Ending student visa program abuse

While not all terrorists have come to the U.S. under the guise of a student visa, many do.

Just last month, authorities arrested Khalid Ali-M Aldawsari, a 20-year-old Saudi national studying in the U.S. on a student visa, for plotting terrorist attacks against soldiers, critical infrastructure, and President George W. Bush. Recent stories have exposed schools that have helped individuals fraudulently obtain student visas, or failed to report students that did not attend class. 

Several 9/11 terrorists overstayed their student visas. The Times Square bomber, Faisal Shahzad, reportedly first entered the U.S. on a student visa.

According to the Department of Homeland Security, more than 7,300 foreign students nationwide left their programs prematurely in 2010 but remained in the U.S. illegally.

These recent abuses of the system show that we don’t have a proper screening system to adequately vet students before being admitted to study in the U.S.

My legislation would require ICE agents at visa stations overseas to review all student visa applications and conduct in-person interviews when deemed necessary before a student is granted his or her visa.

In addition to enhanced screening overseas, the bill calls for more vigilant monitoring of foreign students once they are in the country by ensuring they are active participants in the programs in which they are enrolled and are in fact working toward an education.

It would require academic institutions to report if a foreign student quit attending classes. The Department of Homeland Security would also be granted the authority to decertify a school’s visa program if it is caught defrauding the student visa process.

This has been an ongoing concern for me.

In 2007, I first introduced a bill to strengthen the student visa process. That year, a University of South Florida student was arrested for carrying explosives and charged with trying to help terrorists. The student, Ahmed Mohamed, was in the country with a non-immigrant student visa. In 2008, he was sentenced to 15 years in federal prison.

This has also been an ongoing concern for those worried about the condition of our homeland security.

The 9/11 Commission wrote in its final report that “had the immigration system set a higher bar for determining whether individuals are who or what they claim to be  . . . it could have potentially excluded, removed, or come into contact with several hijackers who did not appear to meet the terms for admitting short-term visitors.”