From WXXI news.

This is connections.

I'm Evan Dawson.

Our connection this hour was made with a move by the Trump administration to ban international students from coming to Harvard for the new Trump administration.

This is a strategy designed to punish elite schools like Harvard and bend those schools to adopt new policies on various issues.

The Trump administration even wants to help right?

Harvard's curriculum.

Here's how The New York Times described it.

Quote.

By mid-April, the Trump administration and the university were in an all out legal war.

Harvard rebuffed administration demands to have a say in its curriculum and its hiring and admissions practices.

In response, the administration said it would freeze $2.2 billion in multi-year grants to Harvard.

And in an April 16th letter to Harvard, Kristi Noem, the head of the Department of Homeland Security, issued new demands for detailed information about every international student there.

Their illegal and dangerous activity, their coursework and discipline records, their history of obstruction of the school's learning environment.

End quote.

As NPR reports, Harvard and the Trump administration continued to go back and forth in court.

On May 23rd, a federal judge in Boston issued a temporary restraining order halting the Trump administration's attempts to block international students from attending.

And so President Trump tried another tactic and announced a direct banning of the entry of foreign Harvard students to the United States.

He said he was asking Secretary of State Marco Rubio to consider revoking current visas to Harvard students.

The administration issued a proclamation condemning Harvard for denying opportunities to hardworking American students, and instead admitting students from nations that seek the destruction of the United States and its allies, or the extermination of entire peoples.

But the courts intervened again, and that order, too, was temporarily blocked.

Last week, The New York Times New York Times profiled international students who have spent recent weeks weighing some hard decisions.

Should they plan to come back to the United States in the fall?

What if they're denied entry?

Should they publicly protest the Trump administration, even if that means risking a response from the federal government?

The times spoke to Welsh student Alfred Williamson, who said that his first year at Harvard was the best of his life up until this conflict.

Williamson told the times, quote, we're being used like pawns in some game.

We have no control over end quote.

And he decided to speak publicly at a rally on campus.

That's when, according to the times, a friend messaged him emphatically afterward saying, bro, delete all the video of you speaking at the protest like immediately.

Journalist noted, quote Mr. Williamson marveled at how surreal the moment felt like a page from one of his history textbooks.

But he did not delete the video.

If he was on a list somewhere, he thought it was too late to get off it now.

End quote.

Today we welcome Alfred Williamson to Connections.

He's a student at Harvard College from Wales.

Alfred joining us remotely.

Thanks for making the time, Alfred.

How are you?

I'm good.

I'm very well, thank you.

Welcome.

Remotely as well.

James McCaffrey is a rising senior at Harvard College from Oklahoma City and a co-founder of students for freedom there.

James, welcome.

Thanks for being with us.

Thanks for having me.

And Lola DeSantis is with us in the studio, a rising senior at Harvard College from Rochester and co-founder of students for freedom there.

Welcome back to the program.

Thanks for being here.

Thanks so much for having me.

Tell us briefly, Lola, what students for freedom is.

Yeah.

So students for freedom, is a, organization of Harvard undergraduates, international and American like, who are from a wide variety of places on the political spectrum, but are united under the common belief that, bans on international students and other attacks on our university are fundamentally anti-American.

What kind of support does your group have from the general campus wide student body?

we have a lot of support.

and we recently had a New York Times piece published, about the organization, about, just how uniting it's been across campus.

of course it's been in the news, you know, in the past year, prior to the attacks on Harvard, by the Trump administration.

the division that we've seen on campus, over the Israel-Palestine issue.

And it's just been so incredible to see students from both sides of that issue, coming together and uniting under this common cause.

what students for freedom likes to say, and what we have in our mission statement is that we welcome students of any political opinion and any political affiliation, and none at all.

so it's been really amazing to see students who weren't previously politically engaged or students who were previously political, engaged, politically engaged on campus and in direct opposition to each other, uniting under this issue.

James, do you agree that this has galvanized the student body?

There?

Yes, absolutely.

People have been more engaged than ever that I've seen on campus.

We've seen people coming together across this common cause and joining and working together to put out a message that we are united in, that Harvard stands united, the student body is united.

The faculty are united, and the administration is united with us.

And we've seen people from just like Lola was saying, from many different groups.

There are Jewish students who have supported our cause.

There are people from the pro-Palestinian groups who have supported our cause, and there are people who have never been politically engaged, who are getting engaged now and doing something.

Several of us, including myself, I've never been an activist.

I've never spoken that protest before.

The past couple of months.

The first protest I went to was probably, I think, two months ago, and now people like me are starting to stand up and speak out because we see how important it is and how essential it is that we say something and that we stand there and there's Stem students who have stood up and started to speak out to about their federal funding cuts, about the struggles they've had, about having to change the language in their grant proposals.

So many things that are impacting every student on campus, no matter who you are and what you do and what you study.

And when everybody gets hurt, it gives them a reason to stand up and work together to stop it.

Well, I'm going to turn to Alfred, who is a student at Harvard.

He's from Wales, joining us remotely.

