I’m an F-1 student in the U.S. right now. What changes for me?

Nothing, for now. The rule that would have given you a fixed end date is postponed. Your I-94 still says D/S, you are still in status as long as you are making normal progress in your program, and your school’s designated school official still handles program extensions the way they always have. If you finish your program or your OPT, you still have the 60-day period that applies under the current regulations.

Did the court strike down the rule?

No. The plaintiffs asked the court to vacate the rule, and the court chose a more cautious path: it postponed the rule’s effective date under section 705 of the Administrative Procedure Act until the case is finally decided. The request to vacate was denied “without prejudice,” which means it can be raised again. The court described its order as “an injunction staying the operation of the rule.”

Does this protect me even if my school was not one of the plaintiffs?

Yes. The court specifically rejected the government’s argument that relief should be limited to the parties in the case. It found that section 705 lets a court postpone a rule in its entirety, and that a party-specific order would create “chaos and confusion” because students transfer between schools and pursue joint degrees. The postponement applies nationwide.

Can the government appeal? Could the rule come back?

Yes to both. The government can appeal to the First Circuit and can ask that court to stay the postponement while the appeal is pending. If a stay were granted, the rule could take effect while the appeal proceeds. Nothing had been filed as of the date of the order. Watch for a notice of appeal and a stay motion in the coming weeks, and treat any headline about the rule as unconfirmed until you see the court filing.

I was getting ready to file an I-539 extension because of the rule. Should I still file?

The rule’s requirement to file an extension of stay with USCIS is not in effect. If your only reason to file was the new rule, talk to your DSO before filing anything. If you have a separate, ordinary reason to extend or change status under the existing regulations, that process is unchanged. Do not let a filing you no longer need create a record you did not intend.

What about the new I-539 and I-765 editions dated 09/15/26?

USCIS announced those form editions in August as a separate agency action aligned with the rule. The court’s order postpones the rule; it does not address USCIS’s form editions, and as of the order USCIS had not said whether it would still require them. Before you file either form, check the edition date on the USCIS form page and confirm with your DSO or attorney. This page will be updated when USCIS says something.

I’m a graduate student. Can I still transfer or change my major?

Under the current regulations, yes — the rule’s bar on graduate transfers and changes of educational objective is postponed along with everything else in it. Transfers and program changes still run through your school and SEVIS as they do today. If the rule is later reinstated, those limits could return, so talk to your DSO about timing if a change is on your horizon.

What about journalists on I visas?

The 240-day cap and the extension process for I visa holders are postponed too. The court noted that DHS “did not identify a single specific national security risk associated with foreign journalists on I-visas,” did not respond to comments that a 240-day term would let officials punish unfavorable reporting, and offered no reasoned explanation for the change at all. Admission for I media representatives continues under the existing rule.

What did the court actually say about national security?

That the government’s national-security justification “borders on the absurd.” DHS pointed to five incidents involving eleven people, out of tens of millions of people admitted over more than forty years — three involving photographs of military installations, one overstay, and one foreign intelligence operative who had been in the country for only two years. The court found that a four-year cap “would do nothing to prevent or even mitigate” any of them, and that DHS never considered “less drastic and more obvious ways to address security vulnerabilities.”

Is the court saying the policy is a bad idea?

It said that is not the question a court can decide. In its words, the judiciary’s role “is not to ensure that the executive branch does not make unwise decisions”; the court’s only authority “is to ensure that when the government promulgates a new regulation, it adheres to the law.” The rule was postponed because DHS did not follow the Administrative Procedure Act — not because the court disagreed with the policy.

Court Postpones the End of Duration of Status (2026)

Executive summary

On September 14, 2026 — the day before the rule was to take effect — Judge F. Dennis Saylor IV of the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts postponed the effective date of DHS’s Final Rule ending “duration of status” for F academic students, J exchange visitors, and I representatives of foreign media (91 Fed. Reg. 44976). The postponement is nationwide and lasts “pending final resolution of this matter on the merits.”

The relief is a postponement under 5 U.S.C. § 705, which the court described as “an injunction staying the operation of the rule.” The court chose it as “the more cautious approach” over vacating the rule outright; the request for vacatur, summary judgment, or other relief was denied without prejudice, so it can be renewed later.

The court found the rule arbitrary and capricious “in at least four respects”: DHS failed to conduct a reasoned calculation of the rule’s costs and benefits, failed to meaningfully consider less burdensome alternatives, failed to respond to significant public comments, and failed to show a rational connection between the rule and its stated goals of national security and fraud prevention.

On national security, the court wrote that “[t]he government’s contention that the rule is necessary to safeguard national security borders on the absurd,” because it rested on “a small handful of anecdotes, each of which involved incidents that the new rule would do nothing to prevent or even mitigate.”

