New Visa Limits Would Be a Self-Inflicted Wound for the U.S.

The Trump administration wants to make it harder for foreign students, exchange visitors and journalists.

By The Editorial Board
The editorial board is a group of opinion journalists whose views are informed by expertise, research, debate and certain longstanding values. It is separate from the newsroom.

Oct. 24, 2020

From day one, a hallmark of the Trump administration has been its relentless assault on immigration, legal and illegal alike. President Trump’s obsession with building a wall on the southern border symbolizes that obsession and all its cruelty and uselessness. Far more insidious, though, is the invisible wall of restrictive policies, procedural changes or extreme vetting directives, lacking any justification beyond a vague and unsubstantiated reference to national security.

The latest brick in this wall is aimed at making it much harder and more expensive for foreign students, exchange visitors and journalists to work or study in the United States. The value of hosting these groups is self-evident — students and exchange visitors bring valuable perspectives (and tuition payments) and, in most cases, take back an appreciation of American life. Resident foreign journalists explain the workings of American society and democracy to audiences worldwide.

But the idée-fixe of the Trump administration is that foreigners are here to steal jobs, spy or commit crimes. So, in what may be the final days of the Trump presidency, the administration is rushing to raise the walls as high as possible, never mind the damage to America’s global standing, recruitment of talent and bottom line.

Basically, the proposed rule from the Department of Homeland Security would end the “duration of status” on visas for students, exchange visitors and journalists, under which they have been able to remain in the United States for as long their studies or work required. The “sheer size” of the population of foreigners in these categories — an average of 2.3 million in recent years — challenged the department’s ability to monitor them and thus posed an “increased risk to national security.”

This amounts to a solution for a problem that doesn’t exist, since the federal government has had ample monitoring mechanisms in place since the 9/11 attacks to keep tabs on foreign students and reporters. But that has never been enough for Kenneth Cuccinelli, the acting director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, whose signature is on the proposed changes. A hard-core foe of immigration whose title is “senior official performing the duties of the deputy secretary of homeland security,” he accused Mr. Trump of being too soft on immigrant workers before signing on to lead the administration’s war on immigration.

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