And Alfred, I was struck by the New York Times piece that, detailed your story a bit in a way that kind of described the way this year has gone for you this academic year, in which as the year progresses, the new Trump administration comes in, you have friends, maybe peers back home asking, you know, are you are you endangered by any of this?

And at first it was kind of like, well, probably not.

And then it really changed in the last couple of months here.

Can you describe what this year has been like and take us through some of that story?

Yeah, of course.

I mean, the first thing I have to say is I never expected any of this to happen.

I applied to Harvard.

I never expected to get in.

known for my family.

Had ever gone to, university in the United States.

no.

If my school had ever gone to an Ivy League, I is the happiest in my life.

When I got accepted Harvard, I went to, is the best day of my life there.

And then I went over to Copenhagen for the summer to start a study abroad program.

I opened my phone one night, and I see a wave of missed calls, messages of people saying like, are you okay?

Checking on me?

I have friends crying for me up, crying their eyes out, saying that they don't know what's going to happen.

I see the news and I'm just in shock.

I never expect this happened.

Like international students like myself.

We fought for years for the opportunity to be able to study somewhere like Harvard in the United States.

And that was taken away in moments.

And we certainly didn't know what to feel.

We felt that we were students in the United States, and then suddenly we were, we felt like illegal immigrants, or as they put it, illegal aliens, in the United States.

So it was just, a moment that I never expected to to happen.

And, I'm still kind of processing now the idea that I won't be able to go go back next semester.

And most the international community, I don't think, have fully processed it because they never expected it to happen.

And they fought for so many years for for this dream.

And they almost refused to face the reality that they might not be able to go back.

So tell me a little bit about where you are and what happens, later this summer and in the fall, because the courts are certainly going and going back and forth.

This administration, as we mentioned in the introduction, there's an administration directive.

The courts will intervene.

The Trump administration tries a different way the courts intervene.

No one can predict exactly where that's going.

But what is your expectation for what you're going to do?

Let's start with that, Alfred.

Yeah.

I mean, it's exhausting.

Like it goes back and forth and back and forth and we don't see an end to it.

And that's what's worrying.

It's not enough for international students to feel that that that they're space that Harvard, guaranteed for the next week or two or next month.

We want it for the whole four years.

And right now, we don't have that kind of reassurance personally.

I've quit.

Transferring to another university has crossed my mind.

It's crossed minds of many other international students as well.

However, I have to doubt that all the transfer deadlines and application deadlines have passed.

There's no official or formal way to actually transfer to another university now.

So right now it feels like either we're going to go to Harvard next semester.

We go, no.

And that's a really scary prospect for a lot of people.

so right now and there might be informal ways of going to another university.

but I don't think anyone really wants to accept that as a possibility.

As I said, international students have fought for years for the opportunity to be able to study somewhere like Harvard.

For many people in other countries.

It's almost their way out.

It's their family's way out.

And right now that might be taken away.

And they don't want to give up on that opportunity unless they are forced to, and also, it's not financially.

It might not be an option for many internationals.

The majority of international students at Harvard are on financial aid, and it's far cheaper to for them to attend Harvard than other places in the world.

So it's not as simple as just going somewhere else.

And, you know, I also want to ask you a little bit about, you know, I think I want to have the self-awareness to, to ask you what kind of came up in the times piece, which is there may be this expectation that students like you, a white male European student, are less at risk as an international student than a student from Palestine, a student from somewhere else in the world.

But that does not change the fact that, number one, the attempted ban is for all international students.

And number two, that you had a lot of pressure on you not to speak at a protest.

A lot of concern from people who love you saying, be careful, don't put your name out there, don't put your face out there.

And you had some decisions to make.

So how do you kind of contextualize your status?

Vis-A-Vis other international students?

Yeah, exactly.

Trump's ban does not discriminate.

It affects any and all of us.

no matter where we're from, what we're doing, what we look like.

so, yes, I mean, I probably am in the far more.

In fact, I definitely am in a more privileged position than a lot of international students when I speak out, because I'm the kind of person that the Trump administration probably has less issue with compared to someone from Palestine, as you mentioned.

That is also, I feel a responsibility to speak up, because the moment that a friend from Palestine to Pakistan gets deported for something they've said or something they've done or even for, haven't done absolutely nothing.

Then I will feel guilty not for having spoken out.

And you're right, it really wasn't a decision to speak out because there are thousands of international students at Harvard, and only a handful of them have decided to speak up.

And I think that says something about how scary it is to speak out.

And I completely understand why every single other international student who has not spoken out has not spoken out, because we have watched I snatch students off the streets in such a brutal fashion, and no one wants that to happen to themselves.

When James and I and Lowell have been at protests, we witnessed international students run and hide in their dorms for fear of being caught on camera by, news agencies.

It's incredibly scary, and it feels incredibly authoritarian, and it feels like we're getting to a point where noncitizens in the United States do not have freedom of speech.

And that is something that is not just wrong, it's un-American.

The First Amendment refers to people in the United States having freedom of speech, freedom of speech, not just citizens.

so I think it's a it's a very scary time as I choose to speak out, because I think the moment that we begin to self silence, the same moment that the American democracy begins to die, and I did come to America because I really believe in American values.

