2 UNL international students have revoked visas restored

Two of the three University of Nebraska-Lincoln international students who had their visas revoked have had them restored after the Trump administration did an abrupt about face on visa cancellations for thousands of students.

UNL spokeswoman Leslie Reed confirmed the visa restorations on Friday.

“Our folks have been monitoring the SEVIS (Student and Exchange Visitor Information System) database on the educational status of our students. They started hearing buzz late yesterday from other institutions in the Big Ten and across the nation that student records were being restored to the database,” Reed said in an email. “They watched overnight and two of our students’ records were restored late yesterday. Higher education institutions have not been given reasons why the status was revoked, nor have they been given reasons why status has been restored."

The U.S. State Department revoked the visas earlier this month. At the time, Reed said UNL did not know why the specific students were targeted and that there was no commonality among their nationalities.

On Friday, the Justice Department announced the visa restorations in a federal court filing.

Politico reported that the mass visa revocations spawned more than 100 lawsuits, with dozens of federal judges ordering the administration to put a halt to them.

The media outlet also reported that Immigration and Customs Enforcement is working on a new policy for foreign students studying in the United States on so-called F-1 visas, and until that policy is finalized, no students will have their visas revoked for minor criminal charges or for cases where charges were dismissed.