"Even What I Say In Class"

COLBY

Over the past six chapters, we’ve traced the story of the visa revocations and SEVIS terminations from the beginning of April 2025, all the way to now, the late spring of 2026. 

Today, in our final chapter, we’re looking at how the effects of this visa turmoil have continued to linger at Fordham.

But first. It’s been a long time since we’ve published Chapter 1. And I think it would be best to begin with a recap. A look back, at where we’ve been. Before we take a deep dive into where we are now.

Enjoy.

--

Late one evening in early April, 2025, Fordham students got a very unusual email.

RIYA

I sat up immediately, and I was reading the email. And I just realized that Oh My God, this is an actual issue that is not going away. 

AMAL

I guess, in my head, I was like: Fordham’s such a small school. So, I’m like: no way this would happen at Fordham. 

JUAN

And I was like: Oh, wow. This is happening. This is a real situation. And this might affect people I know. And I’m kind of scared. 

COLBY

The message was from the president of their university. Tania Tetlow. We asked some students to read it to us.

SOPHIA

Dear Fordham, I write with a heavy heart. 

...

As you have seen in recent news, several faculty have been stopped at the border or detained. And in the last few days, a growing number of students from a wide range of countries, have had their visas revoked without explanation and without notice.

ANNAMARIE

Today we discovered that this has affected one of our own undergraduate students.

...

I wish it were within my power to offer you reassurance.

COLBY

It was worrisome. For a lot of students — domestic, international, whatever — it was the moment a national issue became local. And confusing.

There was confusion over the wording. Some of the students had actually thought —

COLBY

the student had gotten deported? 

SOPHIA

Yeah. 

COLBY

Really? 

SOPHIA

It seemed — it sounded that way to me.

COLBY

That wasn’t true. But that didn’t make the situation any better.

And to make matters even more confusing, when all this stuff started at Fordham that April, it was different from what was happening across the country.

JENNIFER

So, what was happening in the spring, was the government was not, apparently, revoking people’s visas, mostly. What they were doing was canceling their entries in the database.

COLBY

That’s Professor Jennifer Gordon. She teaches Immigration Law at Fordham’s Law School. And what she’s talking about is this governmental database, called the

JENNIFER

Student and Exchange Visitor Information System, SEVIS. S-E-V-I-S. That was the database. Was that they were terminating students in that database.

COLBY

There also were visa revocations that semester. But we’ll tell you about those in just a second. For now, Jennifer is explaining the SEVIS terminations — how the government was —

JENNIFER

canceling their entries, you know literally wiping them out of the database — 

COLBY

Like pressing delete? 

I’m not one hundred percent sure. But I think that they were going into the database and either removing the person, or toggling off the validity of their presence in the database. And you have to be in the database to study. That created a lot of confusion. 

...

COLBY

What did that mean for students? Do you know? 

JENNIFER

Nobody knew. 

COLBY

Wait, wait, wait. So, this happens. And everyone looks at each other and says: We don’t know what to do? 

JENNIFER

That’s correct. And so immigration lawyers are holding webinars. And hundreds of people from universities and the students themselves are attending. And students are desperate to know what is the impact on me, and schools are desperate to know. And the answer is, we don’t know. Because this isn’t what happens.

COLBY

This isn’t what happens — but it was. It was happening. The complication with the SEVIS database — that wasn’t really clear at the time. Mostly, we just understood that Fordham University had been hit. And we began to wonder: How would our school respond? It did already have a plan.

MICHAEL

Oh yeah. This was not something that they just happened to log in and see that day. This was something that we knew was happening at other schools.

COLBY

That’s Mike Trerotola, Chief of Staff to President Tetlow.

MICHAEL

And so we put together a group that was filled with folks from functional areas across the university, as well as professors who had real expertise in these kinds of issues — or who, themselves, had gone through them, as either a student from another country, or as a faculty member from another country.

COLBY

Mike says President Tetlow —

MICHAEL

asked us to start getting together a kind of rapid-response group, a tiger team, if you will. 

ANNIKA

The tiger team, yes...

CAREY

I did not put that name, but people do refer to it as the tiger team. 

MICHAEL

A working group, whatever you want to call it.

COLBY

Those other two voices, by the way, are professors who were actually on this Tiger Team. Annika and Carey. Here’s Annika again:

ANNIKA

I think we were giving some feedback based on what we’d seen with our students, with faculty, what we knew about the broader issues.

CAREY

But it was, I think, unique — the first time I’ve ever seen that happen to kind of address the way the university is working through a joint taskforce between administrators and faculty.

COLBY

There was a lot of anxiety within the student body. A lot of students really weren’t sure how the University would handle this.

One of the reasons for that distrust was because, nationally, the government targeted pro-Palestine activists. 