I believe in freedom of speech.

I believe in academic freedom.

I believe in the right to send.

So I choose to speak out to preserve the same values that actually brought me to this country.

Well, and Lola DeSantis is a Rochester and who's been on this program in the past.

And so in those conversations, we've talked a little bit about your desires to maybe go into a legal career or do the kind of work that you might do.

now as a student trying to advance causes or look at issues that matter to you.

And so when Alfred brings it up, who is protected by the law?

That's a big question.

Right now you have the head of ice, Tom Homan.

You have Kristi Noem from Homeland Security.

You have Marco Rubio, the secretary of state.

You have members of Congress essentially either implying or directly saying that due process is for Americans only, that freedom of speech is for Americans only.

As someone who might go into the law and is looking at these issues, and now you're working with international students and you're seeing what it's like on campus, how does all of that affect you and what's on your mind there?

Yeah, I think, first things first, the 14th amendment is where we get the equal protection under law clause, which is where due process comes from.

and it's where many of our most important and most landmark Supreme Court cases come from, from the right to marry who you want to marry, to the right for formerly enslaved people to be citizens of the United States.

so much comes from that amendment.

So many important Supreme Court cases.

I think one thing that's really, really important to note is that the Equal protection clause does say exactly what Alfred was saying, which is that it is any persons in the United States must be protected equally under law, regardless of race, color, nationality, not just citizens.

Yes.

It's not just citizens.

And I think that's really important to note.

I think the other thing about what Alfred said that's really important to note is that all Harvard International students are affected equally by this.

and it is specifically Harvard, too.

So I think, I mean, I saw a really funny onion article the other day that said, you know, nation cannot believe it's on Harvard's side.

And that's very true.

it's weird to think of Harvard as a victim in this situation, but if we're talking about nondiscrimination, one thing that's been repeatedly on my mind is the fact that this is being applied only to Harvard, and not to other schools.

Is that a form of discrimination under law?

I'm not exactly sure.

but it is fascinating to think about that.

Yeah.

There are a number of political conservatives who have been critics of Harvard over the years who have written about the need to defend Harvard.

and granted many of them, David French, many others are not fans of the Trump administration.

But in some ways, this issue has brought strange political bedfellows.

Fellows together here.

Do you see it that way?

Yes, absolutely.

I mean, yeah, yeah, for sure, because I, I think that so frequently we associate the far right with sort of this don't tread on me.

sort of very, yeah.

An independent sort of a sort of a libertarian libertarian.

Yeah.

so the word I was looking for, of of freedom.

And that's why, honestly, we chose to name ourselves Harvard Students for freedom, to show that there's this direct contradiction between the values that the that the right claims to stand for and what they actually are standing for so very frequently.

And our press releases will even say, you know, these are the values that, to use Trump's words, make America great.

and here he is chipping away and just destroying those values.

So you're intentionally using the administration's language to make a point?

Absolutely.

Yeah.

So let me let me read a couple pieces of feedback.

And I'm going to start with James.

I want to ask all of you about some of these points that some of our audience are making.

First of all, watching on the YouTube chat.

In the comments there, Sidney says, I think if I were an English speaking student anywhere in the world, I would apply to a university in the UK instead of the United States right now.

And Sydney saying that what is happening is going to affect the way students around the world view the idea of not just going to Harvard, but going to school in the United States.

That is Sydney's view.

But let me get Tim's email.

Tim sent us a note for the program and said, isn't the number of foreign students at Harvard going through the roof?

Don't we want more Americans to take those spots anyway?

Tim, I looked up some of the data.

The Associated Press reports that in the mid 1990s, foreign born students at Harvard made up 11% of the student body.

That number has more than doubled to 26%.

Now, that sounds about right to you, by the way.

Lower those numbers okay.

Yes.

So yeah.

So it's a it's just over a quarter of students at Harvard are foreign born as opposed to just over 10% a generation ago.

And Tim is saying, you know, maybe Trump's read, don't we want more American born students?

And I'm going to start with James McCaffrey, a rising senior at Harvard and a co-founder of students for freedom.

What would you say to Tim?

And frankly, what would you what do you make of Sidney's point, James, that, there's a concern that foreign born students will start to, to think otherwise about going to the United States for school.

Well, as far as the foreign born students, their opinions on the schools, I think Alfred will be able to speak better to that.

But from what I'm hearing from those students, often they are more concerned and they are uncertain about what it looks like to the rest of the world.

And it makes them hesitant.

Beyond that, as far as the percentage of international students goes, I think it's a really important aspect that this university is so diverse.

I am from Oklahoma and that's obviously a very red state and not like a super diverse state, and nothing wrong with that in that case.

But it's not.

And so I grew up there, and coming to Harvard really opened up my world because I had never met anybody from another country.

You know, that's just my life before this point.

But when I came here, I'm meeting people from across the world, from Asia, from Europe, from Africa, from South America.

And that gives you a different perspective on what the world looks like.

