Exactly why the president remains so eager to host so many potential Chinese Communist Party spies is not super-clear.
Fox News reports that in a recent exchange with Laura Ingraham, President Trump reiterated his view that “it’s good to have outside countries. Look, I want to be able to get along with the world. Not the French, though” (November 11, 2025).
The French government may be presumed to be as bad as many another European state that is moving in the direction of a CCP style of governance, e.g., to end freedom of speech online and even in private text messaging. The PRC doesn’t have to move in that direction: it is already there, is already a totalitarian dictatorship, is already as bad as itself.
Cut in half?
“We do have a lot of people coming in from China,” Trump says. “We always have, China and other countries. We also have a massive system of colleges and universities. And if we were to cut that in half, which perhaps makes some people happy, you would have half the colleges in the United States would go out of business.”
What proponents of reducing the CCP threat suggest is not “cutting in half” the flow of all foreign students but radically curtailing the flow of students from specific countries that pose a threat to the United States—like China, the country that poses the greatest threat. The impact of even rapid reduction in the number of students from China would not be instantaneous, and not all universities would be affected equally.
Many universities have turned a blind eye to intellectual property theft and other CCP spying going on under their roofs, as well as open collaboration between their researchers and CCP-linked researchers on work of value to the People’s Liberation Army. It wouldn’t be a disaster if some of the worst of these schools had to close their doors. But many colleges and universities that have been dependent on CCP cash could, if deprived of it, save themselves by slashing bloated costs and simply accepting more students from other countries or the United States.
Former national security advisor Michael Flynn says: “If we didn’t allow 600,000 Chinese spies to steal even more intellectual property and other ideas about how to dominate are our way of life, it wouldn’t make a dent in U.S. colleges and universities. We simply don’t need to help the Chinese anymore with their plans to be the sole superpower this century.”
It would make a dent, but one that could be adjusted to.
Dangerous
China specialist Gordon Chang says: “Taking away spots in schools from Americans and giving them to future Chinese Communists is wrong, and admitting students who have been weaponized by the CCP to commit acts of espionage is extraordinarily dangerous. American presidents for decades have allowed China’s regime to maintain in our country organizations and extensive networks of agents and diplomats that surveil, intimidate, and coerce Chinese and other students.”
It’s not that all of the 600,000, or whatever the future annual numbers of students hailing from Red China turns out to be, will end up actively spying on us, harassing non-CCP Chinese students, committing sabotage, or undertaking other destructive missions. But the larger the pool of successful visa applicants from China, the more opportunities the CCP will have to recruit students. Even a small percentage of a very large number may be a very large number.
Vetting of applicants for student visas can do only so much to block those most likely to try to hurt the United States. Every Chinese national who is currently residing overseas is subject to pressure to cooperate with espionage efforts, especially if a prospective spy has family still in China. Downplaying or ignoring the risk won’t make it go away.
Also see:
StoptheCCP.org: “A Thousand Points of Chinese Espionage”
