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Trump’s International Student Policy Faces Court Setback
On September 14, 2026, Judge F. Dennis Saylor IV of the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts blocked the implementation of the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) new rule limiting how long international students, academics, and foreign journalists can stay in the U.S. A coalition of organizations, representing a variety of higher education institutions, advocacy groups, and labor unions, filed the lawsuit. Although Saylor granted the request to postpone the rule’s effective date under the Administrative Procedure Act, the judge denied the request for summary judgment without prejudice, allowing the DHS to refile or renew the request later.
As part of his justification, Saylor wrote in a 48-page order that the Trump administration had not adequately responded to public comments on the rule or considered other alternative options, such as taking into account the effects of potentially lower enrollment. This constituted a violation of the Administrative Procedure Act, which governs how departments can create regulations. DHS also failed to show a rational connection between the proposed rule and its purported national security objectives, which the department argued were necessary to safeguard national security, protect the American border, and crack down on fraud and abuse in the visa system. Saylor wrote that the administration’s national security justification “borders on the absurd,” and that the rationale was “exceptionally weak.”
The judge issued the ruling a day before DHS set the rule to take effect on September 15, 2026. The new rule would have affected international students (F visas), international researchers, professors, and instructors studying or teaching at U.S. colleges and universities (J visas), and foreign press representatives (I visas). If the rule had taken effect as planned, it would have upended a system in which the United States government issued visas to foreign students and researchers for their “duration of status” without requiring extensions. Duration of status (D/S) is an immigration designation that allows international students and exchange visitors to remain legally in the U.S. as long as they maintain their student or scholar status and make normal progress toward completing their program. Under DHS’s new rule, students and scholars would not be permitted to stay in the U.S. for more than four years at a time, or less depending on the duration of their educational program, whichever is shorter.
If enacted, DHS will replace the D/S designation with an “Admit Until Date” (AUD) designation, which sets a nonimmigrant’s maximum period of admission to the U.S. and the last day the nonimmigrant is authorized to stay in the United States. This new rule clashes with the typical length of many Ph.D. programs, which typically take about 6 years to complete, meaning those who intend to stay longer than four years would have to apply to the federal government to extend their status. As of this writing, the current processing time for filing Form I-539, which allows nonimmigrants already in the U.S. to apply for an extension of stay, a change to another nonimmigrant status, or reinstatement without leaving the country, is about 6.5 months for 80% of cases.
In response to Saylor’s ruling, James Percival, the General Counsel for DHS, criticized the system on X, formerly known as Twitter, as prone to fraud and abuse by malicious actors. “Come on a student visa, take one class per semester, and stay here for decades. According to Judge Dennis Saylor, ICE must permit this rampant abuse of our immigration system,” Percival tweeted on X. In a statement to The Daily Princetonian, a DHS spokesperson said that, “The performative outrage is incredible. Where was the outrage when foreign nationals were abusing the system, violating the terms of their student visas, and making a mockery of our immigration laws?”
While President Trump has made positive comments about international students, notably during his podcast interview with venture capitalists on All In, where he suggested that international college graduates from American universities should receive a green card as part of their diploma, there seems to be no evidence to suggest that there is a change in his administration’s immigration policies. The Trump administration has successfully enacted or attempted to propose several measures to restrict international student enrollment, such as successfully requiring all prospective international students to review their social media accounts as part of the interview process to screen for “indications of hostility toward the citizens, culture, government, institutions, or founding principles of the United States,” per guidance promulgated by the State Department.
The divergence between Trump’s public comments on the issue and the administration’s actions led several analysts to believe that Trump’s policy team, led by White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, pursues its own immigration agenda without regard for Donald Trump’s views or statements on high-skilled immigration or international students. Another example of the divergence between the president’s remarks on international students and the administration’s actions is a proposal to impose a $100,000 immigration fee for Optional Practical Training (OPT) to prevent international students from working in America after graduating. OPT is a temporary work authorization that lets F-1 student visa holders gain off-campus practical experience directly related to their major. This goes in stark contrast to Trump’s views, who has argued in the past that international students strengthen the economy and help many U.S. universities’ financial situations by boosting enrollment.
Based on projections from NAFSA: Association of International Educators and JB International, U.S. higher education institutions can expect as many as 112,000 fewer international students to enroll in the coming year. The Peterson Institute for International Economics, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank, warned that these policies “would constrict a key supply of science and engineering talent to the US economy, reducing productivity and slowing economic growth in the long run.” Estimates show that if international student enrollment drops by one-third and stays that way for 10 years, the US will lose between $240 billion and $481 billion every single year. Whether the administration will reverse its current course on international students remains to be seen.
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