And if you have lots of international students in your campus, then the American students are there, who are there are going to understand the world much better and be much more effective.

And the international students who come and study at Harvard are going to learn about America and learn about what opportunities are here and the American values that often we want to kind of help send out into the world of the American values of freedom of speech, the American values of academic freedom, the American values of due process of law.

Those are important.

And if somebody comes from an authoritarian country, we want them to appreciate those values.

I think something that I think about a lot in history is that during World War Two, there were a lot of prisoner of war camps in America that housed the Nazis, and Nazi soldiers were sent to America to go to these prisoner of war camps and they were put there and they learned about America, and they learned about the values.

And many of them realized that they actually liked it a lot in America.

Once they learned about America.

And I think that's a really important thing to learn, that even if maybe a student comes in thinking they disagree with us, they can come here and learn and maybe they will agree with us.

Well, let me turn to Alfred Williamson, a Harvard student who is from Wales.

Number one, Alfred.

I mean, you can't speak for all international students, I get it.

But Sidney is worried that the United States in general is going to have a reputation that repels students who might otherwise have thought about coming to school here.

What do you make of that point?

First, Alfred?

I think that's very likely.

I mean, people choose their colleges for a range of different reasons.

You might choose it because of the professors, because of the resources, but the opportunities.

And Harvard has all of that.

However, the number one thing for most people, especially international students, is to feel safe, protected and free.

And they will no longer feel that in the United States of America.

So and their parents would not want them going to a college where they do not, where they are not safe, where they are not protected with they are not free.

Like if I was now applying to Harvard, my mom would tell me to think about that twice, because she would worry that I'd be snatched off the streets by an Ice agent, or that I would be deported for suddenly saying something that the Trump administration doesn't like.

So I it'll be families, not just individuals, who will think twice about sending their children to American universities.

And this will be a huge loss for the United States.

You know, as, as James mentioned, international students come to the United States because they believe in American values, because they want to pursue American opportunities that they cannot access anywhere else in the world.

And because they want to they want to pursue that hope of their American dream.

And certainly that will be taken away.

And America and these international students, they do incredible things during their time at Harvard.

They do even more incredible things afterwards.

And that will be a huge loss for the American company economy.

They go on to work for American companies.

They go on to found American companies.

Let's not forget Elon Musk was on a student visa.

The founder of Tesla and SpaceX.

Looks like American will miss out on these incredible opportunities for economic growth.

and for perspectives that are absolutely invaluable.

As James touched on, what do you make of, Alpha?

What do you make of Tim, who emailed to say, you know, don't we want more Americans to take these spots?

Are there too many foreign students?

I'm curious to know if you have a thought on that.

Well, I completely agree with what James says.

I think that when you have diversity of different perspectives and backgrounds, you end up creating something a lot better than if you just have people from the same background.

However, if you do think that there should be less international students at Harvard, and if I grant you that this is certainly not the way you do it, you don't just suddenly take away all student visas without any notice, without any backup plan for anyone.

It's incredibly dehumanizing.

Now, next year, we have no idea what we're going to do.

That is completely not the way you treat your international students.

So fine.

If they want to do that, that I understand you can have your opinion.

They could enter discussions with Harvard.

The US administration could figure something out.

I wouldn't even be opposed to that.

But the way they are doing it is completely unacceptable and not just unacceptable.

It's un-American.

It goes against everything that America has ever said.

For Lola, what do you make of not only Tim's point, but he's really, echoing the Trump administration, saying this should be American students.

Yeah.

I think one important thing to remember about the 26% statistic is that the 26% of Harvard students who are international or internationally born include students who are American citizens who are internationally born.

So a student who might hold dual citizenship or moved here, over 14 years ago.

So not all international students are people necessarily living outside the United States?

Are people who are not American citizens?

oftentimes you can even think about, military kids who grow up in other countries.

I have several friends who grew up in other countries, because their parents worked for the U.S. military.

So that's point one.

the second thing is that included in that 2,626% statistic are students at all of our schools.

Harvard College is known for its acceptance rate being 3 to 5% every year.

But our graduate schools oftentimes have acceptance rates that are higher.

Students include people coming here for fellowships, to perform lifesaving research at the medical school.

So not all 26% are located in our highly selective college or law school or business school.

I think that's also really important to remember.

yeah.

so I think those are the two really important things about the statistics.

And then I would just again echo what James said.

not all of our international students are from one part of the world.

Not all of our international students are from one country.

I have friends from at least like 20 different countries.

And that is something that greatly contributes to what makes our school so great.

is that where I mean, a bringing in the best of the best, the most talented from across the entire world?

and that is something that only Harvard can do.

and it is, again, one of the things that greatly contributes to America that so many of the best and the brightest are coming to this country to study at something that Trump, who claims to, you know, care so much about the American economy and American exceptionalism should actually really care about and value, and for American students like myself and James, it's also of great value because it does widen our perspectives, and greatly contribute to my learning experience.

Well, let me read another email.

This is from Charles, who says, he says he supports the Trump administration's efforts to ban international students.

