from Hacker News

US Government threatens Harvard with foreign student ban

by intunderflow on 4/17/25, 10:42 AM with 426 comments

  • by xnx on 4/17/25, 11:37 AM

    Economic, educational, reputational ... it's hard to think of a dimension that the current administration is not destroying the US on.

  • by Molitor5901 on 4/17/25, 12:46 PM

    Tangentially related, but at my university international students paid the most to attend - by far - than any other student. It has been rumored by some that universities may have an unfair preference for international students because of this. I wonder if this thinking is playing into the policy making.

  • by HeavyStorm on 4/17/25, 12:40 PM

    So, are you guys realizing that this is _already_ a dictatorship?

  • by thrance on 4/17/25, 12:00 PM

    Where are those people who two days ago insisted the administration was fighting for "bringing back" merit-based admission to colleges? Are foreign student all incapable or merit or was it simply a lie, like everything else?

  • by DarkWiiPlayer on 4/17/25, 11:38 AM

    What's gonna be next? Banning Ukrainian students to help combat "Russophobia"?

    This is just so weird. How do people support this stuff only to then go on and complain about "free speech" the second you tell them something they said was kind of a little bit mean?

  • by arunabha on 4/17/25, 7:17 PM

    The 'official' explanation that I got from Dang was that political posts hit automated software filters because of flagging and down voting which cause them to disappear from the front page.

    Separately, sometimes the moderation team disables these filters on certain posts, but it's not often.

  • by alwa on 4/17/25, 11:55 AM

    I have a hard time imagining this specific threat to be more than bluster. Would someone with relevant legal expertise be able to comment on how likely a ban on foreign enrollments would be to fly in the courts?

    Surely the administration have a substantial degree of discretion with respect to student visas, but can they precipitate a blanket revocal on something as nakedly coercive (and speech-involved) as this?

    (Edit: at a casual, non-expert glance it seems that a student can apply for a student visa at any SEVP-certified school, and the regulations governing SEVP certification seem to be at [0]. They list a lot of potential reasons to withdraw approval once it’s issued, but they all seem pretty specific: falsifying records, lying on your application, failing to keep proper records in relation to the students’ enrollment, and so on. Does it feel like maybe the mechanic here is claiming that tracking students’ speech is part of that essential record-keeping task?)

    [0] https://www.ice.gov/sevis/schools/reg#2144

  • by OZYMANDIASAK on 4/17/25, 11:44 AM

    At what point can we say that the US truly has fallen from being the leader of the world?

    Each and every decision taken by the current administration is bringing the US closer to an age of darkness and idiocy.

    I’m from Europe, I’m not saying the US was ever perfect but I don’t understand how it came to this.

    My bet is a on a combination of extreme individualism due to a poor internalisation of the ideals of liberalism combined with a predatory capitalistic environment.

    It’s sad to see what happens to a society that has the highest concentration of the brightest minds in world mostly working towards money related goals. So many great people that could work for the greater good and are dutifully tuning algorithms for the 0.01% capturing everyone’s attention and ideas.

    Sad state of the world but I guess you can’t stop “progress”.

  • by insane_dreamer on 4/17/25, 2:17 PM

    They're also threatening to pull their tax-exempt status [0]

    [0] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/16/us/politics/trump-irs-har...

    This is exactly what dictatorships do: comply with our demands or we will bring you down. Harvard might be able to stand up to them, but many other less wealthy universities will fold immediately.

    But if the universities don't bind together and take a stand now, it will be too difficult and too late to do so later. Poor Columbia--now that Trump knows they will cower, he can make whatever demands he wants.

    Don Corleone would be proud.

  • by southernplaces7 on 4/17/25, 6:15 PM

    Why the hell would this be flagged? Perfectly valid, debate-worthy and absolutely relevant in the context of many non-flagged submissions on this site. Again it would be nice if the HN admin stop letting any random orangutan flag anything they like out of their own shitty little naval-gazing ideological fixations.

  • by bryanrasmussen on 4/17/25, 11:33 AM

    for some reason the article has IRS as Inland Revenue Service (at this time)?

  • by kowabungalow on 4/17/25, 11:41 AM

    Universities had better hurry up with opening up their foreign campuses.

  • by inglor_cz on 4/17/25, 12:06 PM

    This comment is not meant to defend this sort of blackmail, rather a tangential thought that struck me.

    Most successful franchises try to expand abroad. Why not build a Harvard branch in London, Dubai, Sydney, Mumbai or Tokio?

