On August 6, 2025, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) filed a suit against Secretary of State Marco Rubio on behalf of The Stanford Daily student newspaper, and two anonymous plaintiffs, citing Rubio and the Trump Administration’s attacks on free speech through the use of immigration laws to arrest and deport students in the U.S. on visas for protected speech. The lawsuit challenges immigration laws that give the secretary of state the authority to revoke any visas at any time, and specifically to revoke visas from those the secretary of state deems “potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences” as unconstitutional.
These laws have come under particular scrutiny after Rubio’s use of them to arrest and initiate deportation proceedings for two students: Mahmoud Khalil, a Palestinian graduate student and negotiator and spokesperson for pro-Palestinian student protestors at Columbia University; and Rümeysa Öztürk, a Turkish graduate student at Tufts University, after she co-authored an opinion piece in the Tufts Daily that called for the university’s divestment from Israel and acknowledgment of the genocide of Palestinians. Öztürk’s arrest in particular, and the visa revocations for a number of other students associated with pro-Palestinian protests or beliefs, have “[cast] a pall of fear over millions of noncitizens, who now worry that voicing the “wrong” opinion about America or Israel will result in deportation,” in the words of FIRE.
FIRE filed both the lawsuit challenging the aforementioned laws and a primary injunction to halt immediately the government’s use of them on behalf of The Stanford Daily and two anonymous plaintiffs, two “legal noncitizens with no criminal record who engaged in pro-Palestinian speech and now fear deportation and visa revocation because of their expression.” Greta Reich, editor-in-chief of The Stanford Daily, highlighted the fear that the invocation of these laws against student journalists has caused, and reported to FIRE that the paper “had reporters turn down assignments, request the removal of some of their articles, and even quit the paper because they fear deportation for being associated with speaking on political topics, even in a journalistic capacity.”
This past month, the Student Press Law Center (SPLC) proposed an amici curiae brief in support of The Stanford Daily, in conjunction with the Associate Collegiate Press, the College Media Association, and fifty-five student newspapers across the country, including The College Voice. The brief stresses the “atmosphere of fear” and “chilling effects” that Rubio’s policies have brought, not only at Stanford, but by student journalists and writers, especially noncitizen writers, at universities and colleges across the country, which stands in direct violation of the First Amendment. Subsequent silences on dissenting opinions, whether over the United States’ relationship to Israel, ICE raids, and other issues facing the country at the time, are demonstrative, to the SPLC, of unlawful government conduct. Both student’s fears to write and hesitancy to publish dissenting opinions, and overwhelming requests for anonymity that can compromise a paper’s commitment to transparency, have been cited as noticeably hindering the functions of student newspapers across the country.
The Tufts Daily stated how they signed onto the brief as they “are committed to protecting the rights of our contributors and staff to freedom of speech,” for citizen and non-citizen student journalists alike, but also because “as [they] watched and reported on the detainment of one of [their] own peers, graduate student Rümeysa Öztürk, in response to her op-ed publication, [they] felt that The Stanford Daily’s lawsuit would help prevent that from happening to anyone else on [their] campus or at any university.”
“We also signed because Öztürk is cited in this case as an example of an international student whose F-1 visa was revoked for exercising her free speech in our publication, and that direct correlation to us could mean that the Daily’s signature may have a notable impact on the deliberations of the case,” they said. “While it’s plausible that the Trump administration may target us for signing this amicus brief, possible retaliation did not alter our decision because of our belief that freedom of speech is a fundamental principle of college campuses and the country as a whole.”
Dylan Fee, Editor in Chief of the Tufts Daily, told us: “Personally, I think this case could be a landmark decision that affects news publications on every college campus in this country… when students are scared into silence in the place where they’re meant to learn how to speak up, it causes a ripple effect of fear for anyone that wants to voice their dissent.”
Student journalists across the country are reporting the same concerns, as well as the same hope for the case. Trinity Poon, Editor in Chief of The Bates Student, who individually signed onto the brief, affirmed that “The Bates Student and other college newspapers [are] uniquely positioned to report on their campus communities– there are no other writers as knowledgeable and connected that can report on the issues and events that affect this particular public… to fulfill this mission, it’s essential that all students feel they can freely report on their campus community without the threat of retribution.” Editor in Chief of the Trinity Tripod, Savannah Brooks, stated that she signed onto the brief as they’d “seen a significant decrease in international students willing to speak to the Tripod or write for the Tripod following the new administration.”
On October 10, 2025, we at “The College Voice” were reached out to by the Student Press Law Center via email to join the Student Press Law Center’s amicus brief in The Stanford Daily Publishing Corp., et al., v. Marco Rubio, in his official capacity as Secretary of State, et al.,. Following a close read and discussion of the information provided, we as an editorial board made the decision to sign on to this amicus brief in broad support of freedom of speech of noncitizen and citizen student journalists at Connecticut College and elsewhere. This decision occurred on October 12, 2025, and reflects our organizational commitment to protect the rights of all who choose to write for “The College Voice.”
Though the decision to join the suit was not taken lightly by our editorial board, we ultimately believe it to be the correct choice. Just last year, one of our fellow NESCAC conference newspapers was affected by the issues the lawsuit aims to address when Tufts University PhD student Rümeysa Öztürk was detained and moved to an ICE center after writing an op-ed. Our collegiate connection to “The Tufts Daily” further informed our resolution to endorse the case.
As around 10% of our school is made up of international students—and we have had multiple international students write for us or work on our editorial board—the problem of protecting our writer’s safety has come up more frequently following Öztürk’s detention. While we as a student newspaper cannot single-handedly ensure the safety of our writers, we believe in the power of numbers. It is our hope that mass advocacy for the protection of student journalism promotes the safety of all students across the nation to be able to openly express their opinion within a free press forum.