He sent me a link to a story from the Associated Press back in 2019, when the Associated Press reported the following.

And I'll quote from the AP article the United States government has failed to stop China from stealing intellectual property from American universities, and lacks a comprehensive strategy for dealing with the threat, a congressional report concluded.

The report says the FBI should be more effective and consistent in warning colleges and universities about the threat of Chinese economic and industrial espionage.

It also says agencies that award research grants or provide visas for scientists don't do enough to monitor or track the recipients, and says universities themselves must do a better job identifying foreign funding sources and conflicts of interest on their campus.

End quote.

So, Charles, the emailer says to me, I he says, I feel this right here is an excellent reason for the international student ban.

We know this is happening.

It's not up for debate.

It's the fact I think it's more than prudent to try to shut it down for the same reason I don't want RGA headquartered in Spain.

It's not xenophobic to point that out.

President Monroe had it right.

The rest of the world can do what they like, but they better not do it here.

That's from Charles.

I'll start with you, Lola.

What do you what do you say to them?

I would like to say again that Harvard's, application process is incredibly, incredibly selective.

and I think that I personally, as a student, am not part of the admissions office.

so I obviously can't speak to their processes, but I would imagine that a school that does selective as Harvard has extensive screening process processes.

yeah, I couldn't speak to that.

But I'm sure the Harvard admissions office, looks extensively into backgrounds.

Yeah.

Charles, I mean, like, if you want to follow up here, I mean, I can't speak to what China is doing in terms of stealing intellectual property.

I'm sure there's advanced operations going in a lot of different directions all around the world in that.

I can tell you that that's not what the Trump administration is talking about here.

They're talking about want of wanting to write Harvard's curriculum control who they hire and fire and control how students protest or what they say about hot issues.

That's and we're going to talk more about charges of anti-Semitism coming up here, because I know some of you have asked about that, but that's what the Trump administration is talking about.

And even if you are concerned about China stealing intellectual property, the decision is just to say no international students come to the United States like, that's it.

And Trump's letter to us actually had nothing about Chinese intellectual property.

No pages long.

And he only banned international students because Harvard said we're not accepting this.

So it wasn't his original.

Yeah.

Yeah.

No it was it wasn't the reasoning.

But I just I'm a little confused by Charles saying, well, back in 2019, they were worried about this.

So therefore how about no international students in the United States.

It's a it seems very unrelated or a huge, huge jump.

But maybe maybe James, anything you want to add?

What would you say to Charles there?

Well, I think that when you're looking at this international student ban in the frame of national security and protecting America's national security, that is an important issue.

It is important that we protect our internet, like our national security.

That's clear.

but if you're actually trying to protect your interest, like national security, wouldn't you be targeting your efforts?

Wouldn't you be?

Okay, maybe if you're concerned about the overall espionage across the nation, from international students, shouldn't there be just a system of.

Screening for that, such as a legal immigration process that we have that we work through, that we already have developed?

You can improve that system to screen for these things.

But just targeting Harvard doesn't make any sense.

Just targeting every single international student doesn't make any sense because it's just looking at one small group of students that isn't really going to actually protect national security.

Well, as we go to our only break of the hour, here's what we're going to do.

I've got more your emails, we're going to talk about, allegations of, out of control protest, anti-Semitism on campus, that kind of because the Trump administration has talked a lot about that and their reasoning for the international student ban, attempted ban at Harvard, which is what we're talking about this hour.

MJ writes to say, Evan, I'm a semi-retired professor in the Graduate School of Education and Human Development at the University of Rochester.

The influx of international students over the past 15 years or so has enabled American higher education to survive.

Structural costs have become so high, and federal and state governments have reduced their support for higher ed.

Not only do international students bring diversity, new ideas, fascinating cultures, but they also provide the financial support that we need.

American higher education is known around the world for its excellence.

This will be dramatically challenged if we cannot continue to bring international students here.

That is from MJ.

We're talking to three Harvard students.

Lola DeSantis is a rising senior at Harvard.

She's from Rochester and she's co-founder of students for Freedom on Harvard campus.

So is James McCaffrey.

He's a rising senior at Harvard.

Joining us remotely.

Alfred Williamson is a student at Harvard from Wales who is also joining us remotely.

And we're coming right back with more of your feedback.

On the other side of this, only break.

Coming up in our second hour, three members, not three members, three candidates for Rochester City Council Council, three people who want to become members of council.

It's the last of our five conversations with the candidates, 15 candidates on the ballot this year for five spots.

Next hour, we sit down with Stanley Martin, Miguel Melendez, nine, or Davis all in studio to answer our questions.

And yours.

Support for your public radio station comes from our members and from Bob Johnson, Auto Group.

Proud supporter of connections with Evan Dawson, believing an informed public makes for a stronger community.

Bob Johnson Auto group.com.

This is connections.

I'm Evan Dawson, Dallas writes to say on the subject of safety, I can picture Jewish students asking for the same thing at Ivy League schools.

They want more safety on campus.

And he wants to know if the students have experienced a culture of antisemitism there.

