Vance announces visa fraud probe of nine elite universities

The Trump administration is going after nine of the country's most prominent universities over alleged visa fraud, accusing them of exploiting foreign researchers to undercut American wages and exposing federally funded research to foreign influence.

Vice President JD Vance announced the investigation Thursday at a White House news conference on the administration's fraud task force. The schools under examination are Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Brown, the University of Pittsburgh, UC Davis, Caltech, Arizona State and MIT. Vance said the universities are abusing the J-1 exchange visitor visa program to import cheaper labor from overseas and skirt employment obligations to U.S. citizens.

"Something weird is going on at these universities," Vance said. "They're using these visas way too much. They're using them to undercut the wages of American grad students and American researchers, and it simply has to stop."

Vance claimed that 61 percent of researchers working on federally funded grants at the nine schools hold J-1 visas, compared with a national average of 38 percent, though he did not explain how the figures were calculated. He also said American graduate students and researchers earn about $20,000 more than workers brought in on J-1s, without identifying the data behind the comparison.

Labor Department Inspector General Anthony D'Esposito said subpoenas have already been served on all nine schools and a visa fraud strike team is being formed. "If an American university is breaking the law to save $1 while exposing American research to a foreign adversary, that is not academic excellence. It's institutional betrayal," he said.

The universities pushed back carefully. MIT said every J-1 holder on its campus was vetted and authorized by the U.S. government and that it takes its legal obligations seriously. Stanford said it would cooperate. Arizona State denied wrongdoing, saying it hires in full compliance with U.S. law.

The university probe was one of three visa crackdown announcements in 24 hours. The administration also suspended Microsoft from the program that lets employers apply for green cards for H-1B workers, accusing the company of fraud after mass layoffs, and the Department of Homeland Security proposed a $70,000 fee on schools for every international student in the Optional Practical Training work program.