51ºÚÁÏ

The records in a federal student database maintained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement had been terminated in recent weeks, often without the students or their schools being notified. Judges around the country had already issued orders temporarily restoring the students’ records in dozens of lawsuits challenging the terminations.

More than 1,200 students nationwide — including at least 27 in the 51ºÚÁÏ area — suddenly lost their legal status or had visas revoked, leaving them at risk for deportation. Many said they had only minor infractions on their record or did not know why they were targeted. Some left the country while others have gone into hiding or stopped going to class.

International students studying in 51ºÚÁÏ and beyond joined dozens of lawsuits challenging the mass termination of students’ statuses.

On Monday, five international students in Missouri filed a federal lawsuit in the Western District of Missouri, claiming federal immigration officials terminated their student registrations “without notice and without cause.â€� Eight other international students in Missouri, including four in the 51ºÚÁÏ area, were part of a separate lawsuit with 133 plaintiffs filed in Atlanta on April 11.

The 51ºÚÁÏ students, according to court records, had minor brushes with the law, mostly through traffic or municipal ordinance violations. One student had previously been charged with petty larceny/shoplifting case, but the case had been dismissed.

51ºÚÁÏ-based attorney Jim Hacking said that four of the 10 students he’s been representing saw their legal statuses restored in the federal system used to track international students by Friday afternoon.

“These students have been suffering for three weeks for absolutely no reason at all, other than the Trump administration wanted to break the law,� Hacking said.

ICE ‘now developing a policy’

In one of the lawsuits, Assistant U.S. Attorney Elizabeth Kurlan read a statement in federal court in Oakland, California, that said ICE was restoring the student status for people whose records were terminated in recent weeks. A similar statement was read by a government attorney in a separate case in Washington, said lawyer Brian Green, who represents the plaintiff in that case. Green provided The Associated Press with a copy of the statement that the government lawyer emailed to him.

It says: “ICE is developing a policy that will provide a framework for SEVIS record terminations. Until such a policy is issued, the SEVIS records for plaintiff(s) in this case (and other similarly situated plaintiffs) will remain Active or shall be re-activated if not currently active and ICE will not modify the record solely based on the NCIC finding that resulted in the recent SEVIS record termination.�

SEVIS is the Student and Exchange Visitor Information Systems database that tracks international students’ compliance with their visa status. NCIC is the National Crime Information Center, which is maintained by the FBI.

Tricia McLaughlin, an assistant Homeland Security secretary, said ICE had not reversed course on any visa revocations but did “restore SEVIS access for people who had not had their visa revoked.�

Greg Chen, with the American Immigration Lawyers Association, said some uncertainty remained: “It is still unclear whether ICE will restore status to everyone it has targeted and whether the State Department will help students whose visas were wrongly revoked.�

Judges overseeing Missouri students’ cases had ordered federal officials to temporarily restore students’ statuses over the past week.

The lack of any final judgment may allow the Trump administration to come back and do the same thing again, 51ºÚÁÏ immigration attorney David Cox said.

“That’s the danger, I suppose, of not having to wait for a court decision,� he said.

Legal fights may not be over

Green, who is involved in lawsuits on behalf of several dozen students, said his cases only sought restoration of the student status and that he would be withdrawing them as a result of the statement Friday from ICE.

But lawyers in the Oakland case are seeking a nationwide order from the court prohibiting the government from arresting or incarcerating students, transferring them to places outside their district or preventing them from continuing work or studies.

Pam Johann, a government lawyer, said it was premature to consider anything like that given that ICE was in the process of reactivating student status records and developing a policy. “We should take a pause while ICE is implementing this change that plaintiffs are seeking right now, on its own,� she said.

But U.S. District Judge Jeffrey S. White asked her to humor the court and clarify ICE’s statement.

“It seems like with this administration there’s a new world order every single day,� he said. “It’s like whack-a-mole.�

Causing confusion

Last month, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said his department was revoking visas held by visitors who were acting counter to national interests, including some who protested Israel’s war in Gaza and those who face criminal charges. But many students whose status was terminated said they did not fall under those categories.

A survey by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs research found that that even the visa revocations for students who participated in pro-Palestinian protests are not popular. About half of U.S. adults oppose this policy, and only 3 in 10 are in support. Among college-educated adults, 6 in 10 strongly oppose, compared with 4 in 10 who aren’t college graduates.

In lawsuits in several states, students argued they were denied due process. Many were told that their status was terminated as a result of a criminal records check or that their visa had been revoked.

International students and their schools were caught off guard by the terminations of the students’ records. Many of the terminations were discovered when school officials were doing routine checks of the international student database.

Jodie Ferise, a higher education attorney in Indiana, said some students at schools her law firm works with already left the country after receiving instructions to self-deport.

“This unprecedented treatment of student status had caused tremendous fear among international students,� Ferise said. “Some of them were too frightened to wait and hope for the administration to change course.�

Earlier this week, before the government’s reversal, Ferise said the situation could hurt international student enrollment.

“The world is watching, and we will lose students, not just by the technical revocation of their status, but by the message we’re sending that we don’t want them anyway and that it isn’t safe to even try to go to school here,� she said.

At least 1,220 students at 187 colleges, universities and university systems have had their visas revoked or their legal status terminated since late March, according to an Associated Press review of university statements, correspondence with school officials and court records. The AP has been working to confirm reports of hundreds more students who are caught up in the crackdown.

Brumback reported from Atlanta. Christopher L. Keller in Albuquerque, New Mexico; Makiya Seminera, in Raleigh, North Carolina; and Annie Ma, Rebecca Santana and Linley Sanders in Washington, contributed reporting. Monica Obradovic of the Post-Dispatch also contributed.