I want to read a little bit more before I kicked the students, and they'll have plenty to say on this, but the new York Times touched on this in their reporting last week on this.

so first of all, they reference Harvard's own work looking at issues related to possible anti-Semitism on campus.

And then they quoted from Alfred.

So I'm just gonna read a little bit from The New York Times, quote, the university had already been heavily criticized for its handling of pro-Palestinian demonstrations and for allowing antisemitism to seep into campus life.

Harvard's own task force on antisemitism detailed in a report the bias, suspicion, intimidation, alienation, shunning, contempt and sometimes effective exclusion that Jewish students had suffered, end quote.

And, then the times goes back to Alfred Story, a student from Wales, and says the following quote.

Mr. Williamson could see that change at Harvard was needed.

Some of his best friends at school were Jewish, he said, and had experienced antisemitism.

Some had told him they did not feel safe on campus.

He agreed to that more effort was needed to open campus dialog to more diverse viewpoints.

But he said he did not believe that the Trump administration's tactics were motivated by actual concern for Jewish students.

Instead, he said, the government seemed set on undermining academic freedom, end quote.

So, Alfred, I'm going to start with you.

There's a lot there.

I want you to describe what you've experienced on campus and how you see this, this question of that the administration is raising that if Harvard won't do X or Y, then we will ban international students because it's become a roiling cauldron of anti-Semitism.

What do you see there, Alfred?

Yeah.

So I do have many close Jewish friends, and anti-Semitism is a problem on Harvard's campus and the problem all across the United States.

And the problem all across the world.

It exists.

It's real.

And there's absolutely no denying that.

Now, this is not how to deal with it.

I don't believe for a second that antisemitism is anything to do with Trump's attack on Harvard.

I mean, if Trump said that he directly that he was attacking Harvard because he hates academic freedom and international students, then that, of course, a lot worse than justifying his attack with the claim that he is defending Jewish students.

So if you actually look at the Harvard, Princeton recently, the survey of the graduating class of 2025, and it found that the majority of Jewish students disagreed with Trump's narrative that he is combating anti-Semitism.

They feel that the Trump administration is essentially weaponizing their identities.

So if this is not actually if the people that this is supposed to protect disagree with Trump's narrative, then what is this really about?

I think this is really about, I think it's really about Trump trying to take away the autonomy of institutions like Harvard.

They've always been the centers of free speech and debate in the American democracy.

And I think that's a really scary prospect.

and if let's just go on then they do actually care about centers, and the Trump administration is really trying to combat antisemitism, then why are they attacking all international students?

Why are they taking with student visas of all international students?

That has nothing to do with it.

They simply trying to punish Harvard and punish international students for attending an institution that refuses to bow down to the administration's demands, like so.

There's nothing to show that international students are more involved in pro-Palestine protests, that they have spoke, that they are more involved in anti-Semitism at Harvard is a completely unrelated matter.

So I think that demonstrates that this was never really to do with anti-Semitism in the first place.

Well, let me ask, James McCaffrey, rising senior, about that.

Go ahead, James.

Yeah, I agree with everything that Alfred said.

in addition to that, there's a lot of weird kind of antithetical things going on.

For example, there was a statement that was passed around for Jewish student students to sign.

and over 100 students signed that statement, essentially saying that anti-Semitism on campus is real and is a problem.

But what President Trump is doing to our campus is actually hurting us.

And many Jewish students signed that statement.

But other Jewish students, domestic Jewish students, not just international Jewish students, didn't sign it because they felt fear, because they were afraid to sign a public statement to put out their opinion.

If this is really protecting Jewish students, shouldn't they feel no fear to sign a statement that says that they disagree with this administration on what they're doing to our campus?

In addition to that, you have the just flat out ban of international students.

I mean, that includes students from Israel, Jewish students from Israel.

Like, you're not protecting those students.

In fact, you're drastically changing their life.

How does that make any sense on protecting Jewish students on campus?

It doesn't makes and it's just sad to see that a real problem like anti-Semitism.

You know, we've seen violence recently and it's been horrible to see those actions taken.

And, you know, we can condemn violence in all terms.

We should be focused on solving those problems of real violence and actual anti-Semitism on campus, rather than using anti-Semitism to force some political agenda on a campus that is already trying to solve these problems.

Lola, what do you want to add to what the campus climate has been like?

Have you?

Dallas wants to know, are you experiencing a lot of anti-Semitism on campus?

well, I'm not Jewish and I'm not Palestinian.

and I'm not Muslim, so I can't exactly speak to that.

but what I will say, it's more important points to bring up to just add is that Harvard Hillel, the organ, is it the Jewish student organization on campus?

center for Jewish Life has actually spoken out against Trump as well.

And they've been intimately involved with the antisemitism task force.

so to actually oppose what Harvard Hillel has stated, and that just seems kind of funny to me.

I think the other important thing to point out is that there is a little bit of confirmation bias happening here.

and selectivity bias, the report on anti-Semitism is real.

and they detail a detailed real statistics in real situations and real incidents.

