Bomb Threats Made to Historically Black Schools Across US
At least a half-dozen historically Black universities in five states and the District of Columbia were responding to bomb threats Monday, with many of them locking down their campuses for a time. In warnings to students, school officials say some of the threats were directed at academic buildings. The FBI “is aware of bomb threats received by some Historically Black Colleges and Universities,” the agency said in a statement provided by Jenna Sellitto, an FBI spokesperson in Atlanta. “The FBI takes all potential threats seriously, and we regularly work with our law enforcement partners to determine their credibility.” In Georgia, Albany State University warned students and faculty on social media that “a bomb threat has been issued to Albany State University’s academic buildings.” School officials at Southern University and A&M College in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, told students to stay in their dormitories and until an all-clear was given. At Bowie State University in Maryland, school officials told everyone on campus to shelter in place until more information was available. Explosive detection dogs and bomb technicians were helping campus police to sweep buildings, The Office of the State Fire Marshall said in a statement. WTOP-TV showed images of police activity concentrated …
Significant Nonimmigrant Visa Fee Increase Expected by September
The Biden administration has proposed raising the fees on almost all nonimmigrant visas. While U.S. officials say the move is needed to better align visa prices with what it costs to provide them, critics worry that if the administration does not address visa wait times, the cost increase could mean even fewer travelers and students coming to the United States. According to a Federal Register notice, the State Department expects the new prices to go into effect by September, and it is accepting comments on the proposed increases until February 28. “All of the fee increases are happening at a time when tourism and travel to the United States is already at an all-time low, and the State Department is imposing waits of six months to a year in many places for a tourist- or business-travel visa,” David Bier, an immigration policy expert at the Cato Institute, told VOA. State Department figures show the visas with the highest numbers of applications are tourism, business, and study. A nonimmigrant visa allows the holder to travel as a tourist or live, work or study temporarily in the U.S. under certain conditions. Visa applications for tourism, B1 and B2, and student visas, F, M, J, will increase from …
US Vice President Harris to Attend Inauguration of Honduras’ First Female President
U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris will travel to Honduras on Thursday to attend the inauguration of Xiomara Castro as the Central American nation’s first female president. Harris attendance at the historic event underscores her role in leading President Joe Biden’s efforts to curb the migration of hundreds of thousands of people from Honduras and neighboring El Salvador, Guatemala and Mexico into the United States each year, many of them traveling on foot over thousands of kilometers. Harris has been specifically tasked with addressing the root causes of the mass migration, including poverty and crime. Biden pledged to adopt a more humane stance on migration than that of his predecessor, Donald Trump, who expelled migrants back to their home countries and separated children from their families. Also attending Castro’s swearing-in will be Vice President William Lai of Taiwan. Castro has talked of switching Honduras’s diplomatic relations from Taiwan to China, which claims the self-ruled as part of its territory and has pushed to isolate Taipei from the international community. Castro campaigned on a platform of ending the corruption that had clouded the 12-year rule of the right-wing National Party, which took power after her husband, Manuel Zelaya, was overthrown by …
US Supreme Court to Hear Challenges to Race-Based College Admissions
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday said it will hear two cases that could determine if race can be used as a factor for college admission. The cases, brought by the conservative group Students for Fair Admissions, targets Harvard, the country’s oldest private school, and the University of North Carolina, one of the nation’s oldest public schools. The group maintains Harvard discriminates by using a quota-like system that disproportionately rejects qualified Asian applicants thus violating their civil rights. “Harvard’s mistreatment of Asian-American applicants is appalling,” the plaintiffs wrote in their brief in the Harvard case. “That Harvard engages in racial balancing and ignores race-neutral alternatives also proves that Harvard does not use race as a last resort.” Harvard says race is only one consideration for admission. “Harvard does not automatically award race-based tips but rather considers race only in a flexible and non-mechanical way; consideration of race benefits only highly qualified candidates; and Harvard does not discriminate against Asian-American applicants,” the school wrote the court in its brief. At UNC, Students for Fair Admissions is demanding a colorblind admissions process. “Public schools have no legitimate interest in maintaining a precise racial balance,” Students for Fair Admissions wrote in its brief …
Afghan Students in the US Face Uncertain Future
Afghan students studying at universities in the U.S. through scholarship programs face a more uncertain future since the Taliban took over and many say they cannot return to their home country because of concerns for their safety. More than 100 Afghan students came to the United States through the Fulbright program last academic year, some of them only days before the Taliban took power in Afghanistan and the U.S. embassy in Kabul was abruptly shut. Under the terms of the Fulbright scholarship program, recipients are required to return to their home countries at the end of their academic programs. Several Afghan students interviewed by VOA said their status as students studying abroad in America endangers their lives under a Taliban regime in Afghanistan. “I have come to terms with the reality that is going back to my beloved Afghanistan and working there is no longer possible,” said Maryam Rayed who left Afghanistan last August to pursue a master’s degree in democracy and governance at Georgetown University in Washington. The U.S. government has evacuated tens of thousands of Afghans who had worked for or had affiliation with the U.S. in Afghanistan out of fear that the …
Omicron Spike Tests COVID Prevention Efforts at Immigration Facilities
The rapidly spreading omicron variant is testing the ability of U.S. authorities to keep tens of thousands of migrants healthy at crowded detention centers, where COVID-19 prevention measures were virtually nonexistent at the beginning of the pandemic but have since improved. More than 2,540 people tested positive for COVID-19 Friday in the Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s 198 immigration detention centers nationwide, according to ICE data, an increase of more than 792% from 285 cases reported on January 3. The surge comes amid a nationwide increase in infections because of the more transmissible omicron variant of the coronavirus. Even so, ICE officials say they have come a long way since 2020 with COVID-19 protection for migrants in their custody. “In terms of improvement, the agency is more communicative than they were before. But honestly, we are still seeing apprehensions and detentions in the same way that we saw at the beginning of the pandemic. … There’s more procedures put in place [such as] request releases, which wasn’t the case before,” said Elena Noureddine, who heads the detention program at PAIR, a Boston-based nonprofit that provides free legal representation for asylum-seekers and detained immigrants. 2020 to 2022 In March 2020, at the beginning of the …
Arkansas Professor Pleads Guilty to Lying About China Patents
A University of Arkansas professor pleaded guilty Friday to lying to the FBI about patents he had for inventions in mainland China. Simon Saw-Teong Ang pleaded guilty in federal court in Fayetteville, Arkansas, to one count from a 58-count federal indictment. Prosecutors say that 24 patents bearing Ang’s name were filed with the Beijing government but that he failed to report the patents to the university and denied having them when questioned by the FBI. The university requires disclosure of all faculty patents, which the university would own. The plea deal calls for a one-year prison sentence, but the crime could be punishable by up to five years in prison. The 64-year-old Fayetteville resident was suspended from the university faculty when he was initially indicted in July 2020. The university website no longer lists him on its faculty directory. …
Biden Admin Unveils Changes to Attract Foreign STEM Students
The Biden administration on Friday announced policy changes to attract international students specializing in science, technology, engineering and math — part of the broader effort to make the U.S. economy more competitive. The State Department will let eligible visiting students in those fields, known as STEM, complete up to 36 months of academic training, according to senior administration officials. There will also be a new initiative to connect these students with U.S. businesses. The officials insisted on anonymity to discuss the changes before their official announcement. Homeland Security will add 22 new fields of study — including cloud computing, data visualization and data science — to a program that allows international graduates from U.S. universities to spend up to three additional years training with domestic employers. The program generated about 58,000 applications in fiscal 2020. The programs are designed to ensure that the U.S. is a magnet for talent from around the world, attracting scientists and researchers whose breakthroughs will enable the economy to grow. Government data shows that international students are increasingly the lifeblood of academic research. The government’s National Science Board reported this week that international students on temporary visas account for more than half of U.S. doctoral …