And at Fordham, the year before all this went down, the University had broken a lot of trust with students. Fordham Administration had facilitated arrests of student protesters.

DAN

I remember just watching through the glass. The first thing I remember happening was they issued suspensions.

AMAL

They gave them suspension letters. And they held up the suspension letters at the window so we can see it. 

...

And the NYPD just kind of came in, grabbed their arms, and tied them up. 

DAN

And they went in, and they took the remaining protesters. Just kind of grabbed them, put them in zip-tie cuffs, and took them out the back.

KENNY

I was manhandled pretty hard.

MICHAEL

The very mechanism by which an ICE raid would occur was established and was built by Fordham in their response to student protesters. The very same lack of transparency. The lack of information. The side-stepping. The tarp that they tried to hide — they created a culture of secrecy.

COLBY

At a national level, the Trump administration is targeting pro-Palestinian student activists. And Fordham University just got hit. So, the big question: Would Fordham facilitate arrests of these students, just like they did the year before?

Some thought that the students had to leave the country immediately.

MICHAEL

So, by law, when your visa is revoked — and you can find this on department of homeland security stuff — when it’s revoked, you have either two weeks or ten days. It’s a number I forgot off the top of my head. But you have that amount of time to basically leave the country. They call it Self-Deport, before they’re going to come after you. That’s basically what they say.

COLBY

But the thing is, remember, these were SEVIS terminations in April. And that means it wasn’t clear, legally speaking, if the students had to leave the country.

That Tiger Team made up of professors and staff members — they tried their hardest to help Fordham figure out how it would help these students.

MICHAEL

I think this was probably the most effective Tiger Team, rapid response group — whatever you want to call it — that I’ve ever been involved in.

COLBY

After maybe the first week or so, it really did seem like Fordham cared a lot. President Tetlow herself, told us that she was —

TETLOW

very much worried that this was just an attack on international education itself. And of doing it in a way that, if in fact it was just sort of randomly picking on some of our students and students around the country, the injustice of that.

COLBY

Even to the point that a very critical student, like this student activist, Michael Magazine, was put at ease.

MICHAEL

Fordham did provide, at least, enough of a commitment regarding their international students that besides that initial week or two, there was never a point in time there-onward, where I felt that Fordham would go against that value of protecting international students and allowing ICE onto campus.

COLBY

You know, undergirding all of this, is the fact that Fordham is a professedly Jesuit, Catholic school. But more than that, Fordham’s other religious leaders find common ground in the idea of Fundamental Human Dignity.

JOHN

Every human being deserves respect for his or her own person; for his or her own right to exist; to be treated with compassion, kindness, understanding, patience.

COLBY

That’s Fordham’s Vice President for Mission, a Jesuit — Father John Cecero. And this is Fordham’s Jewish Chaplain Rabbi Katja Vehlow.

KATJA

Jewish tradition has long — always — stressed the presence of those who are not from here. So, in the Hebrew Bible, it’s full of sentences, such as: Take care of the widow, and the orphan, and the stranger. Because you were strangers in Egypt. 

COLBY

Fordham’s Muslim chaplain, Ammar Rahman, put it like this:

AMMAR

Allah did not say —

...

— we have honored the Muslims, or we have honored the Christians, or we have honored the Jews, or we have honored the Blacks or the whites or the Asian. No. He said:

بَنِىٓ ءَادَمَ 

So the entire humanity is something that is honored in the sight of God. In the sight of Allah.

COLBY

And here’s the way President Tetlow put it:

TETLOW

The idea that somehow being foreign makes you suspect is anathema to our faith.

COLBY

In our reporting, we could not get to the bottom of every little action Fordham did to help these international students. But from the people we talked to, it seemed like: 

TETLOW

I was — I was really happy with the way the University handled this moment. And I’m not saying this because I’m of Fordham or I was on this group. I will say, you know, you don’t always have to be happy with how universities handle issues. But I think this is one where Fordham did the right thing.

COLBY

Even so —

TETLOW

universities, to a certain extent, beyond that, beyond saying we’re going to provide legal counsel, are also finding themselves to be a little bit powerless.

COLBY

Fordham — as a community — was dealing with all this uncertainty, and trying to figure out how to respond to it all. And it’s important to note here: In late April, these SEVIS records were reinstated. 

But In May, there were two actual, like real revocations. And those were not resolved. Those students self-deported. Which is to say that this visa turmoil meant that 2 Fordham students lost the ability to study in the United States. 

But the effects of this uncertainty, and all the questions that came with it — those also lingered.

RIYA

But even for me, I wanted to stay, I wanted to search for a job for a month. Give myself a month. But then I moved all my tickets, moved them up early. Left quite soon after graduation, because I was so scared of being in that fire, that I was just like: It’s okay, I’m going to go back home and figure it out once I am home.

