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Trump admin caves to Harvard and MIT, won’t deport online-only students:
The Trump administration has rescinded a controversial policy that could have forced the deportation of foreign students who attend colleges that aren't offering in-person classes during the coronavirus pandemic.
As we reported last week, Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology sued the Trump administration to block the policy issued by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Under the policy change announced July 6, foreign students with nonimmigrant (F-1 and M-1) visas would have had to leave the United States or transfer to different schools that offer in-person classes.
But US officials agreed to rescind the new policy in a settlement with Harvard and MIT, as revealed [Tuesday] at a hearing on the case at US District Court for the District of Massachusetts. "At a short hearing Tuesday afternoon, US District Judge Allison Burroughs confirmed that a settlement had been reached," The Wall Street Journal reported. "She said the government would rescind the policy, withdraw an FAQ detailing the rule and return to the status quo of guidance issued in the spring."
Under a policy issued on March 13, which is back in effect because of the settlement, ICE provided an exemption to the rule that F-1 students must attend classes in person. The Harvard/MIT lawsuit pointed out that, when ICE issued this exemption, "the government made clear that this arrangement was 'in effect for the duration of the emergency.'" But the Trump administration's July 6 order reversed that policy despite the pandemic raging on and the fact that President Trump had not rescinded his national emergency declaration.
Harvard and MIT argued in their lawsuit that the Trump administration's July 6 policy change "is arbitrary and capricious because it fails to consider important aspects of the problem before the agency... fails to offer any reasoned basis that could justify the policy." The lawsuit also argues that the change violates a requirement to provide public notice and take comments.
Previously:
(2020-07-08) New Rules: Foreign Pupils Must Leave US if Classes Go Online-Only
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 16 2020, @02:46PM (18 children)
Another example of the administration abandoning regular Americans. Already completely hands off with state governors running wild, they now abandon university students to another full price lost semester.
I expect many of the schools that have promised to reopen will wait until students can't jump off anymore to say: Sorry, online classes only, the 70k is due in two weeks!
(Score: 2) by Opportunist on Thursday July 16 2020, @03:55PM (10 children)
70k for tuition? Per year?
Hell, I'm glad I studied in Europe. My whole degree didn't cost a tenth of that.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 16 2020, @04:24PM (8 children)
It's about the going rate for the complete annual package for a private school in the US. If the school is well regarded in an in-demand field, you can expect to earn $100k fresh out of school doing interesting stuff with a selective employer.
It's a lot of money, but it can pay off within 5 years. Not surprising though that many of the students come from families with a six figure income.
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Thursday July 16 2020, @04:50PM (7 children)
For a country that prides itself on being built on mass immigration, US seems to have a surprisingly racist, inward looking and socially divided population.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 16 2020, @05:02PM (4 children)
Doesn't mean we don't reserve the right to determine who may come in.
How?
This is our country. We care more about it than far off places.
Where do you not have social divisions?
(Score: 3, Touché) by PartTimeZombie on Thursday July 16 2020, @10:04PM (3 children)
Fair enough.
You haven't been paying attention, have you?
Unless those far-off places elect someone you don't like of course.
My country does not have anything like the divisions you have.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 17 2020, @03:24AM (2 children)
Yes it does. You have nothing to be proud of in terms of social divisions and racism. According to Wikipedia Crime in New Zealand: "New Zealand's crime statistics are compounded by the over-representation of Māori. Despite Māori making up only 12.5% of the general population aged 15 and over,[31] 2007 figures show 42% of all criminal apprehensions involve a person identifying as Māori, as do 50% of those in prison. In November 2019 the police launched a campaign to reduce Māori re-offending, as 51% of those in prison were Māori.[32] For Maori women, the picture is even more acute: they comprise around 60% of the female prison population.[33]"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 17 2020, @03:51AM (1 child)
The article continues: A forum held at Parliament in 2009 on the Drivers of Crime in New Zealand identified mainly socio-economic factors contributing to crime such as: "Family dysfunction; child maltreatment; poor educational achievement; harmful drinking and drug use; poor mental health; severe behavioural problems among children and young people; and the intergenerational transmission of criminal behaviour."[35] The forum noted that "Many of these issues are concentrated within socially and economically disadvantaged families and communities." In New Zealand, it seems these life circumstances are more likely to affect Maori families than non-Maori – which contributes to the comparatively high rates of offending by Maori.[33] In 2010 the Law Commission released a report on the social destruction caused by alcohol in New Zealand and quoted district court judges who said that 80% of all offending in New Zealand occurred under the influence of alcohol and drugs.[36]
"Socially and economically disadvantaged families and communities" - But you said your country didn't have any of those divisions. Perhaps you should check your white privilege.
#MaoriLivesMatter
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 17 2020, @06:45PM
Huh, sounds just like the old USA.
