Foreign-Student Visa Rule Could Impact Husker Roster

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The Huskers have multiple players from overseas who could end up ineligible as a result.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) just announced a rule earlier this week that could have disastrous consequences for the Nebraska Cornhuskers basketball roster. The decision announced by DHS would result in any school that moves to a 100-percent online curriculum for a student this fall would see visas to be present in the United States revoked for foreign-students. DHS justified their decision by stating any student who does not need to be present in a classroom does not meet the need for a visa to be lawfully in the United States during that online semester.

Schools such as Harvard had recently announced that they would be entirely online only this fall. In light of this, Harvard and MIT filed a lawsuit yesterday against the DHS decision. Now, how this could have the potential to impact the Nebrasketball team is if UNL reverses course (which seems highly improbable at present, but by no means completely impossible) and moves to an online only format for the fall, or has to end all in-classroom instruction early in the semester. To be clear, the DHS rule would revoke visas to foreign-students at that point and they would need to leave the country. Should that happen, almost half of the team would no longer be able to be legally present to participate. For the full roster affected, see Robin Washut’s helpful list below: