Graphic by Hale Whitney ’26
By Quill Nishi-Leonard ’27
Copy Chief
As the 2024 presidential election draws near, the issues of immigration and travel have once again come into the national spotlight. Former President and current Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has often taken hardline stances on immigration, rhetoric that in the past, has sometimes extended to his policies surrounding student visas.
Mount Holyoke News interviewed Larissa Lee ’27, an international student from Malaysia, to gain their perspective on the upcoming presidential election.
“I’ve honestly been worrying a lot about the potential impact on student visas, and immigrant visas in general,” Lee said. “With Trump’s very well-known stance on immigration, I’d be lying if I said I haven’t had cynical thoughts on what this could mean for my future in this country.”
On June 20, 2024, Donald Trump stated on a podcast, “You graduate from [an American] college, I think you should get automatically as part of your diploma a green card to be able to stay in this country.” A green card would allow for international students graduating from American colleges to permanently work and stay in the U.S. This policy would offer international students a clarified path towards permanent residency and citizenship in the U.S., though the Trump campaign seemed to partially retract it later. A few hours after the podcast was released, they issued a statement stating this policy would exclude “all communists, radical Islamists, Hamas supporters, America haters and public charges.”
The rhetoric utilized by the Trump campaign is reminiscent of previous restrictions Trump attempted to impose on student visas while in office. In 2020, Donald Trump issued a proclamation that canceled the visas of over 1,000 Chinese graduate students who had studied at institutions with “ties to China's military fusion strategy,” according to Reuters. Senator Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., criticized this policy as “taking advantage … of fear and division in our country to stoke xenophobia and paint an entire people as guilty by association.”
Lee also expressed concern about the impact of Trump’s language and policies on the safety of international students. “As someone who is Chinese … I am scared for how his potential second term could spread his harmful rhetoric even further and jeopardize the safety of me and many other people in my community,” they said.
In an interview with Mount Holyoke News, Ruth Lawson Professor of Politics and Director of the McCulloch Center for Global Initiatives Kavita Khory urged international students with concerns to “come to the McCulloch Center.” The McCulloch Center offers various resources for international students, including workshops and advising appointments. According to the College’s website, the Center can guide international students through a variety of legal processes, from “immigration regulations and procedures” to “obtaining a Social Security Card and Massachusetts ID.”
“International students are safe here,” Khory said.
Lee urged Mount Holyoke College students to be mindful of the election’s effects on the wider international community. “I hope that people understand that this election has massive implications not just for America, but for the rest of the world,” Lee said. “Whoever is elected represents and makes decisions on behalf of one of the biggest nations in the world currently, so please keep in mind when voting that America is not the only country being impacted by the decision made.”
Madeleine Diesl '28 contributed fact-checking.