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31-05-2025
WASHINGTON: The United States will “aggressively revoke” the visas of Chinese students studying in the country, Secretary of State Marco Rubio has announced, as the administration of President Donald Trump continues its crackdown on foreign students enrolled at higher education institutions.
Rubio announced the shock move in a post on X, as well as a State Department statement published late on Wednesday, titled “New Visa Policies Put America First, Not China”.
“Under President Trump’s leadership, the US State Department will work with the Department of Homeland Security to aggressively revoke visas for Chinese students, including those with connections to the Chinese Communist Party or studying in critical fields,” the statement said.
“We will also revise visa criteria to enhance scrutiny of all future visa applications from the People’s Republic of China and Hong Kong,” it added.
China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs criticized the decision, saying it “seriously damaged” the rights of Chinese students.
“The US has unreasonably cancelled Chinese students’ visas under the pretext of ideology and national rights,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said. “China firmly opposes this and has lodged representations with the US.
“This political and discriminatory practice of the US has exposed the lies of the so-called freedom and openness that the US has always advertised, and further damaged the US’s own international image, national image and national credibility,” Mao said.
China is the second-largest country of origin for international students in the US, behind India. Chinese students made up roughly a quarter of all foreign students in the US during the 2023-2024 school year, at more than 270,000 in total.
A journalist Katrina Yu said many Chinese students in the US come from elite backgrounds and they are “very likely to have some Communist Party connection”.
“There are 90 million Communist Party members here in China. Most of them do not have a role in government and many of them are ordinary people,” she said. “It is likely that students from those families have connections with the Communist Party, even though they may not be a member themselves.”
The action against Chinese students comes at a time of growing friction between Washington and Beijing after Trump accused China of exploiting the US on trade and triggered a tariff war upon returning to the White House for a second term.
US House of Representatives Republicans have also deemed ties between US and Chinese academic institutions to be a threat to national security.
Earlier this month, Michigan Congressmen John Moolenaar and Tim Walberg pressed Duke University in the US to end its relationship with Wuhan University in China over concerns about technology transfer.
Moolenaar and Walberg claimed that the educational partnership created a “direct pipeline between US innovation and China’s military-industrial complex”.
Trump administration’s assault on higher education
Rubio’s announcement adds to more general uncertainty for international students in the US, who have faced intensifying scrutiny over recent months amid the administration’s wider assault on higher education institutions.
On Tuesday, the White House also temporarily suspended the processing of visas for foreign students, ordering embassies and consulates not to allow any additional student or exchange visas “until further guidance is issued”.
The State Department also said it plans to “issue guidance on expanded social media vetting for all such applications”. (Int’l News Desk)
