An international student in Dakota del Sur, who won two degrees in the middle of his fight against the Trump administration attempt to deport her, has been granted a court order.
Priya Saxena, who is from India, received a doctorate in chemical and biological engineering and a mastery in chemical engineering at the South Dakota School and Technology last weekend. A little over a month ago, Saxena had been notified that her visa and her state in the country had been revoked.
Saxena’s lawyer, Jim Leach, told NBC News that his only infraction was for a failure of an emergency vehicle four years ago, which he described as “the lowest possible traffic crime.”
Saxena, who sued the Trump administration, was granted a temporary restriction order until the end of this week, which allowed him to collect his titles. And on Thursday morning, a preliminary court order was granted that prevents the government from trying to stop it or deport it.
“The rule of law saved an innocent person from an illegal action of this administration,” Leach said. “Dr. Saxena is exactly the type of person we should love in this country.”
“The Government sent these letters, regardless of what the conviction was, even for a traffic condemnation,” Leach said about the visa and the state revocations of Saxena. “I have had more traffic convictions since then.”
The National Security Department did not immediately respond to the request for comments from NBC News.
Saxena had been in the country with a student visa that did not expire until 2027. But on April 7, she received an email from the United States embassy in New Delhi, notifying her that her visa had been revoked, according to judicial documents.
Later, a school official told him that his registration had been completed in the student and exchanges visiting system (SEVIS), which maintains information about non -immigrant students and exchange visitors.
While Saxena received traffic violation in 2021, he paid a fine and, when requesting his most recent visa, revealed the information to the government, according to judicial documents.
“The Government once again issued its visa and then returns three and a half years later and says: ‘Oh, wait a minute. Get out of the country now,” said Leach. “It simply makes no sense.”
Due to his loss of status, his school at that time also notified him that he could not receive his pH.D. Bachelor, in which he had been working since 2020, as scheduled this year, according to judicial documents.
While the Trump administration said last month that the legal states of international students will restore until immigration and customs application believe a new framework for the endings, Leach said that the state of Saxena was not affected since ICE had to comply with the judge’s orders in his case. However, the judge granted the temporary restriction order last month, extending the deadline to complete his studies.
Saxena’s graduation coincided with a separate and very controversial graduation that weekend. The secretary of the DHS, Kristi Noem, received an honorary degree at Dakota State University. The protesters gathered at school to criticize the treatment of international students and the hard line immigration policies of the administration.
“You have this woman from India who obtained a doctoral degree in chemical and biological engineering, which obviously requires an incredible amount of work and brain,” Leach said. “Then you have Kristi Noem receiving an honorary title for something. And she dodges the protesters while she is there … it was something out of a really distant novel.”
DHS last month revealed at a judicial hearing in Washington that used 10 to 20 employees to administer the names of 1.3 million students born abroad through the National Crime Information Center, a computerized FBI index that includes criminal record information.
The process, supervised by DHS’s interim executive director, Robert Hammer, populated 6,400 hits, said Andre Watson, deputy director of DHS. And from there, many students experienced terminations of their records in Sevis.
The names were also sent to the State Department, and approximately 3,000 students revoked their visas, Watson said during the audience.
Development has generated criticism of immigration lawyers and legal defenders, who point out that the National Crime Information Center may not have the most up -to -date information. The index is based on cities, counties, states and other sources to voluntarily report their data.
Kathleen Bush-Joseph, lawyer and policy analyst of the United States immigration policy program at the non-partisan migration policy institute mentioned above that the database does not always have the final provisions of the cases. And others have mentioned that this is perhaps the reason why students who have been dismissed or not convicted have experienced a loss of status.
