Current U.S. policymakers believe that likely advance troops for foreign armies should be turned away at the border. Whether to grant a visa is a national security decision, says the State Department.
Nonimmigrant visas
The U.S. State Department’s new guidelines for evaluating visa applications require paying attention to whether an applicant gives any indication that he will be a destructive antagonist of the country once in the country (“Announcement of Expanded Screening and Vetting for Visa Applicants,” June 18, 2025):
Under new guidance, we will conduct a comprehensive and thorough vetting, including online presence, of all student and exchange visitor applicants in the F, M, and J nonimmigrant classifications. [The F category is for academic students, M for vocational students, J for persons hoping to participate in an exchange program.]
To facilitate this vetting, all applicants for F, M, and J nonimmigrant visas will be instructed to adjust the privacy settings on all of their social media profiles to “public.”…
Every visa adjudication is a national security decision. The United States must be vigilant during the visa issuance process to ensure that those applying for admission into the United States do not intend to harm Americans and our national interests, and that all applicants credibly establish their eligibility for the visa sought, including that they intend to engage in activities consistent with the terms for their admission.
Immigrant visas
At the same time, revisions of the State Department’s Foreign Affairs Manual “toughen the statutory bar on issuance of immigrant visas to communist party members and affiliates” (Chodorow Immigration Law, June 15, 2025).
The new version of the manual “deletes prior references to Supreme Court precedent stating that the bar does not apply if the applicant’s ties to the party were nonmeaningful, in that the applicant ‘had [no] commitment to the political and ideological conviction of communism.’ ”
Also barred are “employees of state-owned enterprises, nongovernmental organizations, and quasi-governmental organizations in communist countries.”
The new manual broadens the nature of the affiliation with the Chinese Communist Party and other totalitarian parties that justifies refusing a visa.
The old version stated that “Affiliation Requires Positive Action. A mere intellectual interest in, sympathy for, or favoring the ideologies of the Communist or other totalitarian party does not constitute affiliation with such organization unless accompanied by some positive and voluntary action that provides support, money, or another thing of value.”
The new version states: “Affiliation Does Not Require Positive Action: Advocacy for, solidarity with, or endorsement of the ideologies of the Communist or other totalitarian party constitutes affiliation with such an organization.”
