Latitudes: Why are international students in the middle of debates about the war in Israel and Palestine?

Republican candidates have called for deporting foreign students who express support for Hamas or criticize Israel. ADVERTISEMENT [Latitudes Logo]( You can also [read this newsletter on the web](. Or, if you no longer want to receive this newsletter, [unsubscribe](. Candidates, elected officials threaten to revoke visas of student protesters With tensions running high on college campuses over the war in the Middle East, Donald J. Trump and several other Republican presidential candidates have called for deporting international students who express support for Palestinians or criticize the Israeli government’s military response in Gaza. Such actions would violate the students’ free-speech rights, experts said. The candidates’ comments have once again thrust foreign students into the molten-hot center of American politics. Several Republican senators have similarly called for federal officials to revoke the visas of students who express support for Hamas, the Palestinian group that carried out the October 7 attacks on Israeli civilians. In a [speech]( in Iowa last week, Trump, the former president and current Republican front-runner, called for deporting visa holders with “jihadist sympathies,” and singled out international students. “In the wake of the attacks on Israel, Americans have been disgusted to see the open support for terrorists among the legions of foreign nationals on college campuses. They’re teaching your children hate,” he said. “Under the Trump administration, we will revoke the student visas of radical anti-American and antisemitic foreigners at our colleges and universities, and we will send them straight back home.” While the bloodshed in Gaza and Israel has exposed [deep divisions]( on college campuses, it’s not clear that international students have been prominent protest organizers or activists. Trump also called for imposing ideological screenings on foreign visitors to the United States and said, if reelected, he would reinstate his ban on travelers from a number of predominantly Muslim countries. The [travel ban]( issued less than a week into Trump’s presidency, in 2017, was the first, but not the last, policy move during the Trump administration to [affect international students]( with some efforts targeting them directly. Under Trump’s watch, student-visa rules were tightened, and he considered a proposal to [bar all Chinese students]( whom he allegedly called “spies,” from American campuses. During the [height of the pandemic]( his administration tried to force international students to enroll in in-person courses or leave the country, although officials backed down after public opposition. But in the current climate, Trump is not alone in saying he would rescind the visas of students who support Hamas, which the U.S. government has designated as a terrorist group. Gov. Ron DeSantis, of Florida, a [frequent critic of higher education]( has made the issue a talking point in speeches and media appearances. On “[The Megyn Kelly Show,]( DeSantis said that “any of those students who are here on visas, those visas should be canceled, and they should be repatriated back to their home country. That’s a no-brainer.” He told a [Fox News interviewer]( “You don’t have a right to be here on a visa. You don’t have a right to be studying in the United States.” Another presidential hopeful, Sen. Tim Scott, of South Carolina, expressed a [similar view]( of protesters: “If any of those students on college campuses are foreign nationals on a visa, they should be sent back to their country.” Nor are calls to expel international students limited to the campaign trail. In the Senate, Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican, said he would introduce a [resolution]( calling for President Biden to revoke the visas of any foreign nationals who back Hamas. In a [letter]( to Alejandro Mayorkas, secretary of homeland security, Sen. Tom Cotton, a Republican of Arkansas, urged the U.S. government “to immediately deport any foreign national — including and especially any alien on a student visa — that has expressed support for Hamas and its murderous attacks on Israel.” Republican politicians’ focus on international students has alarmed both educators and free-speech advocates. Not only have some of the statements been overly broad — not differentiating between criticism of Israel’s retaliatory strikes on Gaza, which have killed Palestinian civilians, and support for Hamas’s attacks — but they would punish international students simply for speaking out. That would violate their First Amendment rights, said Sarah McLaughlin, a senior scholar for global expression at the free-speech group Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, or FIRE. Student-visa holders and others legally in the United States have the same free-speech protections as Americans do under court rulings, McLaughlin said. She fears that threats of retaliatory expulsions could have a chilling effect on international students’ speech. Many students from overseas have an imperfect understanding of American law, and they may be wary of taking part in any activities that they fear could