A Chinese doctoral student at Dartmouth College is on the verge of having his visa reinstated after Homeland Security unexpectedly revoked it last week.
Xiaotian Liu, who is pursuing computer science at the prestigious college, had his F-1 student status ended on Friday. His lawyers argued in court filings that the termination occurred without warning and emphasized that he was not involved in any student protests that happened at the college the previous year. This development coincides with the Trump administration initiating a fresh round of visa cancellations affecting international students enrolled in U.S. universities.
Dartmouth officials disclosed that they came across the termination while checking Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (SEVIS) records on Friday. They promptly informed Liu about this decision on the same day, as detailed in documents seen by Fox News Digital.
A federal judge is set to order the visa reinstatement of a Chinese doctoral student at Dartmouth College after it was inexplicably revoked by Homeland Security. The Baker Library at Dartmouth College in Hanover, N.H. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)
Assistant U.S. Attorney Raphael Katz, a lawyer for the federal government, did not have an explanation in court on Wednesday.
“I don’t have the facts to explain why the change in status happened at this point,” Katz said, per The Dartmouth. The outlet reports that one other international student at the college had their visa revoked.
The forthcoming decision was welcomed by Gilles Bissonnette, the legal director of the ACLU of New Hampshire, who said that Liu can now continue studying and working computer science.
“International students are a vital community in our state’s universities, and no administration should be allowed to circumvent the law to unilaterally strip students of status, disrupt their studies, and put them at risk of deportation,” Bissonnette said.
President Donald Trump has suspended federal funding to every Ivy League, besides Penn and Dartmouth, over investigations into anti-Israel protests that have taken place on their campuses since October 2023. Funding for dozens of other universities has also been impacted by investigations for the same reason.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Acting Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement Todd Lyons were named as plaintiffs. ((Photo by Samuel Corum/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images) | (Photo by ROBERTO SCHMIDT/AFP via Getty Images) | (Fox News Digital))
The Trump administration has promised to be more aggressive in ending campus antisemitism after saying President Joe Biden did not hold universities accountable for their violent protests.
The administration has also made moves to detain and deport foreign students who participated in or orchestrated anti-Israel protests at American universities.
Dartmouth, located in Hanover, New Hampshire, is one of the nine colonial colleges chartered before the American Revolution.
Fox News Digital’s Greg Wehner and Elizabeth Pritchett as well as The Associated Press contributed to this report.
