The ACLU of Utah is suing the federal government on behalf of nine international students who had their legal status revoked by the Trump administration. U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem and Todd Lyons, the acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, are named in the lawsuit.
In early April, colleges across Utah confirmed that dozens of international students had their visa statuses unexpectedly stripped away. In many cases, schools and students were not notified about the changes and were unsure why some were targeted.
The April 18 court filing says the students had their Student and Exchange Visitor Information System records “abruptly and unlawfully” terminated. The SEVIS system is a government database that tracks the status of international students. While some students also had visas revoked, the immediate concern in the complaint is those records.
If a student’s visa is revoked, that means they can’t re-enter the country if they leave. Terminating SEVIS records, on the other hand, effectively ends their lawful status in the U.S. according to the lawsuit, and puts them at risk of “arrest, detention, and deportation, and forcing them to lose their schooling and their employment.”
“Upon SEVIS termination, the student instantly becomes out of status, losing all employment authorizations and student privileges,” the lawsuit states.
The ACLU of Utah is joined by lawyers from Denton Durham Jones and Pinegar, as well as Stowell Crayk, in representing the students.
The publication Inside Higher Ed is tracking visa revocations, and as of April 17, they’ve identified more than 1,480 international students across the U.S. who have been affected. ACLU chapters in other states are filing similar lawsuits.
The Utah students represented in the complaint are from China, Nigeria, Mexico and Japan. They attend colleges across the state, including the University of Utah, Brigham Young University, BYU-Idaho and Ensign College. The students’ options, according to the complaint, are to “self-deport” or try to reapply, which would likely be denied. After the students’ registry records were terminated, the court filing says their records were marked as identified in a criminal records check or simply failed to “maintain status.”
The lawsuit reads, “plaintiffs have been experiencing high levels of stress and anxiety following their SEVIS terminations. They are unsure of what will happen to them. They also fear being labeled a national security or foreign policy threat if they seek to return to the United States in the future, or if they seek to travel to another country, because of the labels attached to their SEVIS terminations.”
ACLU of Utah lawyers argue the federal government was not authorized to terminate the students’ status. The lawsuit states the students were “in full compliance with the terms of their student status and had not engaged in any conduct that would warrant the termination of their status.”
Even if a student’s visa is revoked, the lawsuit argues that it doesn't give the federal government the authority to terminate a student’s status and records. The lawyers say doing so was “designed to coerce students, including each Plaintiff, into abandoning their studies and ‘self-deporting’ despite not violating their status.”
If the federal government believes a student should be deported, the complaint says it can initiate removal proceedings and involve the courts. Instead of that, lawyers argue the federal government used SEVIS terminations to circumvent the law and forgo due process because students were not allowed to contest the decisions.
“To terminate an international student’s SEVIS registration, the U.S. government must adhere to regulatory standards and provide basic due process, which it has failed to do - it’s not just wrong, it’s unlawful,” Jason M. Groth, legal director at the ACLU of Utah, said in a statement. “The students have constitutional and procedural protections that we seek to enforce with this lawsuit to ensure the government respects the rights of everyone.”
The ACLU of Utah wants a temporary restraining order to reinstate the students’ SEVIS records to allow them to resume their studies and work.
The attorneys argue the students will face irreparable harm — losing not only immigration status but jobs, money and education — if the courts don’t step in.
Adam Cryak, partner at Stowell Cryak said, “The government has arbitrarily, without any good or valid reason, terminated their SEVIS registrations without providing them any avenue to seek review or procedural due process other than this lawsuit. I have yet to see one of these machine-generated terminations that had a valid basis in fact or law.”
The chaos came weeks before the end of the semester, when some international students were preparing to graduate. Utah Tech University held an early graduation ceremony for some of its students who had been impacted.
KSL NewsRadio reported that a BYU graduate student from Japan had his visa revoked and is unsure why. Like many other students, Suguru Onda’s attorney said Onda was simply told his visa was revoked for “failure to maintain nonimmigrant status.” KSL reported that Onda only had two speeding tickets on his record, as well as a fishing catch-and-release violation that was dismissed in court. However, KSL later reported April 18 that Onda’s visa had been reinstated, according to his attorney.
When asked about the visa revocations during his April monthly news conference, Gov. Spencer Cox said the state asked the Trump administration for more information and “a little bit of a heads up when these things are happening.”
“We'd like to understand better what the criteria are for those changes,” Cox told reporters. “Certainly, we know that there were some that had criminal backgrounds that we were not aware of, that the universities were not aware of. [With] others that does not appear to be the case.”
The governor continued that it’s important to vet international students who come to the U.S. to study and then convince them to stay.
“We know how important those visas are and how important immigrants are to building our economy, and we're very fortunate to have the greatest system of higher education in the world,” Cox said.
