The federal government is reversing the termination of legal status for international students after many filed court challenges around the U.S., a government lawyer said Friday.

In Massachusetts, where at least 115 students have had their visas revoked, university officials and students’ attorneys said they are already seeing their student visa system registrations being restored.

Judges around the country had issued temporary orders restoring the students’ records in a federal database of international students maintained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE. The records had been suddenly terminated in recent weeks, often without the students or their schools being notified.

A lawyer for the government read a statement in federal court in Oakland that said ICE was manually restoring the student status for people whose records were terminated in recent weeks. A similar statement was read by a government attorney in a separate case in Washington on Friday, said lawyer Brian Green, who represents the plaintiff in that case. Green provided The Associated Press with a copy of the statement that the government lawyer emailed to him.

It says: “ICE is developing a policy that will provide a framework for SEVIS record terminations. Until such a policy is issued, the SEVIS records for plaintiff(s) in this case (and other similarly situated plaintiffs) will remain Active or shall be re-activated if not currently active and ICE will not modify the record solely based on the NCIC finding that resulted in the recent SEVIS record termination.”

Green said that the government lawyer said it would apply to all students in the same situation, not just those who had filed lawsuits.

SEVIS is the Student and Exchange Visitor Information Systems database that tracks international students’ compliance with their visa status. NCIC is the National Crime Information Center, which is maintained by the FBI. Many of the students whose records were terminated were told that their status was terminated as a result of a criminal records check or that their visa had been revoked.

Attorneys worry about long-term impact on students

Kerry Doyle, an attorney for Green and Spiegel, said the students her firm represents have not yet seen their SEVIS records reinstated.

“We want to ensure that this episode and the illegal tinkering with their student records does not carry with it any long-term harms,” she said. “To our understanding, even though a number of records are being reactivated, it would appear that they still have this black mark in their records.” 

Some students had minor infractions in their histories after brushes with the law, but other students had no record at all, attorneys told GBH News. 

“We found students where we could not figure out why they were impacted by the policy whatsoever,” said Doyle. “We’ve had students that had minor infractions who, in some cases, they never even filed a case in criminal court. They maybe were arrested, but there wasn’t probable cause to charge them, and they were never even charged.” 

Immigration attorney Jesse Bless represents at least 30 students across the country, including some in Massachusetts. He said about half of this clients have received notice their records were reinstated.

He told GBH News that some of those students, like one in Massachusetts, had “no issues — never met a law enforcement officer.” Others, like one client, caught two fish over the legal limit in New Jersey.

Students who have had their records terminated can sometimes still take classes, but can’t work legally. 

Bless said some of his clients had to leave school because their legal status was ended, others lost their jobs, student housing or had to leave the country with graduation looming soon. 

“There has been massive impact to students,” he said. 

Bless said he was in a court hearing related to the topic on Friday, and it was unclear how the government’s reversal would impact the case. 

“We haven’t seen an [official] policy from the government. We don’t know is this just for today. Does it change next week? Who’s caught up in the dragnet, who’s not? So there’s a lot of unanswered questions.”

Terminations came as a surprise

International students and their schools were caught off guard by the terminations of the students’ records. Many of the terminations were discovered when school officials were doing routine checks of the international student database or when they checked specifically after hearing about other terminations.

At the University of Massachusetts, more than 25 students across five campuses had their SEVIS registrations terminated.

“I can confirm some students from UMass campuses are seeing their student registrations in SEVIS returned to normal status, which were previously revoked,” said spokesperson Colleen Quinn. “The university does not have an exact number of students reinstated; this is an evolving situation.”

At Harvard University, officials are aware of 12 international students and recent graduates who have had their F-1 visa status terminated. Six of those Harvard students and recent graduates have since had their visa status reverted to “active status,” according to the university’s media office. 

The university checks SEVIS records daily, and notifies students of any revocations and reinstatements and refers them to legal assistance. 

Boston University confirmed it has also seen some students’ records returned to active status, and declined to provide the number of students impacted.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Emerson College, which both have had international students’ visas revoked, are continuing to monitor the situation, their spokespeople said.

There are many lawsuits related to the topic and students having their immigration statuses revoked. One is a federal class action lawsuit filed in New Hampshire federal court last week by five international students, representing students in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Puerto Rico who had their F-1 visas revoked by the administration. Two of those students, Hangrui Zhang and Haoyang An, both from China, attend Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, Massachusetts. The suit seeks to have their visas reinstated.

GBH News reporter Sarah Betancourt reported from Massachusetts.

Associated Press reporter Kate Brumback reported from Atlanta.