What people have failed to bring up in their discussions of hate on Harvard's campus is that there was a report on Islamophobia, anti-Arab bias, and Anti-Palestinian bias.

That was just as long as the antisemitism report.

And those students are also facing hate on campus.

They are also afraid, I have a I have a friend who's from and a muslim country, who I was watching the news one night, and I saw that they happened to be in the B-roll footage from Harvard's campus, and I was like, oh my gosh, you're in the B-roll footage, like, so excited.

And they broke down in tears, terrified because they are a student from a muslim country.

And they feared that just being in a B-roll would, would be bad for them.

Just worried about reprisal.

Yeah.

So I think, yes, antisemitism is real.

But Trump is also talking about, in the name of anti-Semitism, specifically banning, I mean, all international students with a focus on students he has labeled as pro Hamas, which is really a very Islamophobic, dog whistle because obviously not all pro-Palestine students are pro Hamas.

It's a crazy claim.

but to ban students that are Muslim or from Arab countries in the name of stopping antisemitism when those students are also facing hate, would be as silly as banning pro-Israel students, Zionist students, Jewish students in the name of stopping Islamophobia.

it's totally a it's a vast generalization, that actually feeds into stereotypes.

and your colleague on the panel says that there's not a carve out for Israeli students who go to Harvard is that, you know, that there's no carve out for Israeli students and there's no carve out for Jewish students from other countries, too.

I think we like to think that Jewish students only exist in Israel, in the United States.

But for example, we've had students who are from Canada, who are Jewish, who have been involved in students for freedom.

Jewish students come from all over the world.

so even even a carve out just for Israeli students wouldn't protect all Jewish students as well.

Kara writes to us on Facebook and says, as a board member of a local college, we talk a lot about the demographic cliff.

There just are not as many students who will enter college in the next ten years.

Besides contributing a good learning environment, we need international students to keep colleges open.

so, I mean, that's the second time we've heard that that idea that international students not just at Harvard, but at the University of Rochester and institutions across the country, are an important component of those campuses for a lot of different reasons.

And if you just reduce it to a financial question that matters there, too.

but let me let me ask all three of you lo, let me start with you.

I'm going to ask all three of you, where do you think this goes next?

Because here we are in June.

You know, Alfred is, you know, wondering about the push and pull of what's going on in the courts and wondering what his options may be if all of a sudden, you know, come a couple of months from now, you can't come back.

you're going into your senior year, probably didn't expect, when you enrolled in Harvard to be at the center of the news so often, but here you are.

What what is next in this story?

From your expectation and what you've both, what you hope to see, but what you think will happen here.

Yeah.

I think it's been really heartening to see how uniting this has been, for American students and international students alike, and also our faculty and staff and our alumni, there's an alumni organization called Crimson Courage that has actually filed an amicus brief.

so I think that obviously taking this to the courts is really important.

I do fear that we might be in this four year battle of a position poll where Trump issues some, really silly, proclamation or new law.

It goes to the courts, it comes back, there's this, you know, back and forth constantly happening.

so I do see that happening.

and I do see it being really exhausting and tiring for the next four years.

but I would hope, that our legal systems can, hold up and make sure that international students are out there.

And again, looking at that legal system that you may be working yourself into in the future.

Lower.

The courts have been moving pretty quickly on a lot of this stuff.

I mean, they've responded within days.

Most of the time when there's some kind of an effort from the administration just take this issue, but also in a lot of other issues related to deportation and and many others.

So are you so far confident that the legal system is holding in the way that you think it should?

yeah.

I mean, every single, statistically speaking, every single, order from Trump, I believe.

don't yeah, I maybe I'm a little bit wrong but has has had an injunction or been struck down.

so I think so long as that continues to happen, I, it does seem that the legal system is holding.

Holding.

I also can't remember the exact numbers, but I think there's like a crazy percentage of federal judges that are actually Harvard grads, too.

not that they not that that would affect, their decisions, but it's also important to remember that Harvard is producing, excellent lawyers as well.

Yeah.

Why do you feel like the legal system is an attractive one for you right now?

I mean, I, I ask that I'm not trying to be cheeky, but there's been a lot of concern that this administration has decided that the power rests primarily in the executive branch and that the courts are to be obeyed at times and they are to be ignored at times, depending on the positions that the courts are taking.

So why why law potentially?

I think that, yeah, it's so far we've seen that the legal system I don't want to say our is our only our last hope because that's a little dismal.

but at the moment, you know, until 2026 when we have the midterms and we could potentially get, you know, a majority in both houses and Democrats could codify some of the things, or at least attempt to, given that Trump does have veto power.

But I don't know if we if we have enough to override a veto come 2026, then we also have the legislative branch.

It seems that Republicans in Congress have very little courage to stand up to Trump right now.

which really leaves federally, at least the last branch of government standing is the judiciary.

I think that there is understandable fear for when things reach the Supreme Court.

given that we do see, a lot of, you know, obviously there's a supermajority of conservative justices, many like Clarence Thomas, who are accepting funding, and accepting personal donations, to rule in the favor of the far right.