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Thursday July 16 2020, @11:33PM
I'm having more trouble finding recent evidence of that. MIT, Hahvahd and other fancy book-learnin' elite-style college-type places at least used to pride themselves on getting the best of the best [ku.edu] from wherever they can find it, but otherwise, it seems like the US -- or at least the loudest voices in the conversation -- is/are drowning in nationalism and anti-intellectualism these days.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 17 2020, @12:03AM
It only seems that way if you just pay attention to the bigots here and on social media.
Most Americans don't paint others with such a broad brush. Most of us understand that people are individuals and aren't defined by stuff like ethnicity or melanin content.
It's just the assholes who do that. There aren't very many of them, but they're *everywhere*.
If you just pay attention to the assholes, all you'll see is their warped view of their fellow humans. It's sad to see, but most of us normal folk just try to ignore them.
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Thursday July 16 2020, @04:55PM
70k for tuition? Per year?
Yeah, well, easy credit drove the price up a bit.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by bradley13 on Thursday July 16 2020, @05:55PM (6 children)
WTF? The federal government should be hands-off. Universities are either private, or state schools. Except for the military academies, there are no federal universities.
TDS gets really tiresome. However much you dislike the guy, not everything is his fault.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 16 2020, @06:49PM
"The Trump administration has rescinded a controversial policy that could have forced the deportation of foreign students who attend colleges that aren't offering in-person classes during the coronavirus pandemic."
He tried to make it his fault so he gets flak. Also, as for the governors running wild portion of the comment it seems pretty clear that medical advice for masks and lockdowns SHOULD have been a federal mandate. The crisis is real and Trump not only failed to provide leadership but encouraged dangerous responses that have led to thousands of deaths.
Trump has blood on his hands, but you're just too tired of people complaining about Trump's never ending fuckups. Where was this tired outrage during the 8 years of Obama? Or the still never ending bUt HiLLarY comments?
Trump is a criminal, get over it.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 16 2020, @09:11PM (4 children)
Tune down your antenna a bit. I support Trump overall, but that doesn't mean I have to support everything he does. And some of the jobs of the federal government are to keep commerce flowing and protecting us from the overreach of state and local governments. There he had two major fizzles already this year, back in April when he suddenly left control of the shutdown policies to the states, and now when he dropped the plan to hold Big Education to resume classes without an indication that they were going to commit to reopen.
IMO it won't be enough to just point the finger at Democrat's screwups until the election. We need constructive action from our president to get our country back.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by PartTimeZombie on Thursday July 16 2020, @10:10PM
Who has "taken " your country?
The president's party hold all of the levers of power, except the House.
If you can only name two occasions your president has had "major fizzles" this year, you should pay more attention.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 17 2020, @12:26AM (2 children)
You really have no idea how government in the US works do you?
The federal government can do many things, but no matter how much you might want it to be true, state and local governments always had full authority over their health systems/pandemic responses.
Trump's fuck ups were numerous, but not using the authority he doesn't have wasn't one of them.
As for the schools, again the Federal government doesn't control, or have authority over even public schools (K-12 or post-secondary), let alone private schools.
In fact, when he says that he'll "cut off money" from schools that don't open for in-person classes, it's actually two untruths. One lie and one misrepresentation.
1. Cutting off funding for schools that don't open for in person classes is a straight-up, bald-faced lie. Firstly, the law regarding federal funding of schools doesn't allow the President or the Secretary of Education to withhold funds except in specific, unusual circumstances. What's more, most of the Federal funding for K-12 for this year *has already been disbursed*.
2. Even if Trump *could* withhold such funds, Federal funds make up less than 10% of K-12 education spending in the US. As such, while it might be irritating to many school districts, it certainly wouldn't put any of them at risk of being unable to function. Which makes it a misrepresentation of the actual state of affairs.
The attempt to cancel visas for foreign students was just a cruel ploy to try to get universities to open for in-person classes.
Since at least some of the school administrations impacted aren't sociopaths, they demurred. Mostly because they're not willing to be responsible for more unnecessary deaths just to win Trump some political points.
Both of those "fuck ups" (scare quotes because they weren't just accidents, they are cruel, selfish grasping at straws attempts to bolster Trump politically, and everyone else be damned) are craven, short-sighted attempts to get folks back to work by giving their kids a place to go during the day. Given the current out of control state of the pandemic in the US, that would pretty much guarantee more unnecessary deaths, just so Trump can win some political points before the election.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 17 2020, @02:34PM (1 child)
It is also to "own the libs", whatever that means. I saw recently a bit on how some of the MAGA crowd are now seeking out masks that specifically don't do anything to mitigate the spread of covid. It is so they can wear them, knowing full well that they are not designed to do what their intent is, but so they can "own the libs". Think about that for a moment. They are unwilling to wear a simple piece of cloth, much less a surgical mask, to help tamp down a public health issue, but they will wear something on their faces specifically for the purpose that it doesn't do anything to mitigate the issue, but so they can have their adolescent thrill of "bucking authority" and "owning the libs". Just think about what that really says about them.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday July 18 2020, @12:45AM
It says they're in the same mental state (and level of development) as a defiant little three year old who purposefully shits his pants and runs around in shitty pants specifically because his mother told him to use the pot.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...