose records were terminated in SEVIS, a dozen were reinstated, according to university spokesperson Janet Gilmore. Similarly, a few students at the Rochester Institute of Technology reported similar outcomes, as noted by the school’s public information director, Carl Langsenkamp. Charles Kuck, an Atlanta-based attorney, mentioned that he has about a dozen clients who also experienced a reversal in their status.
David Wilson, an attorney representing around 20 students in Minnesota, shared that about half of his clients have had their statuses restored. However, he raised concerns about the uncertainty surrounding their student visas, which remain revoked. "That means they’re kind of trapped in the country," Wilson explained, highlighting the need for clarity regarding the government's actions moving forward.
Despite the restoration of records, the termination status will still appear on students’ records, which could jeopardize future applications for green cards or other forms of relief. Elora Mukherjee, director of the Immigrants’ Rights Clinic at Columbia Law School, emphasized that merely restoring service records is insufficient. “The time that they had their SEVIS status terminated could still have harmful effects for those students,” Mukherjee noted, underscoring the need for the government to take further action to make the affected students whole.
While the reinstatement of records is seen as a positive development for international students, attorneys like Shao argue that more comprehensive measures are necessary to ensure their safety in the United States. “By now it’s obvious that the Trump administration spent the four years of Biden plotting their revenge on the immigration system,” Shao stated. He pointed out that once students and legal advocates challenged the administration's policies in court, the rationale behind the original decisions became difficult for the administration’s defenders to justify.
