Columbia emailed international students offering help—and linked to an ICE site calling to report them
Columbia University sent out an email highlighting financial assistance for international students who may be facing "hardship" in their home countries.
But the gesture is backfiring because of a link the original email included that directed students to a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) web page asking for people to report students for visa fraud.
A viral X post about the email noted that "when you click on the link for 'Special Student Relief,' you're taken to the ICE website to report people."
The user went on to caution international students against "trust[ing] Columbia to protect you," citing the detainments of Mahmoud Khalil and Mohsen Mahdawi, both green card holders detained by ICE over their involvement in the pro-Palestine protests on Columbia's campus.
The viral X post quickly drew condemnation, with many decrying it as "evil" and "disgusting."
"Unbelievable! Columbia pretending to 'help' international students then linking them to what is fundamentally a deportation page," blasted one critic.
"Turns out the Ivy League university is the vanguard of Orwellian-style dystopia," wrote someone else.
But while the university did indeed link to an ICE web page that contained information about reporting international students, the email was far from a guise to encourage students to aid in deportations.
The "International Student Hardship Fund" page advertised in the email states that the university "benefits immeasurably from the diverse views and experiences of our remarkable international students, faculty, staff, and alumni."
As such, the university set up a fund, which generally can provide grants of $1,000-$2,500, to assist with unexpected costs for international students, such as those arising from natural disasters, armed conflict, humanitarian crises, and other unforeseen events in their home countries.
But eligibility for a grant requires students to come from a country identified as undergoing hardship by the Department of Homeland Security or the World Health Organization.
That's where the criticism of Columbia's email stems from, as the original version linked to an ICE web page about the DHS list of eligible countries.
The link went to "What's New" on ICE's Student and Exchange Visitor Program page. It includes information about grant eligibility, but that information requires scrolling down.
What was immediately visible was an alert at the top of the page that reads: "If you are aware of student visa fraud or nonimmigrant students working unlawfully in the U.S., report it here."
"This is actually the right link," concluded one commenter of the original version. "The ice website is designed horribly. If you scroll down enough you'll see the special student relief list (but it's on the what's new page rather than a dedicated page)."
Columbia has since updated the link in question to a DHS web page about Special Student Relief that contains no mention of reporting international students to immigration authorities.
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