WASHINGTON — The United States plans to start “aggressively” revoking visas for Chinese students, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said, escalating the Trump administration’s push for greater scrutiny of foreigners attending American universities.

Rubio said in a statement that students affected would include “those with connections to the Chinese Communist Party or studying in critical fields.” The U.S. will also enhance scrutiny “of all future visa applications from the People’s Republic of China and Hong Kong,” he added.

China had the second most students in the U.S. of any country in 2024, behind India. China’s Foreign Ministry didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment made outside working hours.

The move came a day after Rubio ordered U.S. embassies worldwide to stop scheduling interviews for student visas as the administration weighs stricter vetting of applicants’ social-media profiles. It marks yet another effort by President Donald Trump’s push to restrict foreign students’ entry to American schools over claims that they might threaten U.S. national security.

The White House has waged a high-stakes battle with universities that initially focused on elite universities such as Harvard and Columbia over antisemitism. That has turned into a bigger attack over the role of U.S. higher education and the foreign students whose tuition is a crucial source of income for schools around the country.

“For the ones that really can make a contribution, want to make a difference, we want to make it possible for them to come here and bring their great ideas, bring their great intellect and help us build a great America,” Nvidia Corp. Chief Executive Officer Jensen Huang said in an interview with Bloomberg Television. “I think the administration is all in on that and I don’t think anything they have said changes that.”

Earlier Wednesday, Trump said Harvard should cap foreign student enrollment at 15%, escalating his campaign to force policy changes at the elite institution. Rubio told senators last week that the number of revoked student visas is “probably in the thousands at this point,” adding that “a visa’s not a right — it’s a privilege.”

International students accounted for 5.9% of the total U.S. higher education population of almost 19 million. In the 2023-2024 school year, more than 1.1 million foreign students came to the U.S., with India and China accounting for about half, according to the Institute of International Education.

The number of Chinese students has declined in the U.S. — it fell 4% to about 277,000 students in 2024 — amid increased tension between the two adversaries. The FBI has warned that China has sought to exploit “America’s deeply held and vital culture of collaboration and openness on university campuses.”

The State Department is also clamping down more on foreigners seeking to come to the U.S. more broadly as part of Trump’s crackdown on immigration. Earlier Wednesday, Rubio announced visa restrictions on foreign officials and other individuals who “censor Americans,” including those who target American technology companies.

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(With assistance from James Mayger and Derek Wallbank.)

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