HANOVER — A Chinese national Dartmouth College graduate student whose legal status had been terminated by the federal government is back on campus in Hanover after authorities reversed their decision.

Xiaotian Liu, a doctoral student in computer science, is “safe and performing his research at Dartmouth,” Gilles Bissonnette, legal director of the ACLU of New Hampshire, said on Monday. Bissonnette was part of a legal team which earlier successfully won a temporary restraining order to reinstate Liu’s student visa status.

In a sudden reversal, the government announced last week it would reactivate the status of more than 1,000 individuals who had their records terminated from the Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (SEVIS), a required clearinghouse for international students established after 9/11.

A Dartmouth spokesman said Monday that the college won’t comment on the status of any particular student, although Bissonnette said that Liu returned to his studies and work at the college after the court issued the temporary restraining order on April 10.

On Friday, Dartmouth President Sian Leah Beilock and Provost David Kotz sent an email to the Dartmouth community announcing that the college will pick up the legal tab of up to $2,000 on behalf of international students and employees who are “affected” by government actions and need to consult with an immigration attorney.

Dartmouth will “try to address special circumstances” in the event legal costs exceed that amount, they said.

“We recognize how stressful it is to be a member of an academic community at this moment,” Beilock and Kotz wrote, saying they “are keenly aware of the impact our current situation is having on all of you” and that they are engaged in “both public and private” efforts in order that college students and employees can continue their study, research and work.

Beilock said that she and “members of my team” would be traveling to Washington this week for “multiple meetings,” including the Association of American University’s meeting of presidents, where discussions over “new and ongoing joint legal and advocacy work to support higher education” are expected.

Beilock said she would be meeting with elected legislators and “members of the (Trump) administration to advocate on behalf of higher education, Dartmouth, our community, and the principles of academic freedom … free expression, and shared governance that are necessary for American higher education to succeed.”

Beilock has come in for sharp criticism from some corners of the Dartmouth community for being the only Ivy League president not to sign onto the American Association of Colleges and Universities’ statement opposing Trump’s threats to higher education. The petition has been endorsed by presidents from hundreds of college and universities.

The ACLU’s Bissonnette, who joined with law firm Shaheen & Gordon’s Manchester office attorney Ronald Abramson in representing Liu, believes that the blizzard of lawsuits filed around the country in response to the Department of Homeland Security’s unexplained cancellations of student visas early this month forced the government to back down.

“I’m not privy to the internal thought process of this administration but it’s hard to imagine all the litigation that’s transpired over the past couple weeks not having an effect on the government’s decision to reverse course, restore and reactivate the service records of hundreds if not thousands of students,” Bissonnette said on Monday.

The temporary restraining order concerning Liu issued earlier this month by the federal judge remains in effect until Tuesday, at which time Liu’s attorneys had been expecting to seek a preliminary injunction order for it to remain in effect during ongoing litigation.

As of Monday afternoon, Bissonnette said they were still assessing the next steps.

“We continue to have some underlying concerns about the student status of these students independent of the reactivation of the SEVIS record. Those are things that we’re working through and we’ll let the court know our position soon,” he said.

Contact John Lippman at jlippman@vnews.com.