The report, shared exclusively with Mother Jones, reveals an administration pulling all levers to completely reorient the immigration system. The sweeping goal appears to be destabilizing the lives of noncitizens in the United States and boosting deportations.

The quiet war on immigrants, round two

Exclusive: Sen. Edward Markey's new report says the system hasn't been torn down—it's been hollowed out.

motherjones.com

1/ Academic freedom is not equally free. For noncitizen students and scholars, the First Amendment operates inside an immigration system that can make speech costly, precarious, or grounds for removal. Two cases now before the First Circuit make that structure unusually visible.

Knight Institute Urges Appeals Court to Uphold Ruling Invalidating Trump Policy of Deporting Pro-Palestinian Protesters

share.google

When we don't adequately fund public universities, and instead force students to take out loans, what we as a society are really doing is borrowing money from the younger generation—their hard-earned future income—to fund a necessary project that benefits us all: building an educated society.

Mark Copelovitch@mcopelov.bsky.social · 2w ago

1. This is bullsh*t & an epically stupid policy completely detached from any empirical evidence: bsky.app/profile/mcop... 2. We could simply avoid this entire issue by <all together now> Funding. The. Damn. Public. Universities. Like. We. Used. To: bsky.app/profile/mcop...

1/Interesting split is emerging in the cases of Mahmoud Khalil, Mohsen Mahdawi, and Badar Khan Suri: when immigration detention is understood as retaliation for political speech, can a noncitizen challenge that detention in federal court?

Students from Gaza being denied visas to study here because they can't supply original bank statements or account for gaps in their education. Shameful. www.rte.ie/news/educati...

Concern over study visa refusal rate for Gazan students

Concern is growing in Irish universities over a high rate of refusal of study visas to students in Gaza who are due to take up college scholarships in Ireland this September.

rte.ie

School people: ICYMI, I just figured out I had a *gift link* to this article! Trump's private-school subsidy is coming January 1. The history is grim:

Financial Hell Is About to Break Loose in American Schools

School funding is about to drop off a fiscal cliff. Costs will stay the same. What then?

slate.com

So much appreciation for the AAUP's important work!

AAUP@aaup.org · 3w ago

The AAUP stands with Mohsen Mahdawi & other faculty members, graduate students, & academic workers whose speech the federal government is attempting to censor. An injury to one is an injury to all. Full Statement: www.aaup.org/news/we-stan...

"We found that at least 150 institutions of higher ed... are using Flock’s surveillance network.. many campus police departments have facilitated immigration related investigations, even when they are located in sanctuary states and are legally prohibited from doing so" by @torinmonahan.bsky.social

Flock on campus: university police as appendages of a national policing apparatus

Dangerous new forms of networked surveillance are gaining traction with police departments across the United States. One popular example is Flock Safety’s Automated License Plate Recognition (ALPR)...

doi.org

Got a useful question on the thread about student visas as to whether it's contradictory, from an abolitionist perspective, to describe the university as "a sanctuary for knowledge." The answer, for me, is both yes and no. Sharing an elaboration here.🧵

OUT TODAY, the AAUP just released the first comprehensive account of how the Trump administration has taken the same playbook it's used on law firms & foreign governments & turned it on American universities. US higher ed has, in effect, become a target of a massive extortion racket. 🧵

New Report on Extorted Compliance Charges “Massive Extortion Racket” Against Higher Ed

A new AAUP report, "Extorted Compliance: A Threat to Institutional Autonomy, Academic Freedom, and Shared Governance," exposes how the Trump administration has extended its pay-to-play approach to gov...

aaup.org

Glad to see commentary on the duration of status rule change from here too! "As with many of the administration’s directives, the Duration of Stay rule is harmful, but it is also clarifying for the academic community about what it must do to preserve its integrity."

New International Student Visa Rules Squeeze Academic Freedom

Following their now established playbook, the Trump administration is using administrative rules to transform higher education and erode academic freedom.

academicfreedomontheline.substack.com

I can't stress this enough. This was their POLICY and PLAN. I've been saying it for months. I know that you all know this. I hope that the people who are losing their benefits understand too. Brooke Rollins et al have been saying that this is their desire and intention for months.

Carl Quintanilla@carlquintanilla.bsky.social · 4w ago

Page One. @nytimes.com

On 7/17, the Federal Register published a new rule to tighten the conditions on student visas. Now it goes to Congress for review and likely applications starting 9/15. My students are getting official emails and starting to ask questions, so wrote up some observations based on my research: 1/

DHS formalizes major student visa changes: what to know

The Trump administration said the changes will apply to student, exchange, and foreign media visa holders.

newsweek.com

NEW: The Trump admin finalized a regulation which makes the largest changes to the student visa process in 50 years, along with changes to rules for exchange visitors and international journalists. 🧵on some of the most consequential changes set to go into effect in September.

AILA@aila.org · last mo.

