The Ivy League university has expanded an existing lawsuit to include Trump’s latest actions to restrict its international student body.
Published On 6 Jun 2025
A judge in Massachusetts has blocked United States President Donald Trump’s executive order banning Harvard University’s international students from entering the country.
Late on Thursday, US District Judge Allison Burroughs extended an existing injunction to cover the new executive order, granting a petition made earlier in the day by Harvard.
It was the latest legal manoeuvre in an ongoing feud between Trump and the prestigious Ivy League school, located in Massachusetts.
Earlier in the week, Trump had issued an executive order designating international students at Harvard a “class of aliens” whose arrival “would be detrimental to the interests of the United States”.
As a result, he said that he had the right under the Immigration and Nationality Act to deny them entry into the country.
Trump had previously attempted to prevent Harvard from enrolling foreign students, who comprise approximately a quarter of its student body. Harvard had sought — and been granted — a temporary restraining order to prevent that earlier action from taking effect.
In Thursday’s petition, Harvard argued that Trump’s latest effort should also be barred under that existing restraining order. It characterised the idea of blocking students’ entry into the US as yet another attempt by Trump to harm Harvard.
“The President’s actions thus are not undertaken to protect the ‘interests of the United States,’ but instead to pursue a government vendetta against Harvard,” the school’s updated complaint read.
“Harvard’s more than 7,000 F-1 and J-1 visa holders – and their dependents – have become pawns in the government’s escalating campaign of retaliation.”
Burroughs sided with Harvard, saying that Trump’s executive order would cause Harvard and its students to “sustain immediate and irreparable injury”. The court’s injunction prevents the government from “implementing, instituting, maintaining, enforcing, or giving force or effect” to the order while Harvard’s legal challenge proceeds.
Trump’s campaign against Harvard
Trump began his campaign against Harvard and ot