Concern over social media vetting for US student visas

Tánaiste (Irish deputy prime minister) Simon Harris has raised concerns over the US State Department's decision to expand its student visa requirements.

Last week the State Department announced it would resume scheduling appointments for international student visas after halting the process in late May.

New applicants will now have to make their social media accounts public for enhanced vetting.

Harris said he planned to take up the issue with the new US ambassador to Ireland who is due to formally take up his post next month.

Mr Harris said he had asked his officials to engage directly with the US embassy in Dublin in a bid to provide as much clarity as possible about these new arrangements.

"I also asked my officials to engage with third-level institutions and organisations that provide services for students who wish to travel with the United States", he added.

While Harris acknowledged that US immigration policy was "a matter for the US authorities", he said the decision had caused "deep concern, confusion and apprehension" for young Irish people wishing to travel to the US.

"Our relationship with the United States is deep and enduring," he said.

"Importantly it also sees thousands of people travel in both directions every year. The intergenerational, people-to-people relationship between the US and Ireland begins with the opportunities that both countries afford to young people.

"It is important that we work to protect this."

The Trump administration decided to halt the scheduling of student visa appointments in late May as it prepared to step up measures to restrict applicants deemed hostile to the US.

As part of last week's announcement they said scheduling would now resume, and they would now be asking all applicants to make their social media accounts public for enhanced screening.

In a statement a spokesperson for the US State Department said those who keep their social media accounts private may be deemed as trying to hide their activity.

They said officials had been instructed to expand the social media vetting of applicants and search for "any indications of hostility toward the citizens, culture, government, institutions or founding principles of the United States".

"It is an expectation from American citizens that their government will make every effort to make our country safer, and that is exactly what the Trump administration is doing every single day," a senior State Department official said.

The new guidelines will affect all applicants who apply for F visas, which are primarily used by students.

Applicants for the M visas, used for vocational students and those applying for J visas, used by exchange students, will also be affected, a State Department spokesperson said.