US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Wednesday that authorities would "aggressively" revoke the visas of Chinese students, long a major revenue stream for American colleges.
Washington will also tighten visa checks on future applications from China and Hong Kong, Rubio said, days after the US government moved to ban Harvard University from enrolling non-Americans.
"This US policy may seem to be a hasty decision, but it has had an immeasurably devastating impact," Bi Jingxin, a student at a college in the Chinese capital Beijing, told AFP on Thursday.
"If we Chinese want to study in the US, the most important thing is its faculties and cutting-edge academic achievements," Bi, 21, said.
Rubio's proposals, he added, show that Washington was "not behaving in a way that's conducive to the spread of the United States'... international academic image".
"It seems that Trump and his team are acting recklessly, without any thought for the consequences," Bi said.
Elsewhere on the sun-dappled campus of Beijing Foreign Studies University (BFSU) -- one of the country's most prestigious -- the mood was unseasonably gloomy.
"If (the US) is targeting us so strongly, it chips away at my best options (for studying abroad), as well as my impression of the United States," 23-year-old Zhang Yue said.
While she may have considered a course at an American college before, "now, my expectations of (the country) have been lowered", she told AFP, adding that she might opt for a European adventure instead.
In his Wednesday statement, Rubio indicated that officials would particularly go after students "with connections to the Chinese Communist Party or studying in critical fields".
Outside BFSU's library, a student who asked to be identified by his surname, Wang, said that attitude "seemed a bit unreasonable".
"Students go to (the US) purely for academic progress, so they shouldn't have to deal with these kinds of inconveniences," the 19-year-old told AFP.
- Classroom chaos -
Young Chinese people have long been crucial to US universities, with 277,398 attending them in the 2023-24 academic year alone, according to a State Department-backed report of the Institute of International Education.
Beijing's foreign ministry on Thursday blasted Washington for acting "unreasonably" and said it had lodged diplomatic representations.
Also affected are large numbers of Chinese high school students preparing to study in the United States later this year, as well as a thriving private industry that helps prepare them for their lives overseas.
One teacher at a Beijing-based international school said it was "heartbreaking" to see "highly aspirational" pupils wracked with uncertainty over their international futures.
"The timing and short-termism of this announcement means that many of our students... have had to make major changes to their potential pathways," the teacher said, requesting anonymity as they were not authorised to speak to the media.
Daniel Strom, co-founder and lead consultant at Elite Scholar Advising, an educational consultancy, said many clients "remain hopeful that Trump's proposals will be reversed in the courts".
But, he added, some of them had begun to look at alternatives in Britain and Canada if their plans to go to America fell through.
China condemns 'discriminatory' US plan to revoke student visas
Beijing (AFP) May 29, 2025 -
Beijing reacted in fury Thursday at the US government's vow to revoke Chinese students' visas, condemning President Donald Trump's crackdown on international scholars as "political and discriminatory".
Trump's administration on Wednesday said it would "aggressively" remove permissions for Chinese students, one of the largest sources of revenue for American universities, in his latest broadside against US higher education.
The US will also revise visa criteria to tighten checks on all future applications from China and Hong Kong, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said.
Blasting the US for "unreasonably" cancelling Chinese students' visas, foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said Beijing had lodged its opposition with Washington.
Rubio had upped the ante after China criticised his decision a day earlier to suspend visa appointments for students worldwide at least temporarily.
The Trump administration has already sought to end permission for all international students at Harvard University, which has rebuffed pressure from the president related to student protests.
Young Chinese people have long been crucial to US universities, which rely on international students paying full tuition.
China sent 277,398 students in the 2023-24 academic year, although India for the first time in years surpassed it, according to a State Department-backed report of the Institute of International Education.
Trump in his previous term also took aim at Chinese students but focused attention on those in sensitive fields or with explicit links with the military.
- Global uncertainty -
Beijing's Mao on Wednesday said that China urged the United States to "safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of international students, including those from China."
Rubio has already trumpeted the revocation of thousands of visas, largely to international students who were involved in activism critical of Israel.
A cable signed by Rubio on Tuesday ordered US embassies and consulates not to allow "any additional student or exchange visa... appointment capacity until further guidance is issued" on ramping up screening of applicants' social media accounts.
On Wednesday, Rubio heaped pressure on China, saying Washington will "aggressively revoke visas for Chinese students, including those with connections to the Chinese Communist Party or studying in critical fields.
"We will also revise visa criteria to enhance scrutiny of all future visa applications from the People's Republic of China and Hong Kong," he said.
But the slew of measures also threaten to pressure students from countries friendly to the United States.
In Taiwan, a PhD student set to study in California complained of "feeling uncertain" by the visa pause.
"I understand the process may be delayed but there is still some time before the semester begins in mid-August," said the 27-year-old student who did not want to be identified.
"All I can do now is wait and hope for the best."
- Protests at Harvard -
Trump is furious at Harvard for rejecting his administration's push for oversight on admissions and hiring, amid the president's claims the school is a hotbed of anti-Semitism and "woke" liberal ideology.
A judge paused the order to bar foreign students pending a hearing scheduled for Thursday, the same day as the university's graduation ceremony for which thousands of students and their families had gathered in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
The White House has also stripped Harvard, as well as other US universities widely considered among the world's most elite, of federal funding for research.
"The president is more interested in giving that taxpayer money to trade schools and programmes and state schools where they are promoting American values, but most importantly, educating the next generation based on skills that we need in our economy and our society," White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Fox News.
Some Harvard students were worried that the Trump administration's policies would make US universities less attractive to international students.
"I don't know if I'd pursue a PhD here. Six years is a long time," said Jack, a history of medicine student from Britain who is graduating this week and gave only a first name.
Harvard has filed extensive legal challenges against Trump's measures.
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