Ximena Solorzano, Head Photography Editor

The Yale Daily News on Wednesday joined an amicus brief supporting Stanford University’s student newspaper in a lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s use of a federal immigration law to allegedly suppress political speech by international students, including student journalists.

Wednesday’s brief — which was signed by 44 student newspapers across the nation, as well as 11 student newsroom leaders — argued that the arrests of international students whose political speech was deemed a threat to U.S. foreign policy interests have had a chilling effect on student newspapers beyond The Stanford Daily. The brief was prepared by the Student Press Law Center, a legal advocacy nonprofit.

“What our brief does is show the court and the world that this issue is bigger than one newsroom or one arrest or one deportation,” Matthew Cate, the author of the brief and a member of the center’s board of directors, said in a phone interview with the News. “This issue is being played out all across the country with devastating impact, and we need to demonstrate and show to the court what the ramifications are of its decision.”

Ariela Lopez ’27, the editor in chief and president of the News, wrote in a statement that the News has seen international students at Yale more reluctant to contribute to the publication or speak to reporters for articles.

“Independent student journalists are responsible for recording the news of the day on and around campus,” she wrote. “When international students are deterred from sharing their perspectives or afraid of preserving their voices in the News’ historical record, our ability to fulfill that responsibility is compromised. Our signing of this brief does not affect our continued coverage.”

Lopez added that the News’ Executive Committee, which functions as the board of directors of the nonprofit Yale Daily News Publishing Co. and is a subset of the Managing Board, made the decision to sign the brief. Lopez was not involved in the editing of this article.

The Stanford Daily’s complaint, initially filed on Aug. 6, names Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem as defendants. It alleges that the Trump administration has violated the First and Fifth Amendments by using two provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act to start deportation proceedings against international students based on Rubio’s judgment that they compromised U.S. foreign policy interests.

According to the complaint, international student writers at The Stanford Daily have been self-censoring due to fear of deportation since federal immigration authorities detained three international students who publicly advocated against Israel’s war in Gaza — Mahmoud Khalil and Mohsen Mahdawi at Columbia University and Rümeysa Öztürk at Tufts University.

Instances of self-censoring include “declining to cover pro-Palestinian student protests at Stanford, refraining from covering topics related to the conflict in Gaza, and seeking removal of their previous articles about it,” as well as quitting the newspaper, according to the lawsuit. The Daily’s complaint also claims that international students have “largely stopped talking to” the newspaper, “particularly when it comes to discussing topics like Israel and Palestine.”

Attorneys for the U.S. government argued in a Sept. 24 motion that the plaintiffs lack standing because they rely on “speculative injuries” that are insufficiently imminent and based on third parties’ injuries.

Even if the plaintiffs had standing, the motion says, “Congress has wide discretion to legislate, and the Executive has wide discretion to vindicate, the foreign-policy interests of the United States” with respect to student visa holders.

The Wednesday brief by student newspapers and editors argues that the federal government’s actions erode the “fundamental pro-democratic values” that campus publications teach to student journalists and readers, both citizens and noncitizens.

The main student newspapers at seven of the eight Ivy League schools — all but the Columbia Daily Spectator — signed the brief. Other campus publications that signed the brief have cited in editors’ notes decreasing levels of participation from international students, as well as increased requests to anonymize and remove published content.

The brief was also joined by the Associated Collegiate Press and the College Media Association.

Colin McDonell, a lawyer with the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression who represents the plaintiffs, wrote in an email to the News that an amicus brief provides the court with more perspectives from parties outside of the lawsuit who have an interest in its outcome.

“That so many student news organizations like the Yale Daily News united for this amicus brief reinforces the point that the chill on speech experienced by the Stanford Daily and its noncitizen members isn’t unique, that student newspapers across the country are suffering these harms to their rights,” McDonell wrote.

The Stanford Daily was founded as The Daily Palo Alto in 1892.