GUADALUPE

First you need to try to be as perfect as you can. And then there’s not even the comfort that even if you're perfect, you might not get the visa revoked. It could also be just because of where you come from. Or what race — or, I mean — what your name sounds like.

COLBY

The escalating Federal immigration crackdown only made those fears worsen. But some students began to ask themselves: how should we respond? One Catholic student, AnnaMarie, was asking herself that very question.

ANNAMARIE

Who am I, to be born here and have all this privilege? That is not something that I just accept, or feel really guilty about. But it asks for a response. What that response is, I’m still figuring out. But I think that it’s a question a lot of Fordham students can be asking ourselves.

COLBY

She had the beginnings of an answer.

ANNAMARIE

I just have a vision of all Fordham — [laughs]. The whole Fordham community running to the MetroNorth gate where there’s ICE officers trying to get on Campus. Does that mean they won’t still be able to get on campus and probably detain these students that are vulnerable? Maybe not. But at least we’re doing something about it? 

COLBY

What would the purpose of it be? 

ANNAMARIE

Because we’re saying no!

COLBY

Fundamental Human Dignity says no! It’s the idea that everyone does have this innate god-ness to them. In other words, that their dignity is not earned. Their worth is not conditional. It is infinite, and it is shared.

This chapter, we’re hearing from international and immigrant community members, about how their fears have lingered — and grown — in this new era of America’s attitude toward foreigners.

You’re listening to REVOKED?

This is our last chapter. Our finale. 

We’re going to take a look at how the Fordham community is still dealing with the effects of that tumultuous period. How the fear has stuck around.

It’s coming to you today in five acts, a journey through the different levels of the university.

Act I - Students. How a few international students are still fearful.

Act II - Faculty. An honest conversation about worry with a boisterous professor.

Act III - Staff. How this new political era has impacted a few immigrant staff-members.

Act IV - Admin. President Tetlow tells us that she’s still a bit worried.

And Act V - We head back to the Manhattan of our current moment, with a renowned poem by Emma Lazarus, read aboard the Staten Island ferry.

That’s in a second. I’m your host Colby McCaskill.

ELENA

I’m Elena Dimitriou.

ARIANNA

I’m Arianna Pinna.

COLBY

And this is Chapter 7: “Even What I Say In Class.”

COLBY

Okay, Act 1. Before we get to the students, a little bit of context. The visa turmoil may have quieted down. But President Trump’s immigration agenda did not.

Here’s our producer, Elena, with the details.

ELENA

President Trump's campaign of harsher immigration enforcement did not end with the visa turmoil. It kept going well into the summer. All the way till now. 

There was the announcement that came in late May, 2025. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the government would quote unquote “aggressively revoke” visas of Chinese students. 

The summer after the visa turmoil, the US put more restrictions on who could get a visa, and for how long. 

In June, Trump announced a new Travel Ban. He totally restricted travel, entirely, for people from 12 countries. And set harsh limits on another 7.

Foreign students were ordered to make their social media accounts public. The United States would be looking at your Instagram, TikTok, X, whatever, while they vet you for a potential visa.

I’m not exaggerating. That’s what the Department of State said. Here’s a quote: “Under new guidance, we will conduct a comprehensive and thorough vetting, including online presence, of all student and exchange visitor applicants in the F, M, and J Non-Immigrant classifications.”

In the middle of the summer, Congress passed President Trump’s budget. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act. That piece of legislation turbo charged Trump’s mass deportation agenda. The One Big Beautiful Bill allocated 75 Billion dollars over the next four years — Billion with a B — for Immigration and Customs Enforcement. 

If ICE was it’s own thing, it would be the 17th highest funded military in the whole world — that’s according to data by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

After the summer, ICE launched Operation Midway Blitz in Chicago. That started in September. 

In November, ICE began Operation Charlotte’s Web — that was in Charlotte, North Carolina.

In December, ICE started Operation Metro Surge in the Twin Cities in Minnesota.

All this to say, as we’ve been reporting this series, things have been changing, nationally. 

But that’s not just our conclusion.

One of the voices we’ve been relying on for much of this series is Professor Annika Hinze. She was a part of that Tiger Team that helped Fordham figure out how to navigate all the visa and SEVIS stuff. 

But she’s also an immigration expert. She’s both an immigrant herself, and

ANNIKA

I teach Politics of Immigration. And that is a class where I have to change the syllabus almost every semester. Because this is such an evolving topic, as it is. 

ELENA

And especially right now. Things are changing rapidly. In my interview with her, she explained that this era of the second Trump presidency —

ANNIKA

It’s a challenging moment, right? It’s a — we’re really seeing broad changes in the political arena that we’ve never seen before. We’re talking about academic freedom, freedom of expression, in all sorts of different ways. There’s a big — at the federal government level — there’s a big reconceptualization of immigration, and how this country defines itself vis a vis immigration. In comparison to before.

