WASHINGTON — A federal judge barred the Trump administration Friday from terminating a program that enrolls thousands of foreign students at Harvard University after the school filed a lawsuit challenging the move.

Boston US District Judge Allison Burroughs granted Harvard’s request for a temporary restraining order against the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for trying to boot the 6,793 foreign students enrolled for the 2024-25 academic year.

President Trump brushed off the ruling during an afternoon Oval Office event, telling reporters that “Harvard is going to have to change its ways.”

“Billions of dollars has been paid to Harvard. How ridiculous is that? Billions. And they have $52 billion as an endowment,” he said, adding that the administration was “taking a look” at whether to revoke international student programs at other schools that have allowed antisemitism to fester.

Harvard’s lawyers had filed a federal complaint earlier Friday denouncing the removal of international students as “a blatant violation of the First Amendment, the Due Process Clause, and the Administrative Procedure Act.”

“With the stroke of a pen, the government has sought to erase a quarter of Harvard’s student body, international students who contribute significantly to the University and its mission,” the lawyers stated in the 71-page filing.

Burroughs set an initial hearing in the case, the second of its kind brought by the university against the Trump administration, for May 29.

Those lacking legal status to study at Harvard under DHS’ Student and Exchange Visitor Program (SEVP) would have had to transfer to another university or leave the US without the judge’s order blocking the move.

“It imperils the futures of thousands of students and scholars across Harvard and serves as a warning to countless others at colleges and universities throughout the country who have come to America to pursue their education and fulfill their dreams,” Harvard President Alan Garber had said.

Harvard has already been stripped of more than $2.6 billion in grants and other funding, prompting an initial suit against the administration last month.

“The Government’s actions flout not just the First Amendment, but also federal laws and regulations,” a revised version of that lawsuit filed May 13 declared.

“Make no mistake: Harvard rejects antisemitism and discrimination in all of its forms and is actively making structural reforms to eradicate antisemitism on campus,” it added.

Earlier in May, Garber had touted changes to Harvard’s governance following a scathing internal review about antisemitic and anti-Israel bias on campus.

“These students can’t add two and two, and they go to Harvard. They want remedial math,” Trump also claimed Friday. “How do they get into Harvard? Why are they there? And then you see those same people picketing and screaming at the United States … they’re antisemitic.”

“We don’t want troublemakers here,” he added.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced Thursday she was scrapping the SEVP — and accused Harvard of continuing to foster Jew hatred while collaborating with Chinese universities and purportedly hosting members of the country’s paramilitary group.

“It is a privilege, not a right, for universities to enroll foreign students and benefit from their higher tuition payments to help pad their multibillion-dollar endowments,” Noem said in a statement.

The DHS chief also accused the Cambridge, Mass., school of letting “anti-American, pro-terrorist agitators” assault and harrass Jewish students on campus.

Hours later, a federal judge in California issued a nationwide injunction blocking the administration from eliminating the international students’ legal status.

That order, delivered by Oakland US District Judge Jeffrey White, also halts Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) — which oversees SEVP — from arresting or detaining students while litigation plays out.

Ben Loveman, a partner at Reeves Immigration Law Group handling defense for foreign students, said that Harvard’s “cases will likely implicate some of the same regulations at play in the student cancellation cases.”

Noem had initially demanded information from Harvard April 16 about the foreign student population’s criminal histories, which could have been used for deportations.

Administrators hadn’t been forthcoming between now and then, she said before allowing another 72-hour window to present the relevant records — including audio and video footage of anti-Israel campus demonstrators.