jeopardize their visa status. (While violations of the law, such as drunk driving, can run afoul of visa rules, peaceful protest does not.) What’s more, some foreign students may be hesitant to express their views because of [surveillance and censorship by their home governments]( even while abroad. “For international students, they can feel like they can’t win either way — they’re subject to more scrutiny at home and now here,” McLauglin said. “It’s concerning.” She said American colleges should do more to educate international students about free-speech law. Miriam Feldblum, executive director of the Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration, said right now college officials should be checking in with their international students to show their support. Feldblum, whose nonprofit group advocates for international, immigrant, and refugee students, said she was disturbed that foreign students were being thrust into a hot-button debate that may have little to do with them. “My immediate response was dismay and disappointment that international students are once again being politicized.” She noted that some of the elected officials who have spoken out have previously favored restrictions on international students or on immigration more broadly. Fanta Aw, executive director of NAFSA: Association of International Educators, said colleges have mechanisms in place if student behavior violates their institutional policies. “Revoking student visas on the basis of speech alone would be a dangerous overreaction that can only serve to jeopardize the legal protections afforded by the First Amendment, perpetuate inaccurate portrayals of international students, and confound public and private diplomacy,” she said. “International students have been a scapegoat for anti-immigrant xenophobia before, and this is another shameful example. Feldblum said she was concerned about what overseas students will learn from this latest clash. “International students should not fear for their status if they speak out against one side or another — in fact, that is one of the important lessons about the power of democracy and free speech that we want to share with international students on our campuses.” ADVERTISEMENT NEWSLETTER [Sign Up for the Teaching Newsletter]( Find insights to improve teaching and learning across your campus. Delivered on Thursdays. To read this newsletter as soon as it sends, [sign up]( to receive it in your email inbox. Alumni of prestigious fellowships call for ceasefire Current and former scholars in the Fulbright, Rhodes, and other prestigious fellowship programs are calling for President Biden and other American officials to seek an immediate ceasefire in Israel and Gaza. More than 1,800 recipients and alumni of prominent domestic and international scholarship programs signed an [open letter]( urging a halt to Israel’s bombardment and siege of Gaza. “Our commitment to service, leadership, humanitarian principles, and justice compel us to denounce what is clearly evolving into a genocide,” the strongly worded statement said. “The international community must intervene, and quickly.” Among the signatories are more than 400 scholars who signed under condition of anonymity, because of concern about harassment and potential retaliation from employers or colleges. Amytess Girgis, a Rhodes scholar and a doctoral candidate at the University of Oxford, said in an interview that the idea for the statement originated in a group chat between current and former Rhodes scholars, and spread organically. In the past, Girgis said, many of those who have spoken out for Palestinians have been marginalized. “At the end of the day, we’re in elite spaces,” she said of her fellow scholarship recipients. “We can leverage our positions of prestige and our personal connections.” In other news related to the war: - Much of Gaza’s limited scientific infrastructure is in [ruins]( while in Israel, academic laboratories are emptying as young academics report for reserve military service and foreign graduate students return home. - [Tuition payments]( for students at Israeli universities will be delayed because of the war. - Semester at Sea has canceled a [planned transit]( through the Suez Canal and Red Sea because of tensions in the region. This is the second time this semester that the study-abroad program has had to alter its vessel’s route — it earlier called off a stop in [Morocco]( because of a humanitarian crisis following an earthquake there. - At historically Black colleges, the response to the conflict can be complicated by a [shared civil-rights history]( with both Palestinians and Jews. - As the violence in the Middle East entered a horrific and deadly chapter, with Hamas’s fatal attacks on Israeli civilians and retaliatory strikes on Gaza claiming Palestinian lives, college leaders on campuses across the United States tried to find the right words. Here’s [my piece]( on how American colleges are responding to the war in Israel and Palestine. FROM THE CHRONICLE STORE [College as a Public Good - The Chronicle Store]( [College as a Public Good]( Public confidence in higher education has fallen in recent years, with barely half of Americans seeing it in a positive light. [Order this report