The News
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced a crackdown on foreign visas on Wednesday, with Chinese international students named as a particular target, as well as any foreign officials who are considered “complicit in censoring Americans,” he said.
Rubio singled out overseas regulatory actions taken against US tech companies, many of whom have criticized the EU’s digital laws as a threat to freedom of speech.
Meanwhile, limits on visas for Chinese students came in tandem with new Trump administration restrictions on the sale of jet-engine, semiconductor, and chemicals technology to China. Combined with Beijing’s refusal to lift its curbs on the export of rare earths, the announcements suggest a trade war reprieve between the world’s two biggest economies — agreed barely two weeks ago — is withering.