Nine F-1 visas of SMC students terminated
Graphic by Katie Easterson
This article was updated on April 10.
The federal government terminated the F-1 student visas of nine international students from Santa Monica College (SMC), according to bulletins emailed to SMC staff on Tuesday and Thursday. The bulletins were sent on behalf of the SMC Federal Action Impact Analysis Team and SMC Senior Administration, which are led by the college’s superintendent and president Dr. Kathryn Jeffery. Per Thursday’s bulletin, two of the revocations occurred between Tuesday and Thursday.
Without their visas, these students from various regions of the world are at risk of deportation.
The college is prevented from revealing the reasons for the revocations to protect the privacy of all impacted students; therefore, the reasons behind these nine revocations are not yet known or confirmed.
However, the crisis comes amid a nationwide program, initiated by the Trump administration, of targeting and removing international students on student visas who are alleged to have participated in pro-Palestine activism.
President Donald Trump has pledged to flag and deport these international students at colleges and universities and signed legislation to that effect. On Jan. 29, Trump signed Executive Order (EO) 14188, titled “Additional Measures to Combat Anti-Semitism,” which promises to “cancel the student visas of all Hamas sympathizers on college campuses,” including “all the resident aliens who joined in the pro-jihadist protests.”
On April 9, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced new Department of Homeland Security (DHS) protocol, effective immediately, of using antisemitic social media activity, as well as reports of physical harassment of Jewish individuals, as basis to deny immigration benefit requests, in compliance with Executive Orders (EOs) 13899, 14188 and 14161.
“Under this guidance, USCIS will consider social media content that indicates an alien endorsing, promoting, or supporting antisemitic terrorism, antisemitic terrorist organizations, or other antisemitic activity as a negative factor in any USCIS discretionary analysis when adjudicating immigration benefit requests,” the agency wrote in a news release.
The “Antisemitism Awareness Act of 2023,” codified May 2024, adopts a definition of antisemitism written by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, which many have argued labels any and all criticisms of the state of Israel as antisemitic. Title VI of the Civil Rights Act prohibits all race and ethnicity-based discrimination, including antisemitism.
The new USCIS guidance “will immediately affect aliens applying for lawful permanent resident status, foreign students and aliens affiliated with educational institutions linked to antisemitic activity,” the release continues.
The U.S. Department of Education is currently investigating SMC for three cases of alleged antisemitic harassment and discrimination in violation of Title VI. Each of these cases are still open and not yet determined by the Office of Civil Rights. SMC was one of 60 higher education institutions warned on March 10 of “potential enforcement action” if they didn’t comply with the investigations and with upholding Title VI.
In a news conference on March 27, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the State Department terminated at least 300 student visas across the nation.
“We do it every day. Every time I find one of these lunatics, I take away their visas,” Rubio said.
Close to 100 student visas have been revoked in the University of California and California State University systems.
On April 8, at a border security expo, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Director Todd Lyons said he aims for ICE to run like a business and at a faster pace, to become “like (Amazon) Prime for human beings.”
According to the bulletin, SMC’s International Education Center (IEC) has met individually with students “impacted” by the terminations to “connect them with available resources.” IEC staffers were the SMC personnel to notice each of the nine revocations while monitoring the online Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (SEVIS) ran by ICE.
SMC was not directly informed about the revocations.
IEC declined to comment further for this story.
The SEVIS Help Hub on the Department of Homeland Security webpage states that depending on the reason for a visa’s termination, a student and/or their dependents are either immediately ordered to depart the U.S., or in some cases, they may apply for reinstatement.
If a visa is terminated due to a “violation of status,” the student and/or their dependents must leave the United States immediately.
F-1, or Academic Student, visas allow international students enrolled in programs or course of studies that result in degrees, diplomas or certificates to enter the United States and attend a college, university, conservatory, academic high school, elementary school, or other academic institution, or a language training program.
Roughly 3,300 international students from over 100 countries attend SMC, making the college one of the largest beneficiaries of international students of all two-year colleges nationwide.
At the college, F-1 students are required to take a minimum of 12 units per semester to maintain their F-1 status. F-1 students are prohibited from most off-campus employment during their first academic year in the U.S. and are permitted on-campus employment subject to certain conditions.
The same bulletin emailed to staff was posted as an announcement reportedly at the same time, 3:42 p.m., on SMC’s “Announcements” webpage. However, the bulletin was not emailed to students until around 10:45 a.m. on Wednesday.
Jeffery formed the SMC Federal Action Impact Analysis Team to collaboratively assess whether and what responses are needed to federal actions. The team consists of Jeffery; Teresita Rodriguez, vice president of Enrollment Development; Robert Myers, campus counsel; and Dr. Llanet Martin, dean of Equity, Pathways and Inclusion, with help from Thomas Bui, associate dean of Student Life; and Grace Smith, director of Public Information.
To address these federal actions, SMC is “in communication” with the California Attorney General’s office and the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s office, per Tuesday’s bulletin.
The Chancellor’s office did not immediately respond to the Corsair’s request for comment.
The bulletin also lists the college’s immigration resources, including the Dream Resources Center, Immigration Resources webpage, legal updates newsroom, and Federal Immigration Response, all of which are linked on the announcement.
In addition, IEC’s F-1 Regulations website overviews how to maintain and/or reinstate an F-1 status, common obstacles faced by F-1 students, and advice for interacting with ICE agents.
This is a developing story.