GOP Lawmakers Introduce Bill To Deny Student Visas To Chinese Nationals Over Espionage Concerns

U.S. Senator Ashley Moody (R-FL) has introduced a bill that would deny student visas to all Chinese nationals after numerous examples of Chinese espionage on U.S. soil in recent years, including on college campuses.

Moody’s “Stop CCP Visas” act, which was introduced as companion legislation to a a bill introduced in the House last month, cites China’s 2017 National Intelligence Law as a primary concern. The law requires all Chinese citizens and organizations to cooperate with Chinese Communist Party (CCP) intelligence agencies, including students studying abroad.

The law has generated intense international criticism in recent years and has been pointed to as a primary reason to view all Chinese organizations and citizens operating abroad as potential espionage risks.

“I filed a bill yesterday to deny now student visas to Chinese students because China has just passed a law that now requires every national to gather intelligence, including Chinese students here studying, gather intelligence and report back. How do we not pass a law that prevents student visas in that respect?” Moody said on the Senate floor.

“I mean, in the past few years, we’ve had an explosion of Chinese students that were caught gathering evidence, or gathering information on military bases on college campuses. How do we as lawmakers, policy makers, not do that?”

Last month, an identical bill co-sponsored by Reps. Riley Moore (R-WV), Brandon Gill (R-TX), Troy Nehls (R-TX), Scott Perry (R-PA), Andy Ogles (R-TN) and Addison McDowell (R-NC) was introduced in the House.

“Every year we allow nearly 300,000 Chinese nationals to come to the U.S. on student visas. We’ve literally invited the CCP to spy on our military, steal our intellectual property, and threaten national security,” Rep. Moore said at the time. “Just last year, the FBI charged five Chinese nationals here on student visas after they were caught photographing joint US-Taiwan live fire military exercises. This cannot continue. Congress needs to end China’s exploitation of our student visa program. It’s time we turn off the spigot and immediately ban all student visas going to Chinese nationals.”

Concerns over Chinese espionage on college campuses have accelerated in recent years due to the presence of numerous CCP-controlled organizations that were allowed to slip in.

Several universities across the country previously hosted Confucius Institutes on their respective campuses. According to the Chinese government, the project is merely a means to improve foreign relations and promote the exchange of Chinese culture. However, the program has been effectively halted in the U.S. after the State Department designated the Confucius Institute as a “foreign mission” of the PRC.

Former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called the institute “an entity advancing Beijing’s global propaganda and malign influence campaign on U.S. campuses and K-12 classrooms,” in a memo detailing the official designation in 2020.

“Universities around the country and around the world are examining the Confucius Institutes’ curriculum and the scope of Beijing’s influence in their education systems. The United States wants to ensure that students on U.S. campuses have access to Chinese language and cultural offerings free from the manipulation of the Chinese Communist Party and its proxies.”

Lawmakers listed a number of recent examples of Chinese espionage when introducing the legislation, including one in which a Chinese student was convicted of flying a drone over a naval facility in Newport News, Virginia earlier this year. In Chicago, a Chinese national was recently convicted after being tasked by the CCP to recruit spies to steal advanced technology.

“The Chinese Communist Party is fundamentally opposed to our American values, and yet we have handed out hundreds of thousands of student visas to Chinese nationals, many of whom are state-sponsored spies,” said Rep. Brandon Gill. “I fully back Congressman Riley Moore’s Stop CCP VISAs Act, and I am proud to be a cosponsor.”