Trump suspends entry of international students to Harvard, wants Balkan states to accept deportees

U.S. President Donald Trump has suspended, for an initial six-month period, the entry of foreign nationals intending to study or participate in exchange programs at Harvard University. 

The move comes amid an intensifying conflict between the Trump administration and the Ivy League institution.

The proclamation, issued Wednesday, cites national security as the reason for barring international students from entering the U.S. to study at the Cambridge, Massachusetts-based university. It also empowers the State Department to consider revoking visas of current Harvard students who meet certain unspecified criteria outlined in the directive.

Harvard responded by calling the measure “yet another illegal retaliatory step taken by the Administration in violation of Harvard’s First Amendment rights,” and pledged to continue defending its international students.

The suspension is open-ended, with the possibility of being extended beyond six months.

This development follows a legal battle in which a federal judge in Boston recently signaled her intent to issue a broad injunction preventing the administration from revoking Harvard’s certification to enroll international students. The judge, Allison Burroughs, had previously blocked an attempt by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to immediately strip Harvard of its Student and Exchange Visitor Program certification.

After the court intervened, Homeland Security said it would instead pursue the matter through a longer administrative process. Still, Judge Burroughs indicated she would proceed with a preliminary injunction to protect Harvard’s international student population, which constitutes about 25% of its enrollment.

The administration has also taken other actions against Harvard, including freezing billions of dollars in federal funding and proposing to revoke the university’s tax-exempt status. Harvard claims these efforts are retaliatory, rooted in the administration’s desire to exert control over its governance, curriculum, and academic ideology.

A leaked State Department cable, seen by Reuters, revealed that all U.S. consular posts had been instructed to intensify vetting of visa applicants planning to study at or visit Harvard.

Trump’s directive accuses Harvard of maintaining “extensive entanglements with foreign adversaries,” notably China, and of failing to report “known illegal or dangerous activities” by some foreign students. The proclamation also references FBI warnings about foreign entities exploiting the openness of American universities to conduct espionage and misinformation campaigns.

The administration’s immigration agenda extends beyond higher education. According to a Bloomberg News report, the U.S. is pressing Serbia and other Balkan nations to accept migrants deported from the U.S. as part of a broader strategy to find willing recipient countries.

In a related move, the U.S. Supreme Court recently upheld the administration’s authority to revoke temporary legal protections for hundreds of thousands of migrants from Venezuela, Cuba, Haiti, and Nicaragua—potentially leading to a significant wave of deportations.

Neither the White House, the U.S. State Department, nor Serbia’s foreign ministry immediately commented on the Bloomberg report.