DHS has published its Final Rule to eliminate "duration of status" for F, J & I nonimmigrants. One of the most significant changes to international student, exchange visitor & foreign media programs in decades, it will be costly, cause chaos, and cut legal immigration.

I hope the college students who protested the US-funded massacre of Palestinian civilians, while being vilified by their universities and politicians and even the president, understand that they are actually having an impact, just much slower than they hoped

Clara Jeffery@clarajeffery.bsky.social · last mo.

Wow www.nytimes.com/2026/07/15/u...

A case brought by non-citizen students against the Trump administration over the en masse visa revocations in April 2025 will proceed!

“Mahmoud Khalil filed a lawsuit on Tuesday accusing administration officials, pro-Israel groups and a conservative think tank of colluding to suppress his constitutional rights.” Read the full story below. www.nytimes.com/2026/07/14/n...

Mahmoud Khalil Accuses Trump Officials of Conspiring Against Him (Gift Article)

Mr. Khalil will now have to convince a judge that the defendants coordinated to take action against him and other pro-Palestinian activists.

nytimes.com

The ICE murder of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo deserves the same fury as Renee Good and Alex Pretti

So brilliant, so important: "There is no individual refusal within the university in a time when an authoritarian state works illegally and ideologically to annihilate a whole field of scholarly inquiry."

Feminist Studies Journal@feministstudies.bsky.social · last mo.

@durba.bsky.social writing about connections between institutionalized misogyny, Epstein's countless faculty allies, and Harvard's starvation of WGS. An important analysis of the particular ways the Ivies have gutted WGS. (All free, all open access on MUSE)

Crucial thread that gets at the importance of grad student unions for noncitizen/international students, who are always also workers. Wrote about this for @aaup.org's Journal of Academic Freedom a few years ago -https://www.aaup.org/sites/default/files/Abigail_Boggs.pdf

Anna Meier@annameier.bsky.social · 2mo ago

A professor in Tufts University’s School of Engineering required one of his international graduate students to work an unpaid TA job this past spring semester. After she went to her union and blew the whistle, Tufts withdrew her from her program. A thread of rage. 1/

Trans women are women, trans women will always be women, end of story

Happy to have this conversation with Naomi Paik, William I. Robinson, and César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández, organized and edited by Vineeta Singh, out in the world! We explore important threads on the university as a space of work, organizing, and resistance!

AAUP@aaup.org · 2mo ago

The newest episode of Academic Freedom on the Line, "Organizing Lessons from Resisting ICE on Campus," addresses why higher education workers must resist ICE and the rising tide of fascism on and off campus, and get organizing lessons from the front lines. Check it out here ⬇️

A new op-ed in the Washington Times finally says the quiet part out loud: Fascism demands sexual repression. "Pornography corrodes the exact social foundation that supports national strength... A society marked by loneliness, weakened families and diminished social trust becomes brittle."

Can't help but *wonder* if anyone pointed this out to them at the time?

Joseph Howley@illdottore.bsky.social · 3mo ago

You know, when you look at all the cases the Trump admin has lost in its attacks on higher ed, and the Title VI cases over protest that schools have won, and what a poor job he’s doing with Iran, you could be forgiven for wondering why any university felt they “had to” make a deal with these clowns

You know, when you look at all the cases the Trump admin has lost in its attacks on higher ed, and the Title VI cases over protest that schools have won, and what a poor job he’s doing with Iran, you could be forgiven for wondering why any university felt they “had to” make a deal with these clowns

As of this morning, @thenewschool.bsky.social is de facto replacing its History department with a “Center for the American Experience,” which is funded by private and undisclosed donors. The New School has been New Colleged, and there’s no GOP to blame here. Our anti-fascist identity is over.

Where are the student protests? The real answer isn’t that students decided to shut up. It’s that universities, and a hostile federal government, have expended massive resources trying to ensure they do.

“Where have all the student protests gone?”

Trump wanted campus crackdowns. Colleges couldn't wait to oblige.

motherjones.com

Seems applicable to the myth of "the leftist university" as well. See Vance's speech on the idea that "professors are the enemy," for example.

Flux@flux.community · 4mo ago

In the latest Theory of Change, @ajbauer.bsky.social joins @matthew.flux.community to discuss his new book about how the myth of "liberal media bias" has warped American politics. Even Democrats and the mainstream media have been badly damaged by this manipulation:

Got to see a prescreen of I Love Boosters last night - so good! Will be seeing it again after its May 22nd release!

I Love Boosters Teaser Trailer (2026)

YouTube video by Rotten Tomatoes Trailers

youtu.be

Cal State Channel Islands philosophy lecturer Jonathan Caravello has just been ACQUITTED of assaulting ICE/CBP last summer while protesting a brutal Ventura County cannabis farm raid! His defense argued he threw a tear gas canister away to protect protesters. The jury acquitted him in two hours.

CSU lecturer acquitted

Government said he assaulted immigration agent

laist.com