today]( to examine the many roles colleges play in their local communities and how institutions are reimagining their outreach to rebuild public trust. Visa changes could benefit international students staying in the U.S. to work Proposed regulatory changes could make it easier for international graduates to transition from a U.S. student visa to a skilled-worker visa. [Draft rules]( released by the Biden administration would extend by six months the time international students have from when their student-visa status or post-graduate work authorization expires to when their H-1B work visa begins. The process, known as “cap gap,” allows recent graduates to remain in the country legally. The proposed rule automatically provides cap-gap protections until April 1, rather than October 1, as in current regulation. In the draft, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said that delays in processing paperwork to change from an F-1, or student, visa to an H-1B has left some graduates unable to work for a period of time. The changes “would avoid disruptions in employment authorization that some F-1 nonimmigrants seeking cap-gap extensions have experienced over the past several years,” the rule, published on Monday in the Federal Register, states. Stuart Anderson, executive director of the National Foundation for American Policy, a public-policy organization that favors more open immigration, said students and colleges will welcome the cap-gap changes. But they may have mixed feelings about other aspects of the new regulations, such as a provision that would require applicants for specialized occupations to have degrees directly related to those fields. Anderson noted that many workers in high-demand fields like computer science and chemistry earned degrees in different majors. You can read more of his analysis of the rule changes [here](. The public can submit comments on the draft proposal until December 22. Around the globe House Republicans, including the chairwoman of the Education Committee, have introduced [legislation]( that would increase oversight of foreign gifts and contracts to American colleges. Institutions that fail to comply could lose eligibility for federal student-aid programs. The Department of Homeland Security has issued [updated guidance]( about foreign-residency requirements for participants in academic or cultural exchanges who want to change their visa status or apply for new visas. Seven percent of refugees worldwide are enrolled in [higher education]( up from 1 percent in 2019. The United Nations has set a global enrollment target of 15 percent by 2030. More than 2,000 British scientists have signed a [letter]( criticizing remarks by Michelle Donelan, the country’s secretary of state for science, who has said the Conservative Party would “kick the woke out of science.” The Russian government has designated Central European University an “[undesirable]( organization, barring the Vienna-based institution from operating in the country. Russia similarly [blacklisted]( Bard College in 2021. Dutch academics said that [proposed research-security rules]( that would call for screening large numbers of foreign researchers or graduate students were “virtually impossible to implement.” Decisions about whether to work with colleagues in China should be up to academics and not [government agencies]( the new head of the German Rectors’ Conference said. Students at the University of Hong Kong could be fined or expelled for activities that bring “[disrepute]( to the institution, but what conduct qualifies hasn’t been defined. Australia should tighten[regulation of international-student-recruitment agents]( a parliamentary committee recommended. It’s a familiar story: More young Australians are opting not to go to college as they question the [value of a degree](. The return to in-person learning has improved students’ satisfaction with their college experience, with American institutions outperforming their international peers, according to a [survey]( of 126,000 students worldwide. ADVERTISEMENT And finally … For many young people around the world, and young women in particular, the opportunity to continue their education is out of reach. The Interpreter, The New York Times’s newsletter on global affairs, is running a [special series]( focusing on the stories of low-income Indian families, who often send off their teenage daughters to work or marriage: “In India, poor families with ambitious daughters must grapple with a pressing calculation: How much should they invest, and how much risk should they accept, for an uncertain reward in the future? And just as important, who should make that decision?” Thanks for reading. I always welcome your feedback and ideas for future reporting, so drop me a line at karin.fischer@chronicle.com. You can also connect with me on [X]( or [LinkedIn](. If you like this newsletter, please share it with colleagues and friends. They can [sign up here.]( JOB OPPORTUNITIES [Search jobs on The Chronicle job board]( [Find Your Next Role Today]( Whether you are actively or passively searching for your next career opportunity, The Chronicle is here to support you throughout your job search. 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