ELENA

However she told me —

ANNIKA

This country has certainly seen moments like this before, right? So, not to trivialize this moment at all, but the 1920s, right, were a very similar moment. Where you had a backlash against immigration. Where you had, sort of, a nationalist — a white nationalist backlash. This country — intellectuals in this country invented eugenics, right? That then the Nazis actually used or their race theories, as one of the foundations. So, yeah, we’ve definitely seen moments like this before. So, it’s not unprecedented. But is it a break with where we were before? Certainly, yes. 

...

There are control aspects to this, that come with this technology revolution, that are really different.

ELENA

One aspect, for example, is the fact that the government is using your own social media to decide if it wants you in this country. 

That’s a new development.

ANNIKA

But is it a fundamentally new moment? I wouldn’t say so, necessarily.

ELENA

She’s saying: Let’s not pretend the United States has had a spotless record on racism, xenophobia, and the like. 

But it’s also true that for the people going to college in the US right now, in the 2020s — we haven’t really seen a moment quite like this in our political memory. 

If it’s not fundamentally new, it’s at least an escalation.

And this escalation — it’s been influencing students and professors at Fordham, kind of behind the scenes. The fear has been building quietly. And today, we want to bring that to light.

--

Look, I don’t want to pretend that everyone is in agreement here. There’s difference of opinions, even within the international student community. 

One student from Latin America, Juan — he made a good point.

JUAN

I think it depends on who you ask. Because some international students did, most definitely, felt that fear of: Wow, a lot of students are losing their visas. At that period of time, it felt like they were losing their student visas over nothing, you know? And the government was just telling the universities or the students that they had to leave the country. It felt like a shock. It most definitely felt like a shock. And I was — I felt fearful at the time.

ELENA

But during this interview in October of 2025, he wasn’t really scared anymore.

JUAN

No, no. I felt the shock, but I never felt the fear, because I knew personally, in my situation, that I’ve always a solid person, in that sense, you know?

ELENA

But there still is something different here. Maybe for Juan it’s not fear, but it’s something. Because, and maybe you already know what I’m going to say, Juan is not his real name. He wanted to remain anonymous precisely because something's different here. This is how he put it:

JUAN

Right now, it’s sort of hard to express your opinion on this matter specifically. Because there’s definitely a political environment in which International Students have been forced into, where they feel like they can’t really express their opinion completely. Because we run the risk of — we run the risk of being — of facing consequences that we wouldn’t have normally faced in the past.

ELENA

Another international student, Guadalupe — she’s from Peru — explained she’s been acting differently ever since Trump was reelected.

GUADALUPE

Whenever I’m about to go through immigration in the airport, when I’m coming from a country outside the US, I will delete all mention on Trump on my text messages. Even if it’s just news. Or messages of Trump, of anything political. I’m careful about even what I say in class.

ELENA

And even when she’s just out and about in the city, it’s different.

GUADALUPE

Everytime, everytime I’m riding a CitiBike and I think — and I see other people not being mindful, other people ignoring the red lights, because nobody’s coming. And I go: I can’t do that — I can’t do what other people do. Because if I get caught, or I get written up by the police, then I would be on — that I’m at risk of being deported.

ELENA

You know, one international student from China told a similar story. It seems even a tiny infraction, in these times, sparks fear of disaster. 

LEE

My understanding to this, is you have to do something wrong in the first place so they get an excuse to revoke your visa.

ELENA

This is Lee. That’s a pseudonym. He wanted to remain anonymous, and we agreed.

LEE

For me, it was like, after I heard about this entire thing, I start to drive slower. Obey more laws. Try not to break anything.

ELENA

Lee likes to drive his motorcycle on the weekends. But this harsher immigration enforcement has made him reevaluate how he drives.

LEE

Yeah. I do, actually. Because, I’ll be thinking about: Oh, if a cop pulls me over, what’s going to happen? And two years ago, I wasn’t thinking about this. I won’t say how fast I was going, but I was not worried about it. But right now, I’ll be more cautious.

ELENA

Lee’s story is interesting too, because he has more experience in the US than some of his international student friends. 

LEE

So, you know, I came here 2018. That was also Trump, right?

...

We didn’t know he’s like a truly lunatic. So, everything was still on track.

...

I was also applying for the green card. But thanks to Covid-19 and Trump, everything went sideways. So, we actually applied for the green card, it was like 2015. So, now it’s been ten years. And I’m well over 21. So, no green card for me. So, and you see the inflations and everything. And nothing’s been going great. And China is blooming, actually, everything has been beautiful. So, I’m planning just to go back. Yeah. 

ELENA

I don’t know if you caught that last part. But Lee is saying that because of Trump, he’s not planning on staying in the US once he graduates.

