- Proposed CAPS Student Regulation, exchange visas at four years max.
- The media visas can be reduced to 240 days or 90 days for Chinese citizens.
- Around 1.6 million foreign students are currently in the US. In Visas F.
The Trump administration aims to harden the duration of the visas for students, cultural exchange visitors and media members, according to a proposed government regulation issued on Wednesday, part of a broader offensive against legal immigration.
President Donald Trump, a Republican, initiated a wide repression of immigration after assuming the position in January.
The last movement would create new obstacles to international students, exchange workers and foreign journalists who would have to request their stay in the United States instead of maintaining a more flexible legal status.
The proposed regulation would create a fixed period of time for Visas F for international students, Visas J that allow visitors of cultural exchange programs to work in the US. And I visas for members of the media.
These visas are currently available for the duration of the program or employment based in the United States.
There were around 1.6 million international students in Visas F in the US. In 2024, according to US government data.
The United States awarded visas to about 355,000 exchange visitors and 13,000 media members in fiscal year 2024, which began on October 1, 2023.
The student and the exchange visa periods would not last more than four years, according to the proposed regulation. The visa for journalists, which can currently last years, would be up to 240 days or, in the case of Chinese citizens, 90 days. Visa holders could request extensions, the proposal said.
The Trump administration said in the proposed regulation that the change was necessary to “monitor and supervise” the visa holders while in the United States.
The public will have 30 days to comment on the measure, which reflects a proposal presented in 2020 at the end of Trump’s first mandate in office.
Nafsa, a non -profit organization that represents international educators in more than 4,300 institutions worldwide, opposed the 2020 proposal and asked the Trump administration to discard it.
The democratic administration of then President Joe Biden withdrew it in 2021.
The Trump administration has increased the scrutiny of legal immigration, revoke visas of students and green cards of university students about their ideological views and eliminate the legal status of hundreds of thousands of migrants.
In a memorandum on August 22, citizenship and immigration services of the United States said they would resume long -standing visits to the neighborhoods of citizenship applicants to verify what he called residence, moral character and commitment to American ideals.
