Trump’s immigration rhetoric is already impacting college students
With weeks to go before President-elect Donald Trump returns to the White House, colleges are shifting their guidance for students who could be impacted by the immigration restrictions he's promised to enact.
Some schools have issued travel advisories to foreign students, urging them to return from international holiday travel before Trump’s second term begins. During his first time in office, the president-elect didn't just try to stop illegal immigration – he also slowed and upended legal entry into the U.S., including for foreign visitors and students reliant on visas. In a late November message, Cornell University administrators predicted a travel ban is “likely to go into effect soon after inauguration” and called it a “good idea” for international students and staff to be back on U.S. soil before the start of their spring semester.
On another front, independent college counselors and advocacy groups say they’ve encountered a new wariness about applying for financial aid among students from mixed-status families (families whose members have different citizenship status). Despite the longstanding protections of federal privacy laws, some students and their parents have become more anxious about indicating on the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA, that their household members don’t have Social Security numbers – an indication to government officials that they could be undocumented.
“Although the Higher Education Act prohibits the use of data for any purpose other than determining and awarding federal financial assistance, we cannot assure you at this time that data submitted to (the U.S.) Department of Education as part of the FAFSA process will be protected,” the National College Attainment Network wrote in a recent message to its members.
The memo continued: “For some, the potential risks could now outweigh even the considerable benefits of federal student aid.”
Corinne Kentor, a policy and communications associate with the Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration, said her organization has received a "flood of inquiries" over the past two weeks from college leaders asking how they can assure students that their FAFSA data won't be used for immigration enforcement.
Those fears are based on a lot of conjecture, experts say. Significant barriers, including court challenges, would crop up if the Trump administration officials used FAFSA information for anything other than determining a family’s ability to pay for college.
Still, the ominous warnings from prominent universities and national advocacy groups speak to the widespread uncertainty about Trump’s post-election immigration plans, and when those potential changes could affect immigration-reliant industries. In 2022, immigrant-origin students accounted for roughly a third of all students enrolled in U.S. colleges and universities, according to the Presidents’ Alliance.
“There’s a lot of fear circulating among immigrant communities and in mixed-status families,” Kentor said. “It feels like a very heavy responsibility to try and be as upfront as possible without going too far in our speculation.”
A ‘balancing act’ for universities
Walking the line between facts and fear was a primary concern for Stephen Yale-Loehr, an immigration law professor at Cornell University, as he helped draft the school’s new guidance for international students after Trump’s victory in the November election.
“It’s a balancing act,” he said. “You want to provide information for people so they can prepare for possibilities without unduly alarming them.”
The memo warned that a potential travel ban could target entry by travelers from the same countries affected by restrictions during Trump’s first term, including Iran, Syria, Nigeria and Venezuela. China and India could be added to the list, too, the message said.
International students come to the U.S. on visas, which are subject to specific restrictions. "F-1" is the typical visa issued to full-time international students. This designation permits them to enter and remain in the U.S. as long as they're working to finish their academic program. Students on F-1 visas may leave the country but must show certain documents to government officials upon their return. If the visa stamp on their passport expires they must renew it to reenter the U.S.
Cornell's guidance advised students and faculty to prepare for longer visa processing times and carry additional paperwork demonstrating their connections to the university when they pass through U.S. Customs and Border Protection checkpoints.
Yale University, the University of Massachusetts Amherst, Wesleyan University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have issued similar warnings in recent weeks, recommending that students and faculty who intend to travel abroad over the holidays return to the U.S. by Jan. 20.
The anxieties come as a record number of international students are enrolled in U.S. colleges, according to recent estimates, a shift from the years of decline that predated the pandemic, which was further exacerbated by it. Data released last month from the Institute of International Education showed more than 1.1 million international students enrolled last year, a 7% jump from the previous year.
Exactly how Trump’s new policies could impact enrollment trends is unclear, and the president-elect has yet to articulate specific details about how the immigration policy of his second term may differ from the first. Regardless, people like Fanta Aw, the executive director of NAFSA: Association of International Educators, will continue making the case that attracting foreign students and staff to American schools is good for everyone.
"We do think there’s some common ground here in what international students contribute to the economy," she said. The tens of billions of dollars international students bring in each year is "not negligible," she said.
Mixed-status families still reeling from FAFSA glitches
Despite the barriers they face in applying to college, hundreds of thousands of students from mixed-status families submit applications for federal student aid annually. Widespread glitches in the functionality of the FAFSA form hit this group harder than anyone else during the last enrollment cycle.
Read more: How FAFSA 'fixes' turned College Decision Day into chaos
The Education Department, facing a mandate from Congress to overhaul the FAFSA, vastly underestimated the number of people from mixed-status families who would need to have their identities manually verified, a government watchdog found. That miscalculation led to major delays that derailed the college-going process of many students, according to Gaby Pacheco, the president of TheDream.US, a college and career success program for undocumented young people.
“We saw real consequences,” she said, “which were U.S. citizen students opting out of going to college because they just couldn’t afford it.”
After months of controversy, the Education Department allowed parents without Social Security numbers to complete the FAFSA in April. While the latest version of the form is operating much more smoothly, the incoming president has vowed to carry out mass deportations in his next term, fomenting anxiety for applicants in the same vulnerable population.
The main purpose of the FAFSA is to determine financial aid eligibility, and experts say federal law prohibits the use of personal data for anything else. However, the Education Department does share information with the Department of Homeland Security so that it can confirm the immigration status of students applying for financial aid as eligible noncitizens, according to the Higher Ed Immigration Portal. No agreements exist authorizing that information be used for immigration enforcement, and advocates say any such effort would face legal obstacles.
But the discussion has already had a chilling effect, said Hugo Que, the college access program director at 10,000 Degrees, a nonprofit that helps low-income students in California and Utah apply to and pay for college. As someone who was once undocumented, Que said, he understands the “what ifs.”
“I wish I could say with confidence, 'Don’t worry about it,'” he said. “We can’t speak with so much confidence.”
Zachary Schermele is an education reporter for USA TODAY. You can reach him by email at zschermele@usatoday.com. Follow him on X at @ZachSchermele.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: How Trump’s immigration rhetoric is impacting some college students
