Judge college case on facts, not politics: China Daily editorial

The directive issued by the US Department of Homeland Security's Immigration and Customs Enforcement last week, which would prevent international students from studying in the United States this fall if their schools only offer online classes, has met a strong pushback from universities. 

Seven Ivy League colleges were among the 59 US universities that filed an amicus brief on Sunday supporting a lawsuit by Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The lawsuit filed in a federal court in Boston on Wednesday seeks to block the administration barring foreign students, many of them from the Chinese mainland, from remaining in the country if educational institutions don't hold in-person classes this fall.

It is obviously not the proper time to reopen colleges that have been closed because of the pandemic; about 60,000 people are newly infected with the novel coronavirus everyday in the country. The virus' transmission has not slowed after the explosive growth in infections over the past four months, not to mention the prediction of some that it would "magically disappear" has not come true. As of Monday, more than 3.41 million cases had been reported in the country, among whom 127,700 people had died. 

Gatherings of large numbers of students, faculty and staff will directly expose them and their families to the threat of the virus.

As Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology argued in their filing, the administration has purposefully made the decision to bar international students to pressure institutions to reopen amid the coronavirus pandemic.

The administration seems intent on forcing US society to accept the fact that since it is unable to contain the contagion, the country should wait no more to revive its economy.

In other words, the policy is nothing but more political maneuvering by the administration to realize its agenda — of resuming economic and social operations as soon as possible to foster the impression of recovering economic momentum ahead of the presidential election. 

Harvard University President Larry Bacow made no bones about what he thought of the directive. "Its cruelty surpassed only by its recklessness." he said in a statement.

The case is due to be heard in court on Tuesday. It is hoped that the broad support that Harvard and the MIT have received from universities and other stakeholders will convince the court of the need to put people's lives and health first.