    Each of those would likely be subject to some pressures over time, but those times and pressures would vary.

    Nowadays it is a "all eggs in one basket" situation.

  • by hersko on 4/17/25, 1:12 PM

    Tangentially related question: Why do universities like Harvard (who has a ~$60bn endowment) get federal funding at all? Between tuition and donors are they not profitable?

  • by ChrisArchitect on 4/17/25, 2:12 PM

  • by mjburgess on 4/17/25, 11:58 AM

    I had been somewhat neutral on trump -- the grievances of the american right were real and under served. Major civil institutions of power and culture had been monopolised by the left; there had been a "default preference" for wealth over income, capital over labour. Immigration had been treated as a purely economic question, with little regards to the suddenness of population and cultural changes metered out on communities which took on the highest levels.

    I had thought the leftwing reaction to accuse this of authoritarianism, overblown. Many of the actions that had been taken were taken by previous leftwing administrations, just with less publicity (, and so on).

    However I think the rubicon has been crossed. The president now believes he has impunity to engage in extrajudicial rendition to enslave people, including citizens, in foreign prisons. He attacks the centres of civil power: universities, law firms, (likekly soon, ) the mass media. And rival state power: ignoring the supreme court, congress (ie., reorganising federal gov beyond his power), and the institional professional class in the executive.

    All the while, increasingly I see people on the centre-right in the mass media credulously believing the president's account of his actions. Identifying with the president as an expression of their power, and believing likewise, that the whole of civil society is legitimately brought under state ideological control. That the presidency is the state, that state is society, and that society must "for democratic reasons" be brought to the state's heel.

    The next phase of this will be very dangerous for the american people. I think civil resistance will be target for at best, imprisonment -- perhaps even rendition to a foreign prison. All one needs to say is that the resistance protestors are domestic terroists, and trump has a wide base of people credulously willing to believe it -- no doubt looting and other things will occur. It is very easy to imagine state elections being brought under "federal control" and a process of election rigging soon following.

    As far as I can see there are two forces acting against the possibility of an american tyranny: trump's own desire to perform what's he's doing completely destabilises his plans (eg., on the economy especially). Secondly, the federalism of the american system.

    It seems now plausible to me to imagine a future in which a democractic state violently expels federal forces, esp., eg., if ICE are used to rendition american citizens. It will be almost an obligation of states to suspend federal police presense. This, in the end, may make totalisation of federal state power difficult.

  • by oefrha on 4/17/25, 12:03 PM

    I’m a foreigner who was U.S.-educated, spent a substantial part of my life there (left a little while ago), and still have family there. I’m seriously advising prospective students from pursuing a college education in the U.S. now. A partial education is now a very real concern under this mad man, especially for someone with the “wrong” nationality/ethnicity, which could completely upend one’s life and torpedo a lot of career prospects. Not to mention concerns for personal safety.

    As an aside, I faced casual racism plenty of times in the country; pretty sure no one ever gave a shit. Trump country would cheer for it, actually.

  • by belter on 4/17/25, 3:59 PM

    Why is this flagged?

  • by apwell23 on 4/17/25, 11:46 AM

    anyone know why trump didn't do any of these betwee 2016-2020 when he ran on exact same platform. But this time he hit the ground running.

    What's different this time?

  • by titaphraz on 4/17/25, 11:58 AM

    "... he's America's Hitler"

    -- JD Vance, Vice president of USA on Trump, President of USA.

    (Before JD became VP)

  • by josefritzishere on 4/17/25, 5:48 PM

    The president, getting involved with the petty operations of private companies seems anti-capitalist.

  • by Braxton1980 on 4/17/25, 11:30 AM

    I hope people realize that protesting or being angry at Trump/Republicans is pointless.

    The power is bestowed upon them by Republican voters and they are to blame. Voting for one issue, lack of education, or desire to tune out politics isn't a reasonable excuse.

    Edit

    I have no issue with downvotes but offer up arguments why voters aren't responsible.

  • by farmdawgnation on 4/17/25, 11:43 AM

    This seems like a relatively empty threat considering many international folks don’t want to come here anyhow. There are some parallels here to when my toddler tries to give me consequences for doing things she doesn’t like.

  • by DarkmSparks on 4/17/25, 11:49 AM

    60 Universities, the only reason Harvard is interesting here is the revelation its administration are just another average bunch of crayon munching racist idiots.

    Down vote all you want, wont make blocking students from class because they are Jewish and hiring people based on their race or sexual preferences any less moronic.

    Breath of fresh air to see that idiocy burn.