US Drops Case Against MIT Professor Accused of Ties to China
The Justice Department dropped charges Thursday against a Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor accused of concealing ties to the Chinese government, a further setback to a federal initiative that was set up to prevent economic espionage and theft by Beijing of trade secrets and academic research. The department revealed its decision in the case against Gang Chen in a filing in federal court in Boston, saying it could no longer meet its burden of proof. U.S. Attorney Rachael Rollins, the top federal prosecutor in Massachusetts, said the move was “in the interests of justice” and was the result of new information the government had received about the allegations. “After a careful assessment of this new information in the context of all the evidence, our office has concluded that we can no longer meet our burden of proof at trial,” Rollins said. “As prosecutors, we have an obligation in every matter we pursue to continually examine the facts while being open to receiving and uncovering new information.” The outcome, which had been expected and was earlier recommended by prosecutors in Boston, is a blow to a Justice Department effort known as the China Initiative, which was set up in 2018 to …
California Governor Plans to Extend Healthcare Coverage to Undocumented Immigrants
California has a health care problem that’s not unique to the state. Most of the state’s uninsured are undocumented immigrants, according to the non-profit group, California Health Care Foundation. Governor Newsom’s says his solution is simple, but as Anglina Bagdasaryan reports, it’s also controversial. Anna Rice narrates the story. Camera: Vazgen Varzhabetian …
South African University Students Fight COVID Vaccine Mandates
South African university students are fighting mandates that require they be vaccinated against COVID-19 before returning to the classroom on February 14. Even students who are vaccinated, and want others to get inoculated, are against the policy and the students’ union is threatening protests across the country. Linda Givetash reports from Johannesburg. Camera – Zaheer Cassim. Video editors – Zaheer Cassim and Marcus Harton. …
Migrant Caravan from Honduras Stopped in Guatemala
Several hundred migrants who had departed from the Honduran city of San Pedro Sula on Saturday in hopes of reaching the United States entered Guatemalan territory where they were intercepted by authorities who began talks on returning them to their homelands. Some 300 migrants, mainly Hondurans and Nicaraguans, arrived in Corinto, Honduras Saturday afternoon and crossed into the Guatemalan border province of Izabal, where they were met by hundreds of anti-riot agents from the national police and army. The Guatemalan Migration Institute said it was in talks with the migrants on returning them to their countries of origin. Those who wish to remain in Guatemala must present their personal identification document, vaccination card and a negative test for the coronavirus. “People are being returned, everything in order, humanely,” said institute general director Carlos Emilio Morales. “We are protecting our borders; we are protecting the health of all Guatemalans.” Guatemala’s government said 36 people were deported to Honduras because they did not meet the requirements and a group of 10 who met immigration and health requirements were allowed to continue. The migrants had begun their journey toward the U.S. from San Pedro Sula shortly after dawn Saturday, walking to the Guatemalan …
Dartmouth Offers ‘Need Blind’ Admissions to Foreign Students
Dartmouth College, the Ivy League university in New Hampshire, has announced that it will admit international students through a “need blind” process, meaning that their ability to pay tuition will not dictate their admission. Dartmouth already had a policy of “need blind” admissions for U.S. applicants, but now foreign students will be considered for admission regardless of their or their families’ financial status. The decision represents an effort to increase the number of international students at the university. “Talent is spread all across the world. We want to remove any financial barriers,” Darthmouth President Philip Hanlon told the Financial Times. “This move benefits every student on campus, not just international ones. Tomorrow’s leaders have to be global citizens. By us bringing together students from all over the world … they will learn from their peers.” In recent years, the college has increased its recruitment abroad, which is reflected in the growing proportion of international students in its student body. According to Dartmouth, its most recent class was composed of 14% international students, compared with 8% in 2013, when Hanlon became president. Hanlon said in a statement from the college that there is no target for how many international students it now …
