A statue of Thomas Jefferson in front of the rotunda at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville.
Photographer: Norm Shafer/The Washington Post/Getty Images
Expulsions of Chinese Students Spread Confusion From Yale to UVA
Customs agents at US airports have barred entry to at least 20 students and scholars with valid visas since November in ‘more insidious’ version of disbanded China Initiative.
The questions from the US Customs and Border Patrol agent in a windowless room at Dulles International Airport seemed relentless: Was she a member of the Chinese Communist Party? Did she receive scholarship funding from the Chinese government? Who sent her here?
Susan, a second-year Ph.D. student in biomedical imaging at the University of Virginia returning to the US after visiting her parents in China, said she had nothing to do with the Chinese government or its ruling party. But her answers on this exam didn’t matter: Her student visa was canceled, and she was forced to buy a $1,400 one-way ticket back to Beijing. Seventeen hours later, on the last day of last year, she was escorted onto an airplane by armed guards and barred for five years.