President Donald Trump issued a proclamation on Wednesday evening suspending the entry of new foreign students into the U.S. to study at Harvard University, citing national security concerns and other ways that Harvard’s actions have jeopardized America’s national interests.
Trump’s proclamation restricts foreign nationals admitted on student or exchange visitor visas from entering the country “solely or principally” in order to study at Harvard, unless the administration determines that an individual case supports the national interest. (RELATED: The Fall of Harvard: How America’s Oldest University Became Its Most Expensive Liability)
The new proclamation continues Trump’s crusade against Harvard University and could deal a serious financial blow to Harvard’s bottom line. The university would have diminished foreign revenue streams from international students who often pay full-price tuition. In the 2024-25 academic year, Harvard had 6,793 international students representing 27.2 percent of its total enrollment. (RELATED: Harvard’s Sacred Cash Cows)
Wednesday’s proclamation does not come as a surprise. The administration is currently locked in a legal battle in which an Obama-appointed judge temporarily halted a previous Department of Homeland Security attempt to revoke Harvard’s certification to participate in the Student and Exchange Visitor Program. In contrast, Trump’s new proclamation did not address Harvard’s certification but directly restricts those students’ entry into the U.S. using the president’s authority “to suspend entry of any class of aliens whose entry would be detrimental to the interests of the United States.”
Nonetheless, the administration is gearing up for further legal pushback. Attorney General Pam Bondi stated in an X post that the “Department of Justice will vigorously defend the President’s proclamation suspending the entry of new foreign students at Harvard University based on national security concerns.”
However, the proclamation did not only address Harvard’s failures to comply with record-keeping requests about its foreign students. Trump criticized Harvard over its pervasive failures to put America first due to its foreign entanglements, DEI practices, and preference for admitting foreign students over American citizens.
Harvard has maintained “extensive entanglements with foreign countries, including our adversaries,” as the school collected $151 million in contributions from foreign governments and $1.1 billion from all foreign sources between January 2020 and October 2024. Trump also cited from a report by the House of Representatives Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party that Harvard has “repeatedly hosted and trained members of a CCP paramilitary organization” and partnered on research that could advance “China’s military modernization.” The report adds that the paramilitary organization trained by Harvard was a primary implementer of the CCP’s genocide against the Uyghurs. Harvard’s relationship with the organization has lasted at least four years from 2019 through 2024.
Trump concluded his censure of Harvard by pointing out its contempt for many Americans. Even after Harvard’s discrimination against disfavored races in admissions led to Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, Trump argued that Harvard continues to “deny hardworking Americans equal opportunities” because it “admits students from non-egalitarian nations” instead of American citizens. Trump’s assertion is backed up by the data, as Harvard’s 27.2 percent international student population is a significant increase from the 19.9 percent it had 15 years ago.
Rather than focusing on the education of American citizens, Harvard brings in students from countries that “seek the destruction of the United States and its allies, or the extermination of entire peoples.” Trump’s proclamation pointed out Harvard’s repeated embarrassments and presented the case against the university to the American people.
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