The suit, filed in federal court in Boston, says the policy is “arbitrary and capricious and an abuse of discretion.”
Two of the nation’s most elite universities filed a lawsuit in federal court this morning challenging a new rule that would subject international students to deportation this fall if their courses are delivered online only.
Harvard and MIT sued the Department of Homeland Security and U. S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, known as ICE, which announced the policy on Monday. The suit seeks a temporary restraining order against the rule. It says the policy violates the Administrative Procedures Act because it is “arbitrary and capricious and an abuse of discretion.”
Jon Wasden, a lawyer who formerly worked in the Office of Immigration Litigation at the U. S. Department of Justice, says Harvard and MIT have a strong case, in part because they are narrowly targeting the way the government formed its rule. “There’s no question that the government can change its mind on policy,” he says. But proposed changes are supposed to be published in the Federal Register and interested parties given time to comment. “The Department of Homeland Security has become horrible about not following that legal requirement,” he says.
The Supreme Court’s June 18 ruling that preserved the DACA program also turned on an Administrative Procedures Act claim by the plaintiffs who said the government hadn’t properly explained why it wanted to end the program. “A lot of the analysis from the DACA case will be relevant for this one,” says Wasden.
ICE posted its cryptically worded policy hours after Harvard announced its plans for reopening its undergraduate campus on September 2nd. All classes will be online and no more than 40% of it 6,700 students will be permitted to live on campus where they will isolate in single dormitory bedrooms and interact with professors and peers remotely.