LEE

Well, things happen, right? We have seen that Trump made this entire thing unstable.

...

And now people are worrying. Like: My plan was to work for some company after undergrad, and go to grad school after. But now their plans have changed, right? People are wondering, can I stay here? Or what do I do after school?

...

So, people fear more about the US. Fear more about Trump. Because they hear about all this stuff, visa getting revoked. Many many protests. Sometimes even I have to calm my mom down. It would be like: It’s okay. Everything’s fine. It’s totally working well. And so yeah, I think people are definitely getting less desire to come here. 

ELENA

But again — just to reiterate. This is not how he always felt. This is a different political moment. An escalation. This wasn’t how he was feeling —

LEE

Two years ago.

...

Because we didn’t even think about this, right? We never thought we could get our visa revoked. If I get a speeding ticket, I would just deal with it. Because I’m somehow still a part of the society, even though I’m an international student. But now it feels like we’re more separated, actually.

...

You have to be more careful. You have to be extra careful for not breaking any law.

...

Like I said, I think it separates us. It almost feels like they don’t want us here, somehow.

...

I won’t say it’s a new thing. Because it was already hard for an international student to stay here. But now it seems like there’s no hope.

ELENA

If you’re a Fordham student listening to this: This is your classmate. You almost certainly have sat next to a student in the same position as Lee. Think about all the classes you've had over the years. 

Yeah. Either you’re thinking about this, or you’ve sat next to someone who has thought about this.

Professor Carey Kasten. Remember, part of the Tiger Team? The words she used to describe this were —

CAREY

A culture of fear, right? They certainly — I was just talking with a faculty member today about student thesis topics, and students being more cautious than they used to be about choosing what they want to write about. Because then that could be out on the internet somewhere. And they might not get the government job that they want, right? There’s an element of fear that has affected the real things people do in life, and the knowledge that we produce and the way we talk about things. And that is a desired effect, I think, from the administration.

COLBY

Welcome back to REVOKED? This is Act II.

So, the visa turmoil at Fordham, and Trump’s immigration crackdown — those two things have not just impacted students. They’ve also influenced faculty — the way professors think about the future safety of their students. 

And to demonstrate this, I want to introduce you to a new voice.

MARK

Okay, so this was something — let me just tell you the concept behind this. When, you know, Trump was elected a second time, he indicated that he was going to try and deport millions and millions of immigrants, of undocumented immigrants.

COLBY

This is Professor Mark Naison.

MARK

I, as someone who comes from a family of immigrants, and has done a lot of work in the Bronx with immigrant communities, I figured: This is something we need to get on right away.

COLBY

As he said, Mark has been working and serving with immigrant communities for a while. I first heard about Mark and his activism from Riya. You remember her, right? International student from India.

RIYA

It was my professor Mark Naison, who was heading one of these groups called the ICE Breakers.

...

One of my friends had been a student, and he would tell me about it, about how much Dr. Naison was doing.

...

I think he gave me the most confidence. Even more than maybe official emails. And that really helped me.

...

I think he’s so — he was so vocal about all these issues, through his social media. Through his class teaching. Everything. Whether it was pro-Palestine movements, ICE in general, or international student specific issues, he knew what to say to who, and when. And I think that for me, that was so comforting.

COLBY

I interviewed Mark in late August of 2025. Just a few days before school started up again. 

I did check in with him before we published this episode, just to see if he feels differently now about any of the things we talked about last year. And he told me he’s the same guy, you know. Still feels the same way.

And I want to take you here next, because, well, one) He’s got some great stories. But two) I caught a glimpse of something at the end of our conversation. Something I didn’t expect.

By the way, yeah, as Riya said, one of the ways Mark had decided to respond to all these visa revocations and SEIVS terminations was to create a new group. He called it ICE Breakers. That’s ICE like Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The Federal Agents. And the Fordham Students would be ICE Breakers. You get it.

MARK

So, I had an idea for these groups in a lot of different areas. So, I started out with eastern Long Island, where I spend some time. New Jersey. Upstate New York. And then I mentioned this, and a couple of my Fordham students thought: We need to do something around here, if our students are being targeted, or people in the Bronx. 

COLBY

Mark said he was thinking about what to do, even as early as the day of the election.

MARK

This was the issue I was going to concentrate on, because I felt the strongest about it. But also, as a historian, I feel that when you’re dealing with authoritarian governments, you have to organize covertly.

...

I think people are — were paralyzed in the beginning. They were terrified. Because, remember, you also had Musk coming in. And then also with Zuckerberg and Bezos. It seemed like everybody was against — you know, you had the tech people. You had the media moguls and Trump and project 2025 all coming — people were terrified. And I said: Shit. These people are — I’ve got to do something to give people courage. 

...

So, I said: Let’s get these groups, only with people you trust, and don’t publicly identify yourself as part of this group. Because it makes it harder to do things you need to do.

