On Friday, the American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island — alongside three other ACLU affiliates and law firm Shaheen and Gordon — filed a federal class-action lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, requesting to reinstate the F-1 student status of over 100 students in New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Maine, Rhode Island and Puerto Rico who have had their student visas revoked.
The named plaintiffs include five international students from India and China, who attend universities in Massachusetts and New Hampshire.
According to an ACLU press release, these students had their “F-1 student immigration status unlawfully and abruptly terminated” by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security “with no specified reason as to why.” Among the affected international students are “a handful of students from Brown University and the Rhode Island School of Design who have had their student status revoked in the past few weeks,” the press release reads.
At least one Brown student and a “small number” of recent graduates have had their visas revoked as of April 10, The Herald previously reported. Additionally, as of April 7, one student at RISD had their visa revoked.
Neither the University nor RISD responded to a request for comment.
“It’s disturbing that several international students studying here in Rhode Island, at both Brown University and RISD, have had their student status determinations revoked without explanation,” said Steven Brown, executive director of the ACLU of R.I., in the press release. “There is no question in my mind that actions like these have a chilling effect on international students who are currently in Rhode Island and the rest of the country,” Steven Brown wrote in an email to The Herald.
“The American Civil Liberties Union appears far more interested in protecting foreign students than (the) civil liberties and safety of Americans,” Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary of DHS, wrote in an email to The Herald.
The ACLU “should consider changing their name,” she added. “It is a privilege to be granted a visa to live and study in the United States of America. When you break our laws and advocate for violence and terrorism that privilege should be revoked and you should not be in this country.”
The class-action lawsuit aims to “protect (students) and others who have had to suddenly leave their studies and face possible deportation for absolutely no legitimate reason,” Steven Brown added.
The filing notes that affected international students now “face immigration detention and deportation,” arguing that the Trump administration’s “unilateral and unlawful terminations have severely disrupted the educational opportunities of students who are in the middle of their studies.”
“To terminate student status, the student, for example, must fail to take full courses of study, engage in unauthorized employment or be convicted of a violent crime with a potential sentence of more than a year,” the press release states. “For those who would be represented in this case, none of those situations exist.”
Additionally, the suit argues that the terminations violate students’ due process rights, given that the Trump administration did not communicate direct notice of the revocations to international students, provide students with reasoning for the termination of their student status or grant affected students an opportunity to terminate the revocations.
Earlier this month, the ACLU of New Hampshire filed a separate lawsuit on behalf of a student at Dartmouth whose visa has been revoked. In an emergency meeting on April 9, a federal court in New Hampshire temporarily restored his visa status.
International students at Columbia, Harvard and Stanford University have also had their visas revoked.
The ACLU’s press release included an estimate of over 1,400 international students and recent graduates across over 210 colleges and universities “who have had their legal status changed” as of April 17.
Sanai Rashid lives in Long Island, New York. As an English and Economics concentrator, she is passionate about storytelling and how numbers and data create narratives in ways words alone cannot. When she is not writing, you can find her trying new pizza places in Providence or buying another whale stuffed animal.
Sophia Wotman is a University news editor covering activism and affinity & identity. She is a junior from Long Island, New York concentrating in Political Science with a focus on women’s rights. She is a jazz trumpet player, and often performs on campus and around Providence.
