A federal judge in Atlanta has sided with more than 100 international students in a ruling that will temporarily protect them from possible deportation.
The Friday evening court order applies to 133 students and recent alumni at universities across the country, including 27 in Georgia, who abruptly had their immigration status terminated by President Donald Trump’s administration. After the students filed a lawsuit against the federal government contending the “arbitrary and capricious” terminations were illegal, U.S. District Court Judge Victoria Calvert heard arguments Thursday morning before issuing her ruling.
Plaintiffs, according to the 15-page court order, successfully demonstrated that they would face “irreparable harm” if their immigration status was not temporarily reinstated. And Calvert noted that many are merely weeks away from attaining their degrees.
Charles Kuck, an Atlanta immigration attorney representing the students, argued on Thursday that federal law requires the government to follow a series of steps before terminating a student’s immigration status. And according to the court order, regulations state that a student’s status can only be terminated if they fail to maintain it, if for instance they do not engage in a full course of study or are convicted of a violent crime.
“Plaintiffs do not have any criminal history that would warrant their … records being terminated,” reads the order. “Nonetheless, many of the emails from the schools direct Plaintiffs to leave the United States with little notice to prepare to do so.”
All 133 plaintiffs are anonymous in the lawsuit “due to fear of retaliation” by the government. But the complaint does list a few of the Georgia colleges they attend: the University of Georgia, Georgia Tech, Kennesaw State and Emory universities.
In Thursday’s hearing, the federal government, represented by Assistant U.S. Attorney R. David Powell, argued that the damages the students would suffer were not irreparable; they could transfer their credits to a school in another country, he said, and could receive financial awards for lost employment.
Calvert, though, wrote in her order that: “These harms could not be sufficiently compensated with monetary damages.”
Powell was unable to convince the court that granting temporary relief to the students would harm the federal government. Similarly, Calvert did not find that siding with the students would hurt public interest. In fact, the court concluded that, “there is substantial public interest in ensuring government agencies abide by federal laws.”
In part of her ruling, Calvert cited cases in other parts of the country — such as Montana, New Hampshire, Minnesota and Wisconsin — where other federal judges have granted international students temporary relief. But the Georgia case is unique in the sheer number of students involved. Kuck says it is by far the largest lawsuit since the Trump administration began terminating the immigration records of international students several weeks ago.
Kuck estimates the administration has canceled the records of up to 6,000 international students nationwide. As of Friday, more than 1,550 students and recent graduates have had their legal status changed, according to Inside Higher Ed.
Standing outside the courtroom Thursday, Kuck was confident his clients would receive the relief they requested, and he was confident they would also prevail in a preliminary injunction hearing scheduled for this week. If they do, their status will be permanently reinstated.
“When the government doesn’t follow the rules, it requires people to stand up,” said Kuck. “That’s what these students are doing.”
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