COLBY

He sent an email to some Fordham students who wanted to start a group. We’re sitting in his office. Right in front of his computer. So, I ask him to read me the email.

MARK

Fordham ICE Breakers, modeled on similar groups forming around the country, will be a private network of people determined to prevent deportation of undocumented college students, families and working people who have committed no crimes  It will also, as the first college group formed, try to prevent visa revocations of international students. The group, whose members will meet on ZOOM and in small private gatherings, will keep track of ICE raids on and off campus, and provide aid to people on and off campus targeted by raids, deportations and visa revocations.

...

Although individuals in the group will not be publicly identified, the group may produce pins and stickers with the letters IB written on them so that people resisting deportations can identify themselves and find other like minded people ready to stand up for vulnerable groups.

...

While I was doing this —

COLBY

This is him just talking again.

MARK

While I was doing this, there were all these people setting up ICE Watchers groups in different communities to warn people when they were coming, so people would hide. 

...

Part of this is having a warning system. The other part of this is: What do people need if they’re hiding? They need food, and they need legal assistance.

...

I can’t tell people — I don’t tell people what to do. I give you cover.

...

So, I’m giving — encouraging other people to organize. I’m the public image of it. But what people do is up to them. Because every community is different.

...

I was a kid who I grew up in a tough neighborhood where my goal was to kick everybody’s ass and everything. And I figured everybody would hate me, but it wouldn’t matter because I was just going to beat you. Whether it was sports or school. I was like this hyper-competitive —

COLBY

He says that he was almost a Donald Trump in the making

MARK

except I didn’t have a rich daddy. And then, when I got to college and got involved in the Civil Rights movement, and started to use my energies to help people, I discovered that people actually liked me. So I said: Look, I’m a competitive person in some ways, but I’m happiest when I’m working for justice. When I’m helping vulnerable people. And this is maybe the most important part of my life. 

...

I like walking out front of other people — and getting the street cred for taking a stand and being unafraid. And also, I think it sets a good example for my students, so see somebody who’s not as scared to speak out. And who like dares people to come after me. I coined this expression, BIOMF. Which is actually in the Urban Dictionary. 

COLBY

Spell that out. 

MARK

BIOMF. Bring it on Motherfucker.

...

Because I’m not scared of being shot, stabbed, or blown up. I’m scared of cancer and Alzheimer’s.

...

I like fighting, I like conflict. But I also like helping people. So, why not put myself out there as this figurehead, in a way that allows other people to do really positive things, without putting themselves at risk.

...

So, that’s sort of my role, you know. To be out front. Let the blows come at me so the people doing the more important work can do it without interference.

COLBY

Mark said that he kind of took a ‘hands off’ approach to Fordham ICE Breakers once he sent that email. They’re off doing their thing.

MARK

There's roles for everybody here. And my role is sort of to give people courage. But them to figure out what to do.

COLBY

As we were talking, the focus shifted more to his thoughts about the future. How this immigration crackdown might get worse.

MARK

What I feel is that universities have to step up to protect their students. And, hopefully, you know, Fordham is trying — doesn’t want this to happen. Is going to use all the means in its disposal to prevent this. But I don’t have any weapons to prevent this. I don’t have — they have a legal department. They have lobbyists.

COLBY

You know, one weapon he does have, is himself.

MARK

I’ll tell my students: If anyone wants to try and deport my students, they’ll have to come through me. I’m willing to get arrested to protect them, if necessary.

...

I’m not going to depend on Fordham to protect people. If they do, great! I happen to think that their heart’s in the right place on this issue, much more than many universities. And they’ve done a good job. But, again, I’m thinking from the standpoint — organize with the people you trust. And then figure out where to go from there.

...

All I can say is I’m much happier teaching at Fordham right now than I would be if I was at Columbia or NYU. I think this is a great place to be right now.

COLBY

As we’re talking, I ask him if he’s scared. He says no. I press a little further. Scared for the safety of your students?

MARK

Oh, them, yeah. But not — in other words, I’m not, I’m never scared personally. I’m scared for my students. I’m scared for my community partners.

...

I have no idea what the atmosphere of my classes are going to be like. And I’m very curious. I did tell them, if ICE is in the area, I’m teaching remotely, to protect the vulnerable students. I have a lot of immigrant kids in both of my classes. I’m curious what they have to say. I mean, I don’t know.

COLBY

But soon his mind shoots back decades, he kind of gets reflective, and he tells me this story.

MARK

In fifth grade, the Baldy Scare — that this gang from the Bronx, Arthur Avenue, was going to come to Brooklyn and shave kids heads. 

COLBY

Really? 

