By Emma Tucker, Andy Rose, CNN

(CNN) — President Donald Trump has signed a proclamation to suspend international visas for new students at Harvard University, the White House announced Wednesday, in a dramatic escalation of its efforts to block foreign nationals from enrolling at the elite university.

The proclamation temporarily blocks the entry of nearly all new international Harvard students under visas most use to study at US universities or participate in academic exchange programs. It also directs the Secretary of State “to consider revoking” those visas – known as F, M and J visas – for current Harvard students who meet the proclamation’s “criteria,” the White House said in a statement.

The move throws Harvard’s ability to enroll international students – which make up about 27% of the student body – into doubt once again just days after a federal judge blocked the administration’s last attempt targeting foreign students at the nation’s oldest and wealthiest university.

While Harvard has argued in legal filings that White House orders were behind the Department of Homeland Security’s effort to revoke its ability to host international students, this is the first time Trump has gotten directly involved in the dispute at the center of his broader battle against elite US academics.

Harvard “will continue to protect its international students,” its spokesperson told CNN. “This is yet another illegal retaliatory step taken by the Administration in violation of Harvard’s First Amendment rights.”

Trump briefly mentioned his fight with Harvard on Friday during a meeting with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in the Oval Office, repeating that the administration wants a list of Harvard’s international students – information the government already has.

“I think they’re starting to behave actually, if you want to know the truth,” Trump said, referring to Harvard.

Harvard is battling the White House on two fronts, as the university also has sued the Trump administration for cutting more than $2.2 billion in federal funds and threatening billions more, as well as Harvard’s tax-exempt status. That money remains frozen as the case is pending in court, scheduled for arguments next month.

The White House said the latest move is an attempt to “safeguard national security,” accusing Harvard of having “concerning foreign ties and radicalism.” The announcement also cited the university’s alleged failure to “provide sufficient information” about foreign students and “reporting deficient data on only three students.”

“Harvard is either not fully reporting its disciplinary records for foreign students or is not seriously policing its foreign students,” the White House said. It also accused the Ivy League institution of failing to address antisemitism on campus as well and persistently “prioritizing” diversity, equity, and inclusion – designed to advance racial, gender, class and other representation in public spaces – that Trump decries as “illegal and immoral discrimination.”

The new proclamation “exempts aliens whose entry is deemed in the national interest” and does not apply to international students attending other US universities through the Student and Exchange Visitor Program, known as SEVP, run by the Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement unit, or ICE.

The president’s order is scheduled to last six months unless extended, states the proclamation, which gives the attorney general and the secretary of Homeland Security 90 days to make a recommendation on whether it should be extended.

“Harvard’s conduct has rendered it an unsuitable destination for foreign students and researchers,” the proclamation reads.

The proclamation immediately drew condemnation from China, the second-largest sender of international students to the US. “China-US educational cooperation is mutually beneficial. China has always opposed the politicization of educational cooperation,” said Lin Jian, a spokesperson from China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in a regular news conference Thursday.

The president’s new action against Harvard came on the same day he issued a proclamation banning most travel to the US from 12 countries, with tighter restrictions on another seven countries.

Most presidential proclamations do not carry the force of law in the same way executive orders do. While they can address policy matters — such as Trump’s announcements on tariffs — they are most often used for routine declarations, like recognizing Mother’s Day. In recent cases, Trump has used proclamations to announce his intentions, citing legal authority he claims to already possess.

Trump’s Harvard proclamation reflects a clear attempt to frustrate the school’s recent success in court against the White House. Last week, a judge temporarily blocked the Department of Homeland Security’s decision to drop Harvard from SEVP, which would have made it impossible for the university to host any international students.

US District Court Judge Allison Burroughs said she would issue an indefinite order preventing the Homeland Security Department from making any changes to Harvard’s international student visa program.

“I want to make sure that the status quo is clearly maintained to the extent that we can make that happen,” Burroughs, an Obama appointee, said in court last Thursday.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem had ordered the termination of Harvard’s SEVP certification, citing the university’s refusal to turn over the conduct records of foreign students requested in April by her agency. The school argued it had turned over all the information it had, saying the government’s demand included records it doesn’t keep.

Harvard has accused the government of failing to follow its own requirements for removing a university from the SEVP program and argued the revocation was “clear retaliation” for its refusal of the government’s ideologically rooted policy demands, including banning masks at campus protests and expanding “viewpoint diversity” within the university community, subject to third-party auditing.

“This is really like sentence first and verdict afterwards, so there continues to be a different set of rules for Harvard, a different set of procedures for Harvard, a different set of laws for Harvard,” said university attorney Ian Heath Gershengorn in court last week.

Although the administration had previously agreed to follow procedures giving Harvard 30 days to contest the loss of its international program, Gershengorn told Burroughs that a court order was still necessary. He said he feared the government might attempt a new strategy.

“We want to make sure there are no shenanigans between now and then,” he said last week.

The Department of Education has warned US colleges and universities of possible consequences if they don’t take adequate steps to protect Jewish students and separately threatened federal funding of any American academic institution that considers race in most aspects of student life.

The administration also escalated its fight with Columbia University on Wednesday, declaring the school doesn’t meet accreditation standards because of its failure to protect Jewish students.

The White House has homed in on foreign students and staff it believes participated in contentious campus protests over the Israel-Hamas war. The administration’s attacks on Harvard began March 31, when Trump officials sent Harvard a letter advising they would review all roughly $9 billion of the Ivy League institution’s contracts and grants.

Last week, the White House directed federal agencies to cancel all remaining contracts with Harvard University – about $100 million in all, two senior Trump administration officials told CNN.

Some Harvard staff worry draining the university of its foreign students would debilitate the academic prowess of both the institution and, potentially, American academia as a whole.

“This retaliatory action threatens serious harm to the Harvard community and our country, and undermines Harvard’s academic and research mission,” university spokesperson Jason Newton said last month after the administration moved to ban Harvard from enrolling foreign students.

In the 2024-2025 academic year, there were 6,793 international students enrolled at Harvard, and its international academic population is comprised of 9,970 people, according to the university.

International students are more likely to pay full tuition at US colleges, in part because most aren’t eligible for federal financial aid, bringing significant funding to colleges, CNN has reported.

More than three-quarters of international students primarily fund their education themselves, through their family or through current employment, the Institute of International Education found. Less than one-fifth received primary funding from their US college or university.

This story has been updated with additional details.

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CNN’s Elizabeth Wolfe, Danya Gainor, Katelyn Polantz and Devan Cole contributed to this report.