Trump targets Harvard visa applicants with new social media checks over anti-semitism concerns
The Trump administration is escalating its social media vetting of visa applicants seeking to travel to Harvard University, a State Department cable sent to diplomatic posts Friday shows.
The cable signed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio instructs all U.S. missions and consulates abroad to immediately enhance the vetting of such visa applicants, with the intention of expanding the scrutiny process over time.
The vetting will go beyond student applicants, according to the cable seen by NBC News, as it also includes faculty, employees, contractors, guest speakers and tourists.
The stepped-up vetting is intended to “address acute concerns of violence and anti-Semitism at Harvard University” and calls for vetting of “any nonimmigrant visa applicant seeking to travel to Harvard University for any purpose,” the cable states. Non-immigrant visas are for temporary entry to the U.S.
In response to an NBC News request for comment on the cable, a State Department spokesperson said, “The Department does not comment on internal communications.”
NBC News also has contacted Harvard for comment.
For the expanded social media screening, consular offices have been told to identify applicants with “histories of anti-Semitic harassment and violence, and to duly consider their visa eligibility under U.S. immigration law.”
In those instructions, the cable criticizes what the administration described as Harvard’s failure to maintain a campus environment “free from violence and anti-Semitism.”
The cable instructs U.S. consular officers to ask visa applicants to set all their social media accounts to public in the event that they need to be reviewed as part of the vetting.
The State Department also instructed officers to “consider whether the lack of any online presence, or having social media accounts restricted to ‘private’ or with limited visibility, may be reflective of evasiveness and call into question the applicant’s credibility.”
On Tuesday, the administration stopped scheduling new interviews for international students seeking visas to study in the U.S. The halt on interviews was intended as a precursor to the expanded social media screening, allowing diplomatic and consular posts to prepare for the larger and adjusted workload.
The vetting is another volley by the administration in its ongoing battle with Harvard and other universities.
Harvard has fought back against the administration’s attempts to control the university’s hiring and admissions, diversity outreach and initiatives and foreign student enrollment. The administration has cut billions in research to pressure Harvard to cede to its demands.
On Thursday, a court extended its bar on the Trump administration’s attempt to revoke Harvard’s ability to enroll international students.
The administration said in its cable that the stepped-up social media vetting of visa applicants to Harvard is a pilot program that could be expanded.
Other groups of visa applicants could be included later, the administration said in its cable.
Foreign students have been targeted by the administration, stripped of visas and arrested, detained and deported, including those who protested Israel’s military response since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel.
Rubio said on Wednesday that the State Department would work with the Department of Homeland Security to “aggressively revoke visas for Chinese students.”