A more thorough explanation:

status quo ante

Status quo ante means the situation that existed before something else happened. It is a Latin phrase.

• After the war, the country returned to the status quo ante.
• The company wants to go back to the status quo ante before the new management took over.

These examples show how the term status quo ante is used to refer to a previous situation that existed before a change occurred. In the first example, the country returned to the situation that existed before the war. In the second example, the company wants to go back to the situation that existed before the new management took over.