Nothing about the current system changes. F-1 students keep the “D/S” notation on the I-94, keep the 60-day period after completing studies or practical training, and keep the school-based extension process. No four-year cap applies and no extension-of-stay filing is required because of this rule.

The government can appeal to the First Circuit and can ask for a stay of the postponement while it appeals. The case itself continues in the district court. The court was explicit that it was not ruling on whether the policy is wise — only on whether DHS followed the Administrative Procedure Act when it adopted it.

What happened, in plain English

In July, DHS finalized a rule that would have ended “duration of status.” Instead of being allowed to stay for as long as their program lasts, international students, exchange visitors, and foreign journalists would have received a fixed end date — four years at most for F and J, 240 days for I — and would have had to ask USCIS for more time, with a fee, fingerprints, and no right to appeal a denial. It was set to start on September 15, 2026.

Eight organizations sued: groups representing colleges and universities (the Presidents’ Alliance, NAFSA, and the Massachusetts independent colleges association), a teachers’ union, a graduate-worker union, the United Auto Workers and one of its locals, and the union that represents journalists. They asked the court to stop the rule before it started.

On September 14, the judge did. He found the plaintiffs are likely to win, because DHS did not do the basic work the law requires before changing a system that has been in place since 1978. In the court’s words, DHS “effectively ignored the immense costs” of the rule, dismissed roughly 22,000 public comments with “conclusory statements, non sequiturs, and statements of ‘belief’ without supporting reasoning,” and never explained why a four-year cap would stop the handful of incidents it cited as its reason.

The judge was careful about what he was and was not deciding. He wrote that a court “does not have the power to block the rule on the ground that it is misguided or ill-advised.” Its only job is to make sure that “when the government promulgates a new regulation, it adheres to the law.” On that question, he found “the promulgation of the rule clearly failed to comply with the APA in multiple respects.”

The practical result: the old system stays exactly as it was. If you are an F-1 or J-1 student, your I-94 still says D/S, your school still handles program extensions, and you still have 60 days after you finish (for F-1). The rule is not dead — the government can appeal, and the case is not over — but it is not in effect, and the court said it stays that way until the case is finally decided.

This is general information, not legal advice, and it describes active litigation that can move quickly. Immigration outcomes depend on individual facts — confirm your specific situation with your designated school official and a licensed immigration attorney.

What the Court held

The plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits: “the promulgation of the rule clearly failed to comply with the APA in multiple respects.” The court rested entirely on arbitrary-and-capricious review and did not reach the First Amendment or contrary-to-law claims.
Cost-benefit analysis: DHS “did not even attempt to quantify the actual costs and purported benefits of the Final Rule, much less perform a reasoned balancing.” Its treatment of the costs was “egregiously flawed and incomplete.” Adopting the rule without a reasoned cost-benefit analysis was arbitrary and capricious.
Alternatives: DHS “failed entirely to perform a meaningful consideration of reasonable alternatives” — upgrading SEVIS, fixed terms tied to actual program length, and targeted vetting of high-risk fields — and “did not provide adequate reasons for rejecting them.” “An ipse dixit response is not a reasoned analysis.”
Public comments: DHS “did not respond to, let alone meaningfully engage with, multiple substantial comments,” including evidence that the rule would deter enrollment, that doctoral programs routinely exceed four years, that same-level degrees are legitimate, that students and schools relied on the existing system, that USCIS could not absorb the extra filings, and that the rule would chill foreign journalists.
Rational connection: “DHS’s proffered objectives bear no reasonable connection to the Final Rule.” The national-security rationale rested on five incidents involving eleven people out of tens of millions admitted over four decades, none of which a four-year cap would have prevented. The fraud rationale never showed that long stays were fraudulent. On overstays, “eliminating duration of status may well increase the risk of unintentional overstays because it shortens the departure period from 60 to 30 days.”
Irreparable harm was shown and is “already occurring”: students had withdrawn from programs, one university reported a 42% drop in international applications, and DHS itself estimated 135 hours of adaptation work per school official in the first year.
The balance of equities and public interest “strongly favor” relief: roughly 1.6 million people in F status, 504,000 in J status, and 24,000 in I status; $44 billion contributed to the economy in 2023–2024; about 16,000 J-1 medical residents, roughly 10% of resident physicians in the country.
Scope: relief under § 705 is not limited to the parties before the court. The plaintiffs represent almost 600 institutions, but there are more than 5,000; a party-specific order “would inevitably generate” “chaos and confusion.” The postponement is nationwide.
Form of relief: the motion is “GRANTED to the extent that it seeks to postpone the effective date of the Final Rule pursuant to the Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. § 705,” and “DENIED without prejudice to its renewal” as to vacatur, summary judgment, or other relief.