The Trump administration’s crackdown on foreign students and staff at universities is bringing both fear and a renewed vigor for the pro-Palestinian movement on U.S. campuses.
In recent weeks, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has gone after those who were involved in last year’s encampments protesting Israel’s war in Gaza, arresting one green card holder and revoking the student visa of another, while also detaining and deporting a foreign-born professor.
The headline-grabbing events have caused some students to retreat and hide any evidence they were involved in the movement out of fear of retaliation. But others have found a second wind after the Palestinian cause struggled to maintain momentum on campus this year.
“There’s two sides, right? You’ll definitely have people who are international students or those in precarious positions who are undoubtedly limiting their protests, having to change their Instagrams or going private on social media” due to the Trump administration’s actions, said Momodou Taal, a British graduate student at Cornell University who has already been suspended and reinstated on campus due to his role in pro-Palestinian protests.
“By the same time, it’s also reinvigorated more people to come out as well,” Taal added. “I think it’s had a double effect, right? What we find is that the more — the more oppression that comes out, the greater the response in terms of activism.”
The crackdown began with Mahmoud Khalil, a recent graduate student at Columbia University and legal immigrant who was a lead negotiator during the pro-Palestinian encampments.
Khalil was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) earlier this month, with President Trump cheering the detention and explicitly trying it to his political activities.
The federal government says Khalil is a Hamas supporter and national security threat, but it hasn’t presented any evidence to support these claims — or officially charged him with any crime.
Only an immigration judge has the authority to revoke a green card, and the courts have ordered that Khalil not be deported while his case his considered. His attorneys are fighting to bring the case back to New York, where he was arrested, after ICE transferred him to a Louisiana facility.
DHS also announced another Columbia student who had her student visa revoked and fled to Canada, which it cheered as a “self-deport.”
Taal has sued the Trump administration over its recent actions to deport foreign students, assuming he could be a target due to the high-profile nature of his suspension back in April 2024.
“And given how they went after Mahmoud, who has a similar fact pattern, I didn’t want to be a sitting duck for eventually myself or other international students. So, I found the lawsuit as a form of protection seeking national injunction to challenge the constitutionality of these executive orders,” Taal said.
The crackdowns have led to a heated debate over national security vs. free speech as the federal government appears to label any who participated in the pro-Palestinian encampments on campuses last year as “pro-Hamas.”
It is illegal to provide material support such as money to declared terrorist organizations, but ideological support can be a tricky legal line, and the Trump administration is arguing those who are not American citizens have a shorter leash in that area.
The Trump administration also recently deported a Brown University medical school professor, despite a court order forbidding the move, saying she went to the funeral of a Hezbollah leader.
Experts say the moves chill campus culture not only for international students, but for U.S. citizens, too.
“When you have a class of people, non-citizens, who suddenly have to worry more about whether or not something they may say in that debate could result in their deportation […] that is going to affect what people are willing to talk about on campus, and not just for the international students, but also for professors and for their fellow students, who are Americans,” said Robert Shibley, special counsel for campus advocacy at the Foundation for Individuals Rights and Expression.
American students would inevitably think during debates on certain topics, “‘Are we putting [foreign students] at risk of deportation just by inviting them to have this conversation?’” he added.
Within the pro-Palestinian movement, students are trying to figure out ways they can continue their work while keeping others safe.
Isabelle, a student from Northwestern University who asked that her last name be kept private, says she had to have “hard conversations with my friends about, ‘How am I going to keep you safe?’ and ‘How are you going to keep doing what you’re doing because it means everything?’”
“What I’ve seen in my time as a student organizer is that there are always different roles in the movement, and some of those are more forward-facing or have the higher potential of encountering police violence or disciplinary procedures within a university context. And so, what I’m seeing is that there are students who are maybe wary, given their immigration status, but they are not giving up the fight,” she said.
The Trump administration has taken steps to punish schools it doesn’t believe have has taken the proper steps to the protests that occurred, saying the institutions failed to protect their students from antisemitism.
Columbia was at the start of the encampments last spring and saw some of the most intense demonstrations with protesters taking over a building and police sweeping through to remove the activists.
The federal government has revoked $400 million in funding from the university, demanding substantial changes to both academics and disciplinary procedures before talks to turn the faucet back on can begin.
Isabelle argues the Manhattan-based Ivy League school offers a cautionary tale to others.
“Columbia offers an excellent example in the way that — and not to be replicated — but in the sense that Columbia sent police on its students, it has suspended and expelled dozens of students, it has disciplined faculty, it has taken a very hard approach to complying with the pro-Israel, the far-right forces that we are now seeing empowered by the Trump administration, and they still had funding cut,” the Northwestern student said.
“I believe that universities should be making the utmost attempt to protect their students, their faculties and their community, particularly their international and undocumented students, as well as their trans students, their Palestinian students,” she added.