MARK

Yes. And they actually closed school in the afternoon because of the Baldy Scare. So, what they did in my elementary school, is they took the toughest and most disruptive kids, and made them crossing guards. So I was a lieutenant in the Safety Patrol in the fifth grade. So, I had to cross the kids, as they were going home, pretending that I wasn’t terrified that the Baldys were going to get me. 

COLBY

Act III

Mark is not the only staff member feeling the effects of this new political moment. Fordham is filled with people who are now thinking — and living — differently.

Here’s our producer, Arianna, with the story of two more.

ARIANNA

They’re voices you’ve heard before. 

AMMAR

Hi, my name is Imam Ammar Abdul Rahman.

KATJA

My name is Rabbi Katja Vehlow. 

...

I’m the director of Jewish Life here.

AMMAR

I am the director of Muslim life —

KATJA

The Jewish Chaplan. And the Campus Rabbi 

AMMAR

and also the Muslim chaplain.

KATJA

at Fordham University.

ARIANNA

Katja and Ammar have worked at Fordham for almost two years. 

They’re the on-campus faith leaders for their respective traditions. And they’re both immigrants. Katja is from Germany. And Ammar is from Ghana. So because of both of these things: Because their job is to talk about the hard things with students, because of their own story, they’ve gotten to see first hand the toll these policies have taken — the stress and worry they create.

KATJA

You know, people who have grown up here, who I’ve spoken to, who just talk about the incredible difficulty of living in families where some have legal status to stay here. To work here. To study here. And others do not. And what that means. Whether that’s them or that’s others, that’s a lot of stress. It’s a lot of stress that I think American born people, I think, do not recognize. 

AMMAR

You know, now we’ve seen people who have their citizenship, or have their greencard, being revoked — and being sent back to countries they haven’t lived in in decades. Right. So, leaving their families and their children. So, there’s that fear and anxiety and uncertainty. Not just with me. But the people that I work with, the Masjid that I lead. We see that in a day to day basis. People fearing to go to work, or to take their kids to school, because of what they anticipate might happen.

KATJA

When I was faculty in South Carolina, I had friends or acquaintances who couldn’t understand that I wasn’t a citizen yet. And they would say: But  it’s so easy to become a citizen! Why don’t you just do it? And, first of all, I hadn’t fulfilled the legal requirements of five years of being here on a green card, yet. But also I then made a list of all the documents you actually needed. And they were shocked. How could this be so difficult? And I said: Well, this is the case of a very straight-forward immigration. With a job and with no bumps, legal bumps that can happen very quickly. And yeah, it’s not so easy to become legal.

ARIANNA

Ammar explained that, for him, this country had this hope associated with it.

AMMAR

America has been an experiment since its inception, right? Since its creation, it has been the experiment of: Let’s bring all the best, and the minds and people to come together and work together.

...

There’s a profound story in the Islamic tradition, where the prophet, peace be upon him, was persecuted in Mecca — by his own people. Just like many of us that leave our homeland, not because we want to, but because of the circumstances — whether it’s the social, economic or political circumstance — make some of us want to leave to come to a place where we think or we’ve heard that there’s opportunity. That, so long as you do this, you’ll get the opportunity. So long as you abide by the law, so long as you do what’s right, there’s an opportunity.

ARIANNA

But now, it just seems like that bargain has totally changed.

AMMAR

I mean, it’s certainly a lot of uncertainty. There’s some level of anxiety and fear and worry. Because nothing is what it used to be anymore.

ARIANNA

And one of the ways that it’s changed — for both Katja and Ammar — is that their personal safety has come under question.

KATJA

I also know that being a citizen is not the protection it maybe have once would have been. So, I know on election night, my son, who was eight, or seven maybe, when the election happened, came to me and said: Mommy, are you going to get deported? And so, I told him: No, I’m a citizen. I’m okay. I’m here. But that we have friends for whom this may be much more difficult as well. So, I do know I personally am not affected. I remember very well.

AMMAR

Like, I can tell you: I walk around right now with my, what’s it called? With my passport card in my wallet. I’m being honest, I can show it to you right now. Like, it’s so bad. I have my citizenship. I’ve never broken the law. But, I know that based on some of the videos that I’ve seen — alright, I’ma just show you a part of it — based on some of the videos I’ve seen, how people get treated, just because they don’t have this. And to me, it’s like I could walk around and be like: I’m good. I’m good. But what if, by the time I realize I’m good, I’m being thrown in the jail that my family don’t even know where I’m at.

ARIANNA

These are two American citizens. Yeah, born in another country, but now also citizens of this country. And their safety is now questionable, to themselves and to their families. 

That’s the world we’re living in now. That’s what these immigration policies have achieved.

But, like great chaplains, they also have hopes for the future.

AMMAR

I just want to say that people of faith have been the forefront of making sure that — or ensuring that — immigrants, or people who don’t even have a quote, unquote legal immigration status, do not feel alone.

