‘To Protect US From Foreign Terrorists’: Trump Imposes Travel Ban On 19 Countries
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State Department unveils social media screening rules for all student visa applicants
June 19, 2025
The State Department will start reviewing social media ‘to make America and its universities safer.’
State Department employees who review applications from foreign citizens for student and exchange visas will be told to review their social media posts and search for signs that they “bear hostile attitudes toward our citizens, culture, government, institutions, or founding principles,” according to a document obtained exclusively by The Free Press.
The instructions are being announced today and will be sent to consular offices in a cable, the State Department’s official channel of communication.
Last month, Secretary of State Marco Rubio issued an order to temporarily halt interviews with foreign citizens applying for student and exchange visas. That move was part of the Trump administration’s ongoing crackdown against antisemitism at U.S. colleges and universities. The new instructions will allow interviews to resume—with new screening requirements that tell consular officers exactly what to look for.
The cable instructs the consular officers to conduct an extensive social media review of all applicants. Applicants will be required to set all of their social media to a “public” setting, allowing officers to thoroughly search for applicants “who bear hostile attitudes toward our citizens, culture, government, institutions, or founding principles; who advocate for, aid, or support designated foreign terrorists and other threats to U.S. national security; or who perpetrate unlawful antisemitic harassment or violence,” according to the instructions reviewed by The Free Press.
For example, the cable added, “You might discover on social media that an applicant endorsed Hamas or its activities,” in which case, the applicant would presumably be denied a visa.
Consular officers will have the discretion, however, to determine whether an applicant’s activism amounts to an actual threat, the State Department said in the instructions. For example, if an applicant were to post on Instagram text that encourages the takeover of campus buildings, their application would likely be treated differently than that of an applicant raising money to bring humanitarian aid to Gaza.
The cable also told consular officers that when expediting student visa applications, they should give preference to those seeking to study at schools where foreign students are less than 15 percent of the total student body. Foreign students at Harvard, for instance, make up 27 percent of the student body.
In addition to social media, State Department officials are required to scrutinize each applicant’s “entire online presence,” including “any databases to which the consular section has access.” The cable, which is marked “SENSITIVE BUT UNCLASSIFIED,” said to “implement these vetting procedures within five business days.”
A senior State Department official told The Free Press: “It is an expectation from American citizens that their government will make every effort to make our country safer, and that is exactly what the Trump administration is doing every single day. This is particularly true when it comes to our visa system, which had previously lacked proper vetting and screening mechanisms.”
Toughened social media reviews “will ensure we are properly screening every single person attempting to visit our country,” the official added.
“They think that the Biden administration and various college administrators allowed these people free rein to impair the ability of other people to learn,” said Andrew Arthur, a resident fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies. “I’ll take them at face value when they say that. And if that is their take, then they’re probably going to use every shot in their locker, every tool in the toolbox, every knife in the drawer to do that.”
As the Trump administration continues trying to deport some anti-Israel activists who helped lead campus protests, including Mohsen Mahdawi and Mahmoud Khalil at Columbia University, the State Department’s new instructions show how determined the government is to not let some people in at all.
“Removing foreign nationals from the United States, even when they have clearly violated our laws, is a lengthy, expensive, and difficult process,” the instructions said. “Therefore, we must be vigilant during the visa issuance process.”
