A total of 11 international students within the Texas A&M system have had their visas terminated, according to the student-run Battalion newspaper. Credit: Shutterstock / University of College

Students at Texas universities are among the hundreds of international scholars nationwide targeted for deportation by the Trump White House as it cracks down on pro-Palestinian protests and other forms of dissent, according to news reports.

Texas A&M officials on Tuesday told The Battalion student newspaper that the federal government has terminated the legal status of 10 international students at the school’s College Station campus. The feds also revoked the visa of a student at the system’s Texas A&M-Galveston campus, according to the report.

What’s more, the Department of Homeland Security has yanked away the visas of two international students at the University of Texas, News4SA reported Monday.

“Specifically, they are changing their Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (SEVIS) record from Active to Terminated, which essentially means they no longer have legal status in the U.S.,” Texas A&M’s International Student and Scholar Services director Samantha Clement wrote in an email obtained by The Battalion.

“This is an unprecedented situation being faced by nearly all U.S. institutions at the same time, so we are essentially figuring it out as we go along,” Clement also wrote.

A&M officials didn’t indicate that any Texas A&M-San Antonio students were caught up in the dragnet.

The University of Texas at San Antonio didn’t respond to the Current’s request for comment on whether the Trump administration has changed the immigration status of any of its students.

President Donald Trump said at the beginning of his second term that international students who participated in the nationwide protests against Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza last year should be deported. Those threats were amplified last month when the U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said students coming to U.S. schools protest won’t be granted visas.

“If you apply for a student visa to come to the United States and you say you’re coming not just to study, but to participate in movements that vandalize universities, harass students, take over buildings and cause chaos, we’re not giving you that visa,” Rubio told reporters during a press conference.

One of the UT students whose visa was targeted by the feds hails from India, while the other is from Lebanon, according to News4’s reporting.

Federal officials didn’t notify UT that the students’ immigration statuses had changed, according to the Houston Chronicle, and school officials only learned about the development after checking a government database that tracks international student visas.

The feds said the UT students’ visas were revoked because the pair had been identified in a criminal records check, the Chronicle reported. It’s unclear whether the international students were targeted due to involvement in the pro-Palestine protests last spring.

The Chronicle also reported that three of the Texas A&M students’ terminations were related to “long-resolved issues,” including a speeding ticket in one case.

The sudden spike in student visa terminations comes weeks after Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested Tufts University PhD student Rumeysa Ozturk for writing an op-ed encouraging her school to divest from Israel. The Turkish student’s arrest, which was caught on camera, sparked protests in Boston.

Ozturk’s arrest followed that of Mahmoud Khalil, an Algerian international student at Columbia University, who was picked up by ICE over allegations he participated in and organized pro-Palestinian protests last year.

Both Ozturk and Khalil are being held in a detention center in Louisiana. Civil rights groups argue the Trump administration relocated them across the country to make it harder for them to defend themselves against deportation.

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This article appears in Apr 2-15, 2025.

Michael Karlis is a multimedia journalist at the San Antonio Current, whose coverage in print and on social media focuses on local and state politics. He is a graduate of American University in Washington,...