Many institutions are preemptively urging their international students to return to their campuses before the president-elect's inauguration on January 20.
Harvard, MIT, University of Southern California (USC), Cornell… Many American universities are urging their foreign students, some currently on winter vacation in their country of origin, to return to their campus before the inauguration of the President-elect Donald Trump on January 20.
During the 2023-2024 year, the United States welcomed more than 1.1 million international students according to figures from Open Doors and the Institute of International Education (IIE). A record number. The latter mainly come from India (29%), China (25%), South Korea (4%), Canada and Taiwan (2%). The French represent 0.8% of international students – the equivalent of 8,543 students.
The shadow of the “Muslim ban”
On numerous occasions during his campaign for his re-election, the Republican insisted that one of his priorities will be to crack down on immigration, whether legal or illegal. During his first term, the former real estate mogul imposed restrictions on entry into the United States from seven Muslim-majority countries – the «ban Muslims» – in January 2017.
This criticized measure concerned at the time around 17,000 students in the seven countries affected by the law: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The list was subsequently extended. If the «ban Muslims» had been repealed by Joe Biden in 2021, Donald Trump's advisers have indicated that such restrictions could see the light of day again.
Likewise, the future tenant of the White House has indicated that he wishes to cancel the visas of students from countries “openly anti-American and anti-Semitic”. A reference, in particular, to the pro-Palestinian demonstrations which multiplied on American campuses after the start of the Israeli response against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
India and China targeted?
“A travel ban expected to take effect shortly after Donald Trump’s inauguration”warns Cornell University preventively on its website. “This ban should concern citizens of countries targeted by the first Trump administration: Kyrgyzstan, Nigeria, Burma, Sudan, Tanzania, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Syria, Venezuela, Yemen and Somalia. New countries could be added to this list, notably China and India.she explains in a message published at the end of November.
In an email to students on special visas seen by Axios, USC said they should be in class when the semester begins on Jan. 13. “This is particularly important given that a new presidential administration will take office on January 20, 2025 and – as is often the case – could issue one or more executive orders impacting U.S. travel and processing visas”warns the university.
The Wesleyan University Office of International Student Affairs has for its part “strongly encouraged” his students to “return to the United States and return to campus before Sunday, January 19, 2025”rapporte The Guardian.
“Premature” alerts
Other universities have not given specific guidelines. This is the case at Emory University. The Atlanta (Georgia) establishment, specifies Axios, which had a copy of a message addressed to students, considers these alerts “premature”. “Once real policies and mandates are in place, we can discuss the impacts”writes the campus spokesperson.
Arizona State University, which has the fourth largest number of international students, also does not issue guidelines, according to spokesperson Jerry Gonzalez, also to Axios.