But we also have judges, and I, I can't believe I'd ever be saying this, but like Amy Coney Barrett, who seemed to at least have some moral compass, that's guiding them to not make decisions that are totally out of line.

so I, I do feel a little bit for the Supreme Court, but I do think that our, our, circuit judges and other federal judges are so far holding the MAGA right is not happy with Justice Coney Barrett.

They're not.

and she's.

Yeah.

I could talk about that a lot.

The whole separate conversation.

James McCaffrey, where do you expect this to go next?

Where do you hope that this is going next?

It's not going to get any easier.

It's going to keep on getting harder.

President Trump is going to continue to probably attack Harvard because this is a matter of retribution.

It's not a matter of national security.

It's not a matter of protecting students from anti-Semitism.

It is a matter that Harvard stood up and said no.

And he doesn't like that.

And he's a petty man in many ways and is going to keep on finding ways to try and hurt the university, because this is a place that supports academic freedom, that supports freedom of speech, things that he wants to reduce, and in our country.

And he wants to see less speech and less opposition.

And what I see coming next is a lot of opposition to what he's doing, because he keeps on crossing a line and he keeps on crossing another line and eventually people are going to get fed up with it.

What I see happening is that people are going to come together and realize, okay, we may disagree on issues like abortion, we may disagree on issues like the border, we may disagree on issues like, I don't know guns, but we can agree to the simple idea that everybody has a right to freedom of speech, to the simple idea that everybody has a right to due process.

Even if you're not a citizen of this country and realize that those are really founding ideas and President Trump is pushing against that.

But I think there's a lot of Republicans that are being quiet because I don't know, they should be open about this.

But politicians are often not that brave and want to run when reelection.

And so I see people starting to realize that it's really important that we stand up for those core values.

You can disagree on a lot of stuff, but you have to recognize the fact that the Constitution is a very important document, that the law is very important, and that we're not just going to throw that in the trash as Americans, and that's going to be part of what makes American a great place to be, is that we can fight this and push back on this and make sure that our country continues to uphold the American dream, even if we had some struggles at some time.

Well, Alfred, you're due back at Harvard when?

In August.

if I'm allowed to return, when do you expect to know that?

You are definitely coming back.

See?

Well, that's the thing, right?

As international students, we don't see an end to this.

It seems to go back and forth and back and forth.

I think that the Trump administration will continue to try to punish international students for attending an institution that refuses to bow down to its demands, and it the Trump administration also wants to attack Harvard because it has the integrity to stand up to those authoritarian demands.

so right now, as international students, to kind of just have to sit here and wait as the white House tries to take away our rights and to turn that stretch of our lives, and there's absolutely nothing we can do.

and I think that that's a really scary prospect.

and of course, like as I said before, the judge blocking the order, it was a good thing.

And I'm sure that will continue to happen.

But I'm sure the Trump administration will keep trying to find another way to punish Harvard for refusing to comply to its demands.

It is simply just trying to take away the autonomy of institutions that have always been the pillars of of academic freedom and free speech in the democracy.

And it seems to me right now that the Trump administration is trying to attack everything that is making America great.

And international students are part of what makes America great.

I'm afraid.

I can't say that you sound optimistic about, your likelihood of completing four years at Harvard right now.

I don't know, I mean, it's a it's a difficult fight.

I think it's been we've only seen the first few steps of a very long journey, because the Trump administration, as we've seen, is were leadless they're willing to violate the Constitution known to win this fight.

and Harvard have told us that they will stand by international students, that Harvard understands that Harvard is not Harvard without its international students, and it's 27% of the student body.

So I think both sides have a lot of willingness to fight.

And but now I really can't see an end to it.

as was mentioned, this might be something that last the whole four years.

Yeah, I certainly plausible you know, Dallas points out President Trump's approval ratings have been trending back upwards or they're not high at this point.

But they were trending hard downward for weeks and weeks and weeks, especially around, ostensible Liberation Day with tariffs.

And they are, they're moving in a better direction for the white House, too.

So they've stabilized some, at least for the moment, if you want to base anything on that.

And the white House feels emboldened, I think, to continue to pursue this.

So I don't blame Alfred for the uncertainty, but I want to thank Alfred Williamson for making the time to talk about it.

A student at Harvard from Wales joining us remotely.

Alfred, good luck to you.

Thank you for joining us today.

Thank you.

James McCaffrey, a rising senior at Harvard from Oklahoma City, co-founder of students for Freedom at Harvard.

Thank you, James.

Nice talking to you.

Thank you.

Well, the DeSantis, a rising senior at Harvard, co-founder of students for freedom.

I know we'll talk again.

Thanks for making time for the program.

Thanks for having me.

We've got more connections coming up in just a moment.

And.

This program is a production of WXXI Public Radio.

The views expressed do not necessarily represent those of this station.

Its staff, management, or underwriters.

The broadcast is meant for the private use of our audience, any rebroadcast or use in another medium, without express written consent of WXXI is strictly prohibited.

Connections with Evan Dawson is available as a podcast.

Just click on the connections link at WXXI news.org.

Support for your public