Jun 5, 2025 | 🛂 Trump's new travel ban, threats against Columbia and Harvard

Hi everyone!
 

Trump has instituted a new travel ban, saying "We will not allow people to enter our country who wish to do us harm." The ban is more of a restriction, targeting certain kinds of visas from nations that do not do proper vetting procedures for visas. The visa-restricted nations are Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan, and Venezuela while the outright bans are on travel from Afghanistan, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Myanmar, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen.

During his first term, Democrats framed his travel bans as a ban on travel from Muslim-majority countries in an effort to try to make it a race thing, which I remember from back then because I was mostly Trump-opposed at the time. Since then, I dug into it, read the executive order, and looked at the underlying reasons it turns out that there are many nations that do not have a very operational government and don't keep track of terrorists, so when visas are issued, there's no recorded background to check.

This makes it super easy for terrorist types to come to the US, criminals, or human traffickers, or whoever else. It's not a great situation. Egypt isn't on the list, though Trump said the restrictions were in response to the Boulder terrorist attack by the Egyptian man. Also, Afghans on the special visa program who were those who helped the US are exempt from the ban. A bunch of them have been waiting in Pakistan until they get approval to come over.

Our Ivy League schools are in even more trouble this morning as Trump threatens the accreditation of Columbia University (not cool, Mr. President, seriously, they're doing their best), and further restricts Harvard's international student visas. Columbia complied and they're still being smacked, which seems unfair. In the past two years, their leadership has changed twice. They've expelled students who engaged in violent, disruptive protests, suspended students just recently who were part of the library occupation during finals, and are trying to do what's best for students.
 

Harvard has not complied, and while the school is losing their access to big foreign piles of money through the Trump administration's plans to end foreign student visas, it still has its accreditation.

Of Harvard, Trump said "Harvard University is no longer a trustworthy steward of international student and exchange visitor programs. When a university refuses to uphold its legal obligations, including its record-keeping and reporting obligations, the consequences ripple far beyond the campus. They jeopardize the integrity of the entire United States student and exchange visitor visa system, compromise national security, and embolden other institutions to similarly disregard the rule of law."

On the New York mayoral debate stage last night, all the candidates said that Mahmoud Khalil, a former Columbia grad student who finished his studies in December, should be released from custody and reunited with his family. He's got a new baby at home, he's got a green card, and he's got a penchant for aligning with the ideology of terrorists. The Trump team says he's a threat to national security.

Each of the 9 candidates said that Khalil should be released, saying that he needs due process, proof of ties to terrorism, etc. Cuomo said, "This is a continuation of Trump eroding democracy, chipping away at due process, he should be released, he should be released immediately, he shouldn't have been detained in the first place."

Here's what's on my desk today:

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