Ranjani Srinivasan, a Fulbright recipient from India who was pursuing a doctoral degree in urban planning at Columbia University, fled to Canada after authorities revoked her student visa and showed up at her campus apartment on March 7.

Two weeks later, in Somerville, Massachusetts, Rumeysa Ozturk, a Turkish citizen and graduate student at Tufts University, was taken into federal custody after she drew the attention of a Right-wing group that says it combats antisemitism on college campuses.

Those cases and others — unfolding amid President Trump’s campaign to deport immigrants — have cast a spotlight on student visas, which allow foreign nationals to enter the US for full-time study.

International students at universities across the country are afraid of being targeted.

“They’re terrified. They’re unsettled,” said Fanta Aw, executive director and chief executive of Nafsa, a nonprofit association of international educators. “Some of them are asking themselves, ‘Should I remain here, knowing there is so much uncertainty, or is it best that I just go home?’”

Here is what we know about the legal protections afforded to student visa holders, their vulnerabilities and the power the federal government possesses to revoke their visas.

Visa basics

International students typically have what is known as an F-1 visa, and they must meet and maintain certain criteria that are set by the federal government and the host school.

Typically, students must be enrolled in an academic programme at a college or university that has been approved by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. Those studying under an F-1 visa generally cannot work off-campus during their first academic year and must show that they have enough money to afford living in the US during the entire time they are studying there.

F-1 visas typically are issued for the duration of a student’s stay in the US and can be extended if the coursework or research takes longer than planned.

Student visas are mutually beneficial for international students and their host schools, providing the institutions with cultural enrichment and billions in tuition dollars. According to a study by Nafsa, the 1.1 million foreign students at US colleges and universities contributed $43.8 billion to the nation’s economy during the 2023-24 academic year.

In return, international students receive a typical American college experience — one that has sometimes involved the longstanding tradition of students speaking out against opinions, policies or politics they oppose.

New York University has the most foreign students of any US school, followed by Northeastern University in Boston, then by Columbia and Arizona State University, according to the Open Doors report compiled by the Institute of International Education, a nonprofit organisation that focuses on international student exchange programmes and conducts an annual census of such students in the US.

At NYU, 22 per cent of students come from outside the country.

Students from India make up the largest proportion of international students, at 29 per cent, according to the report, followed closely by students from China, at 25 per cent, and then by students from South Korea, at 4 per cent. Canadian students were next, at 3 per cent.

Legal protections

Visa-holding students have the same basic constitutional protections as US citizens, including the First Amendment right to free speech, said Joshua Bardavid, an immigration lawyer in New York.

“The Constitution applies to all persons,” Bardavid said. “Even people who are undocumented have basic and constitutional due process rights.”

But those rights can be superseded by the federal government in some circumstances, including when officials screen foreigners at the border. The speech of people on student visas is still protected, but it doesn’t always protect their immigration status.

International students are especially vulnerable to deportation because of the temporary nature of their legal status. Joseph Lento, a lawyer who regularly advises foreign students, said that a student’s visa status could be abruptly suspended or revoked if immigration officials determined they were not in compliance.

Secretary of state Marco Rubio has ordered diplomats overseas to scour the social media content of student visa applicants to identify those who have criticised the US and Israel and potentially bar them from entering the country.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio looks on, on the day of a meeting of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) with Foreign Ministers at NATO's headquarters in Brussels, Belgium April 4, 2025. Reuters

Last month, he told reporters that the state department, under his direction, had revoked the visas of possibly more than 300 people — students, visitors and others — and was continuing to revoke visas daily.

On Friday, Ted Mitchell, the president of the American Council on Education, a membership association that includes many colleges and universities, wrote a letter to Rubio urging him to better explain the government’s recent actions.

The government has the authority to revoke the legal status of people who it believes are affiliated with terrorism. That power was expanded in the 1990s at the height of the nation’s tough-on-crime policies and then broadened once again after the September 11 attacks.

Even foreign-born students who are lawful permanent residents or who are naturalised citizens risk losing their right to live in the US if, for example, immigration officials determine that they are affiliated with a terrorist organisation. Federal immigration officials have recently made such accusations against students without providing proof.

Why revoke?

Typically, international students lose their legal status when they break the rules of their visa programmes, such as by working in the US when they are not allowed to, or by having their grades slip to the point that they are no longer in good academic standing. At NYU, students who maintain a grade-point average above 2.0 are regarded as being in good standing.

Foreign students can also lose their visas if they are considered a public danger.

“I’ve seen a student visa revoked because a student had a massive number of speeding tickets,” said Sarah Spreitzer, who oversees matters related to international students at the American Council on Education.

Historically, it has been rare for students to be deported because of acts of political expression.

On college campuses across the country, administrators and faculty members have expressed concern about students’ ability to share their opinions without risking their legal status.

“We have students who are here to study journalism in the US precisely because of the reputation of freedom of the press here, and now they’re extremely worried about whether they can even do their work without having their visas revoked and having all kinds of difficulties about their immigration status,” said Jelani Cobb, the dean of the Columbia Journalism School.

Revocation appeal

Students seldom appeal the revocation of their visas in court because the odds of success are slim, Bardavid said.

“I can’t even think of a case offhand where a student would successfully be able to have challenged their denial of a student visa in federal court,” he said.

“That’s just not going to happen.”

Lento stressed that because visas were granted at the discretion of US officials, lawful activity that drew negative attention could result in scrutiny from immigration officials or academic leaders.

Many students, he said, do not realise that an arrest or even disciplinary action from their school can jeopardise their immigration status, regardless of whether they are found guilty.

New York Times News Service