Amicus Brief by Former Government Officials Calls International Students Ban Unconstitutional
A bipartisan group of 21 former high-ranking government officials, including national security, foreign policy, and intelligence experts who worked on security matters across six decades and seven presidential administrations, filed an amicus brief calling President Trump’s ban on Harvard international students “nakedly punitive,” “unprecedented,” “dangerous,” and “a self-inflicted national security injury.”
The group is represented by the Peter Gruber Rule of Law Clinic at Yale Law School and by Nystrom Beckman & Paris LLP, a national litigation boutique law firm based in Boston.
The case involves President Trump’s executive order attempting to prevent international students from studying at Harvard University. A federal court temporarily blocked the administration from implementing the order and the case is now on appeal before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit.
Amici served at the highest levels of the U.S. government. They include federal judges; United States senators; a secretary of defense; directors of national intelligence, the CIA, and the NSA; U.S. ambassadors (including three to the United Nations); a national security advisor (and two principal deputies); and a White House chief of staff; among other senior officials. Two-thirds were appointed by or served in Republican administrations.
According to the brief, the administration attempted to justify the June 4, 2025 executive order on “national security grounds.” But, “in Amici’s long experience, it is the administration’s damaging actions — not Harvard’s — that threaten U.S. national security.”
As the former government officials explain, “in an age where technological dominance determines national security, keeping the doors of our leading universities open to international students is vital to protecting America’s national security.” The brief cites the large numbers of international students who pursue advanced STEM degrees at U.S. universities and then remain in the U.S. to work in essential national security fields (e.g., artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and advanced semiconductors): “Fully half of the advanced degree holders working in America’s defense industrial base are foreign-born.”
Moreover, the brief explains that international students “who return to their home countries after studying in the United States frequently assume positions of global leadership and influence,” thereby creating an “educational diplomatic pipeline [that] provides the United States with an invaluable instrument of soft-power influence, diplomatic relationships, and opportunities to promote democratic values worldwide.” By contrast, excluding international students “directly benefits America’s adversaries and strategic competitors,” many of whom have launched initiatives “designed to attract STEM talent away from the U.S.” as part of the “global competition for talent.”
The senior government officials also demonstrate that the executive order exceeds the President’s authority because it “unconstitutionally seizes for the President the roles of prosecutor, judge, jury, and legislator of punishment.” The order violates the separation of powers — by infringing on the role of the judicial branch — and is a constitutionally forbidden “bill of attainder,” because it singles out, without due process, an ideological or political opponent for “retributive” and “retaliatory” punishment, according to the brief.
According to their counsel, Sterling Professor of International Law Harold Hongju Koh, “Amici see this as a critical case, not just for Harvard, but for every American university and their international students who help make it a global beacon. Our Constitution gave no power to the Executive repeatedly to punish disfavored universities on a whim. And a leading bipartisan group of national security experts confirms that a punitive blanket ban on a university’s international students grievously harms, not serves, America’s national security interests.”
The Peter Gruber Rule of Law Clinic at Yale Law School was founded in 2016 by Koh and William O. Douglas Clinical Professor of Law Michael Wishnie ’93 to address threats to the rule of law.
The clinic is now led by Koh, Peter Gruber Rule of Law Fellow Sonia Mittal ’13, as well as Visiting Lecturers in Law Eugene Fidell, Margaret Donovan, and Bruce C. Swartz ’79, and cooperating attorney Justin Cole. Yale Law School clinic members who worked on the brief included Matthew Botvinick ’26, Jun Luke Foster ’25, Fred Halbhuber ’25, Inbar Pe’er ’25, and Brady Worthington ’27.
Joel G. Beckman, Michael Paris, and Joshua E. Goldstein of Nystrom Beckman & Paris LLP also represent Amici.
The case caption is President and Fellows of Harvard College v. United States Department of Homeland Security. The preliminary injunction on appeal was issued by Judge Allison Burroughs of the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts. The administration filed its appellate brief in the First Circuit on Aug. 25, 2025. Harvard’s brief is due Sept. 24.
