In an email sent to the community yesterday, President Clayton Rose wrote that Bowdoin will submit an amicus brief supporting a lawsuit that Harvard University, the University of Southern California and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) submitted on Wednesday.

The lawsuit follows an announcement from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on Monday that all students on F-1 visas whose university curricula are entirely online must leave the country and that any students currently outside the United States will be barred from entering or reentering the country.

Bowdoin announced on June 22 that nearly all courses other than first-year seminars would be online. Under ICE’s new regulations, Bowdoin’s international students, nearly 10 percent of the student body or approximately 200 students, will be required to leave the country or will be unable to enter.

“It is an appalling and divisive announcement at a time when so many in our country and around the world are already dealing with extraordinary challenges and hardships—and it is one tied directly to the politics of ‘re-opening’ the country and to the administration’s longstanding and ongoing assault on immigrants and immigration,” wrote Rose in another email to the community addressing ICE’s decision on July 7.

Bowdoin joins a list of colleges and universities who announced plans to submit amicus briefs. Other small liberal arts colleges such as Swarthmore, Bates and Middlebury have also announced intent to support the lawsuit.

Additionally, Rose informed the community that he is in contact and has been working with other schools and umbrella organizations for higher education and the Maine congressional delegation.

“Senators Collins and King and Representative Pingree all oppose the move by ICE and are engaged in work to have it changed,” wrote Rose.

This is a developing story and will be updated if new information becomes available.