US President Donald Trump’s drive for mass deportations of migrants is riling college campuses and fueling a global rethinking about the promise of coming to America.
“The message coming from Washington is that you are not welcome in the United States,” said Edwin van Rest, chief executive of Studyportals, which tracks real-time searches by international students considering studying in other countries.
Student interest in studying in America has dropped to its lowest level since the Covid-19 pandemic, it found. “The fact is, there are great opportunities elsewhere.”
The United States still beckons to the “huddled masses” from the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty. The strong economy has helped draw millions more every year, with the inflow driving the US population over 340 million. But polling by Pew Research Center from January through April found that opinions of the United States have worsened over the past year in 15 of the 24 countries it surveyed.
Trump’s campaign against international students who have expressed pro-Palestinian sympathies stick stubbornly in the minds of people across the world who for decades clamored to participate in the land of opportunity.
Immigration influx
Immigration in 2024 drove US population growth to its fastest rate in 23 years as the nation surpassed 340 million residents, the US Census Bureau said in December. Almost 2.8 million more people immigrated to the United States last year than in 2023, partly because of a new method of counting that adds people who were admitted for humanitarian reasons. Net international migration accounted for 84 percent of the nation’s 3.3 million-person increase in the most recent data reported.
But where some Americans see immigration largely as an influx of workers and brain power, Trump sees an “invasion,” a long-standing view.
Since returning to the White House, Trump has initiated an far-reaching campaign of immigration enforcement that has pushed the limits of executive power and clashed with federal judges trying to restrain him over his invocation of special powers to deport people, cancel visas and deposit deportees in third countries.
The US is still viewed as an economic powerhouse, though people in more countries consider China to be the world’s top economy, according to the Pew poll.
Netherlands-based Studyportals, which analyzes the searches for international schools by millions of students worldwide, reported that weekly pageviews for degrees in the United States, collapsed by half between January 5 and the end of April.
It predicted that if the trend continues, the demand for programs in America could plummet further, with US programs losing ground to countries like the United Kingdom and Australia.
“International students and their families seek predictability and security when choosing which country to trust with their future,” said Fanta Aw, chief executive of NAFSA, which represents international educators. “The US government’s recent actions have naturally shaken their confidence in the United States.”
(Associated Press)
