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Judge extends order barring UI international students' deportation or detention • Iowa Capital Dispatch [1]
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Date: 2025-05-05
A federal judge has extended a temporary restraining order barring the Department of Homeland Security from deporting four international students at the University of Iowa while she considers whether to convert that order into a preliminary injunction.
The students are suing the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for revoking their status as students. While the students have been pursuing their case under a series of “John Doe” pseudonyms, U.S. District Court Judge Rebecca Goodgame Ebinger ruled Monday that the students will have to publicly identify themselves or drop out of the case within the next 24 hours.
The students’ identities have already been revealed to Homeland Security, but lawyers for the four had argued their clients shouldn’t be forced to publicly reveal their identities in order to pursue their lawsuit against the government. Ebinger found the students’ generalized fear of harassment didn’t meet “the very high standard” for granting them anonymity, citing past court rulings that say court proceedings “are only truly public when the public knows the identities of the litigants.”
Also on Monday, Ebinger agreed to extend, for 14 days, her temporary restraining order protecting the four international students from being detained or deported by ICE or Homeland Security. She said she plans to rule on whether to grant a preliminary injunction to that effect before the restraining order expires.
According to the lawsuit, each of the plaintiffs was admitted to the United States on an F-1 student visa. The students claim the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has violated their due process rights by terminating their student status without legal justification or explanation.
Named as defendants in the case are Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, of which Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, is a part. Also named as a defendant is Acting Director of ICE Todd Lyons.
In granting the students’ initial request for a temporary restraining order, Ebinger concluded the students had “demonstrated a likelihood of success” as to their legal claims and had also shown they could otherwise be subjected to irreparable harm.
The judge noted there had been no suggestion that any of the recognized, lawful reasons for terminating the plaintiffs’ status as students — such as providing false information to the government, engaging in unauthorized employment, or failing to engage in an approved course of study — appeared to exist or were even argued by Homeland Security as a justification for its actions.
At Monday’s hearing, Ebinger asked Homeland Security’s lawyers whether they opposed the students’ request for an extension of the temporary restraining order.
“I’ve been instructed by my client not to agree to an extension of the temporary restraining order,” Department of Justice attorney Rachel J. Scherle replied.
Since beginning their studies, the lawsuit claims, the plaintiffs have maintained their status as students, are in good academic standing and have not committed any serious criminal offenses. Three of the four are studying chemical engineering, economics or exercise science, while the fourth is working for the State of Iowa as an epidemiologist.
DHS: Students’ status signifies only a ‘red flag’
The lawsuit claims that on April 10, 2025, ICE abruptly canceled, without explanation, the plaintiffs’ status as students within DHS’ Student and Exchange Visitor Information System database.
Four days later, the lawsuit claims, three of the plaintiffs each received identical messages from U.S. embassies, warning them that “remaining in the United States can result in fines, detention, and/or deportation,” and adding that “deportation can take place at a time that does not allow the person being deported to secure possessions or conclude affairs in the United States. Persons being deported may be sent to countries other than their countries of origin.”
The lawsuit claims Homeland Security’s “lack of transparency and procedural safeguards created chaos within educational institutions and upended the lives of lawful F-1 visa holders.”
The lawsuit emphasizes that the plaintiffs are not challenging the revocation of their F-1 student visas but are instead challenging DHS’ termination of their student status to create a “pretext for future adverse immigration actions against them.”
At Monday’s hearing, Ebinger questioned Homeland Security’s position that terminating the plaintiffs’ status as students isn’t a precursor to deportation and merely indicates there is some sort of “red flag” that called for additional investigation by the federal government.
“You keep saying it’s a ‘red flag’ for further investigation,” Ebinger said, and then asked where such a characterization was documented and whether that information was ever communicated to the students or their school.
Lawyers for Homeland Security acknowledged the “red flag” status wasn’t communicated directly to the students, but also noted that the warnings of detention and deportation, while based on DHS’ action, came from the embassies, not from DHS itself.
A group from Iowa City attended Monday’s hearing as a show of a support for the plaintiffs. UI graduate student Miranda Schene said she felt it was important to show that the students have people behind them.
“I just think that this is an incredibly important issue for all of the University of Iowa students,” said Schene, a doctoral student in molecular physiology and biophysics, “because this is one of those cases that’s determining whether or not students who come here internationally actually have the freedom to stay and finish their degrees without fear of arbitrary punishment by the government.”
Marie Krebs said while she supports the plaintiffs’ desire to keep their identities from being made public, having their names out could help garner additional support. “I can’t imagine the trauma that they’re enduring behind this,” she said. “They’ve got to be really scared.”
Oliver Weilein, a member of Iowa City’s city council, also attended the proceedings and said he was concerned that disclosure of the students’ names might make them a target of bigots. Homeland Security’s actions, he said, “does not come out of concern for our community. This doesn’t come out of concern for criminals being in our country. This comes out of racism. This comes out of wanting to make immigrants go back.”
Nicole Yeager of the Campaign to Organize Graduate Students said the case is one of many attacks on public education now taking place. “There are so many students right now who can’t sleep at night,” Yeager said. “The loss of community benefit and good and incredible scholarly work is there, and we’ll never fully know the impact of that.”
— Brooklyn Draisey contributed to this report.
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