In-class student visa rule rescinded

Policy rescinded amid threats of legal action

The Trump administration reversed course Tuesday on a July 6 rule change from Immigration and Customs Enforcement that would have required international students to attend inperson classes to stay in the country.

The Trump administration’s move to rescind the hotly contested policy directive follows a week of mounting public criticism and legal action challenging the rule.

The government resolved a lawsuit filed by Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in federal court, meaning the rule will revert back to its March guidance, which allows international students to maintain their visa requirements even if their university or college opts out of in-person instruction to mitigate COVID-19 spread.

Arizona State University, University of Arizona and Northern Arizona University had joined legal action against the rule Monday. All three universities were part of a coalition of 20 academic institutions across the West that filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court in Oregon on Monday seeking to block the ICE rule.

ASU was also one of nearly 60 colleges and universities listed in an amicus curiae brief Sunday supporting the lawsuit filed by Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

All three Arizona universities had previously announced that their plans for the upcoming academic year would

allow in-person opportunities for their international students, meaning that the new procedures proposed by ICE would not affect the approximately 15,000 international students attending the state’s largest academic institutions. But international students across the state still questioned the logic behind the ruling and their futures in the United States.

The swift action against the rule change was evidence that people with the power to do something were willing to listen and act, said Charlotte Till, an international doctoral candidate at ASU.

“It shows that there was considerable energy and effort made to demonstrate just how bad of a decision it was in the first place,” she said.

Till called the decision to rescind the rule change a “victory for all international students in the U.S.”

And while uncertainties around expiring visas and international students who are not already in the U.S. remain, she said it’s reassuring for now that at least the students who are currently in the country will be able to stay and start or continue their programs “without that fear looming over them.”