KATJA

Judaism is a kind of hopeful tradition, or a tradition that sort of skews towards hope. So I am hoping that we will continue to remember our humanity, and also the humanity of others.

AMMAR

This generation, this younger generation, is going to change what the world looks like in the next 15 to 20 years. We do not have to be complicit with the way things are right now. We do not have to accept what folks who have lived more than five decades before us — who perhaps are not in touch with our own reality — we should not allow their view of the world dictate what we become. Or the future leaders we become.

KATJA

And that we’ll continue to work towards supporting and upholding these values. Here at Fordham. Both for me, but for everybody, really.

COLBY

Act IV.

Over this past year, as we’ve been reporting this story, we’ve gotten to get a glimpse into Fordham Administration as well. 

Fordham’s President Tania Tetlow agreed to sit for an exclusive interview on this subject — the SEVIS terminations and visa revocations. This was back in October, 2025. The next semester after all the visa turmoil went down.

And Tetlow said just straight up: The terminations and revocations — they scared her. You’ve heard parts of this bite before. But here it is.

TETLOW

I was very much worried that this was just an attack on international education itself. And of doing it in a way that, if in fact it was just sort of randomly picking on some of our students and students around the country, the injustice of that. So, it is hard to know or project what was going on, but that was my worry. And I worried very much about the individual students affected, of the unbelievable cost of uncertainty because they were not even notified that their visa was pulled. 

...

I was worried about all of it. 

COLBY

And even at that point, months after it had happened, she was still feeling uneasy.

COLBY

How does that feel? 

TETLOW

Well, uh, I don't — there's a lot else going on. And I think a lot of other schools did see declines in international enrollment. And this all happened a little late in the application cycle. Um. And so, uh, well, but, am I feeling relieved? No. 

COLBY

You're not feeling relieved? 

TETLOW

I, you know, one thing at a time, but there's a lot going on.

COLBY

Every level of Fordham is still feeling the effects of this visa turmoil, and Trump’s immigration crackdown. 

And, as a whole, the institution has changed as well. 

There’s now this kind of unofficial way that Fordham can deal with immigration-related emergencies. That’s the Tiger Team. It’s still around.

COLBY

It is still kind of a resource you draw on? 

MICHAEL

Absolutely! 

COLBY

Mike Trerotola, Chief of Staff to President Tetlow and leader of this group. When we talked in October, 2025, he said:

MICHAEL

Very fortunately, in this moment right now, we don’t have an issue going on. But that group is prepared to come together when an issue happens. And they know that it will happen quickly if it does happen.

COLBY

We also asked Fordham for the stats about the international student population. They told us that in the Spring of 2025, there were around 1600 international students at all levels of Fordham. And by the next semester, that number had technically risen by more than one hundred.

They did insist — well, I’ll just read you what they said.

“PLEASE NOTE: There are multiple factors that impact the number of students each semester, and it should not be assumed that the changes were a direct impact of the SEVIS or visa challenges.”

But even if Fordham, as an institution hasn’t been decimated — based on our reporting, it’s fair to say that this community’s peace of mind sure has taken a big hit. 

Immigrants who have American citizenship have begun to carry their documents with them. Just in case. Professors are concerned about their student’s safety. Students are reconsidering what opinions they want to share in class. International students are changing their plans and leaving the US as soon as they graduate — specifically because of this visa turmoil. Not only students who graduated in 2025. But students this year, in 2026.

This is where we’re at now. 

This is the current situation at Fordham.

COLBY

Act V.

We are back on the ferry where it all began. A trip into the choppy waters of years past. 

But now — now we’re returning back to our current political moment. 

So happens next? I don’t know. I really don’t. So I don’t want to predict anything. I just want to end this series with two things. First, a poem. And then some final thoughts.

First, the poem. The New Colossus, by Emma Lazarus. It's about the Statue of Liberty. Seems kind of fitting. Here it is.

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame, with conquering limbs astride from land to land; 

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand a mighty woman with a torch, whose flame is the imprisoned lightning, and her name Mother of Exiles. 

From her beacon-hand glows world-wide welcome; 

Her mild eyes command the air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she with silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

And now, some final thoughts. 

You know, When I look across the bay. Here’s what I see. 

I see a college, I see a city, I see a country that has dramatically changed over the last year. More and more it seems an international student’s status can be taken away on a whim. 

Or an immigrant can just be snatched off the street and deported. And yet, I think the idea of Fundamental Human Dignity — it defies all that. A fellow traveler’s humanity — whether that’s an international student at Fordham, or an undocumented immigrant in the Bronx — their humanity is divine. 

Yeah. It’s kind of like even though the government may disregard it. Or not recognize it, it’s still there.

We all still carry that worth in us. 

You could say it's the only thing that can’t be revoked.