On May 22, 2025, a federal judge in the Northern District of California issued a nationwide preliminary injunction in a case led by Van Der Hout and co-counsel, challenging ICE’s arbitrary termination of thousands of international students’ SEVIS records. These terminations had severely disrupted students’ education, employment, and legal status.

The lead case, Doe v. Trump et al. (4:25-cv-03140-JSW), was argued on May 14 by Van Der Hout partners Johnny Sinodis and Marc Van Der Hout. Although ICE had temporarily reactivated SEVIS records pending new policy guidance, Judge Jeffrey S. White found that future arbitrary terminations remained a threat and therefore issued a preliminary injunction, taking under advisement whether to make the injunction nationwide, which he ultimately did eight days later. In his written opinion, Judge White barred ICE from arresting, detaining, transferring, or imposing legal consequences on students based on SEVIS terminations.

This marks the first nationwide injunction granted in the series of lawsuits on this issue.

An initial Case Management Conference is scheduled for August 1, 2025, at 9:00 a.m.