Universities urge foreign students to return to campus ahead of Trump's return to power

Several universities are warning foreign students to quickly return to campus before President-elect Donald Trump assumes power on Jan. 20, 2025.

The universities that issued warnings, including Harvard, U.S.C. and Cornell, warned that, following the president-elect's inauguration, travel bans could be implemented for foreign nationals from various countries.

"A travel ban is likely to go into effect soon after inauguration," the Cornell Office of Global Learning warned students on its website in late November. "The ban is likely to include citizens of the countries targeted in the first Trump administration: Kyrgyzstan, Nigeria, Myanmar, Sudan, Tanzania, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Syria, Venezuela, Yemen, and Somalia. New countries could be added to this list, particularly China and India."

Cornell advised students to return to the United States before the start of spring semester classes on January 21.

Harvard also told its students to be prepared for tighter immigration controls.

"Budget time ahead of the semester start, prior to the January Martin Luther King holiday," Harvard advised foreign students on its website.

According to the New York Times, the University of Massachusetts Amherst, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of Pennsylvania and Wesleyan University also issued similar advisories and warnings.

The announcements, all precautionary in nature, come as Trump and his cabinet prepare to make a radical U-turn on Biden's immigration policy, which was much more lax and permissive compared to the Republican president's first term.

In fact, Trump said during the presidential campaign that he wanted to bring back or tighten some of the travel restrictions he imposed in his first term. However, it is unclear whether or not that might affect foreign students.