- calendar_today August 21, 2025
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On Monday, former President Donald Trump said the U.S. would be admitting 600,000 Chinese students to American colleges and universities, even as his administration levied sweeping new tariffs on Beijing.The proposed revocation of visas sent shockwaves through the higher education community.
Some universities urged Trump not to go through with the policy, arguing it would place an undue burden on institutions of higher learning that relied on Chinese students both for cultural diversity and to help fund research.
The former president himself had walked back those comments in June, saying that he had “always been in favor of allowing students in” from China.“We have no magnets,” Trump said during Monday’s news conference. “China, intelligently, went and they sort of took a monopoly on the world’s magnets, and it’ll probably take us a year to have them.”
“We’re going to allow their students to come in. It’s very important, 600,000 students. It’s very important,” Trump said during a news conference at the White House. “But we’re going to get along with China.”
Trump’s comments follow months of escalating tension between the U.S. and China, as both nations have imposed or threatened new levies against each other’s exports. In May, U.S. authorities announced a 145 percent tariff on all Chinese goods. Beijing followed up with its own 125 percent tariff on U.S. exports. While negotiators in Geneva, Switzerland, agreed last month to a truce on new tariffs, Trump has repeatedly signaled in recent weeks that he would soon be levying new penalties against China.
Last week, the former president indicated that his administration would slap a 200 percent tariff on magnets made in China, because Beijing had a near-total monopoly on their production.
“We have no magnets,” Trump said during Monday’s news conference. “China, intelligently, went and they sort of took a monopoly on the world’s magnets, and it’ll probably take us a year to have them.”
At the moment, about 270,000 Chinese students are enrolled at colleges and universities in the U.S. Were 600,000 students were to arrive in the U.S. to study, they would more than double the number of foreign nationals currently studying in the country. It would also provide a much-needed boon for colleges and universities that have come to rely on tuition from foreign students, in particular those from China.
The announcement represents a U-turn from earlier statements made by Trump’s administration. In May, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the Trump administration would “aggressively revoke” visas for Chinese nationals, specifically those “affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party and Chinese military or involved in sensitive research.”
The proposed revocation of visas sent shockwaves through the higher education community. Some universities urged Trump not to go through with the policy, arguing it would place an undue burden on institutions of higher learning that relied on Chinese students both for cultural diversity and to help fund research.
The former president himself had walked back those comments in June, saying that he had “always been in favor of allowing students in” from China.
On Monday, as he prepared to announce a dramatic increase in student visas from China, Trump was asked whether the two nations were moving closer to a trade deal.
“It’s always moving closer, but we’re just doing what we have to do,” Trump said. “We are not backsliding at all. We’re doing great with China, but it’s different from the way it was under Biden.”
The student visa announcement on Monday, coupled with the tariff threats, seemed to confirm that the Trump administration would be continuing to keep up economic pressure on China, but without completely shutting the door on cooperation and dialogue between the two nations.