Navient Resolves US State Probes Into Its Student Loan Practices
Navient Corp said Thursday it agreed to pay $145 million to settle multistate litigation into its student loan practices. The company also said it will cancel loan balances for about 66,000 borrowers with loans that were largely made between 2002 and 2010 and later went into default. Navient said that as part of the settlement, it denied violating any laws or causing borrower harm. …
Dartmouth to Offer ‘Need Blind’ Admissions to Foreign Students
In an attempt to attract more foreign students, Dartmouth College in New Hampshire says it will admit international students regardless of their ability to pay tuition. International students will be admitted through a “need blind” process used for U.S. students. The college charges about $80,000 per year for tuition and accommodation. “Talent is spread all across the world,” college president Philip Hanlon told the Financial Times. “We want to remove any financial barriers. This move benefits every student on campus, not just international ones. Tomorrow’s leaders have to be global citizens. By us bringing together students from all over the world … they will learn from their peers.” A variety of factors has led to decreased numbers of international students applying to U.S. colleges. These include rising costs, stricter visa policies and the COVID-19 pandemic. Dartmouth said its most recent class took in 14% international students, compared to 8% in 2013 when Hanlon took charge. A handful of other universities is taking similar measures. In the Dartmouth College statement, Hanlon said that while there was no target, he expected “international applications will skyrocket” and would not be surprised if the proportion reached 25 percent in the coming decade. “Dartmouth has …
VOA Unpacked: Root Causes of Central Americans’ Migration to US
Many of the people attempting to cross the U.S.-Mexico border are asylum seekers, and the vast majority come from three Central American nations: Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. In 2021, migrant arrivals to the U.S.-Mexico border reached multi-decade highs, but border surges are not a new phenomenon and are the product of a complex set of factors, the roots of which span generations. This video explores the roots of Central American migration to the U.S. …
Families Separated at US Border Now Fear Extortion Attempts
For the 30-year-old Honduran woman, the worst seemed to be over. She’s been reunited with her son who, as a 6-year-old, was separated from her under the Trump administration. She’s working construction in North Carolina. And attorneys were negotiating a payment for families like hers that endured separations. But reports about those negotiations have created a new worry: extortion attempts stemming from the mistaken belief that she received a huge payout. Her family has already received demands for $5,000 a month. “Apparently, I am a millionaire now,” said the woman, who, like others interviewed by The Associated Press, spoke on condition of anonymity due to fears for her family’s safety. “I don’t have the money to pay for something like that and I don’t know what to do. I am desperate, really.” While specific reports are isolated, widespread extortion in Central America explains why many seek asylum in the United States in the first place. Some advocates fear prospects of large payments will fuel many more threats. An attorney for the woman and other families has asked U.S. officials to consider admitting more relatives because of the threats. It is far from clear whether families will receive any money at …
US Returns More Migrants to Mexican Border City Under Rebooted Trump-Era Policy
The United States on Wednesday began returning migrants to the Mexican city of Tijuana in a restart of a Trump-era program that forces asylum-seekers to wait for U.S. court hearings in Mexico, Mexican authorities and the U.N. migration agency said. The United States and Mexico last month agreed to relaunch the controversial scheme known as Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP), in keeping with a U.S. federal court order. U.S. President Joe Biden, a Democrat, has struggled to reverse many hardline immigration policies put in place by his Republican predecessor, Donald Trump. Biden ended MPP soon after his inauguration in January as he sought to pursue what he called a more humane approach to immigration. But a federal judge ruled Biden’s move did not follow proper procedure, and in August ordered MPP reinstated. The program first resumed in December at the international crossing connecting El Paso, Texas, to Ciudad Juarez. More than 200 people have been returned to Mexico so far under the relaunch of MPP, according to the U.N.’s International Organization of Migration (OIM). Two migrants were returned to Tijuana, across from California, on Wednesday with future appointments in U.S. courts, an official with OIM told Reuters. The migrant rights advocacy …
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