Dear Erica,
Tense greetings from Washington, D.C., where the Senate has just voted to pass a stopgap funding bill to keep the federal government open (the current funding bill was set to expire at midnight today, Friday).
On March 11, the Trump administration fired the entire staff of the International and Foreign Language Education office, part of a move that reduced the U.S. Department of Education’s workforce by half. This drastic action raises many red flags, not the least of which is the viability of Title VI and Fulbright-Hays programs, including the National Resource Centers, Centers for International Business Education and Research (CIBER), and Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellowships. Several states have filed a lawsuit in opposition to the staffing reductions.
Meanwhile, the funding freeze affecting all State Department grant programs that was supposed to lift two weeks ago remains in effect. So far only limited funds have been trickling out—equal to only about 15 percent of what is owed. As NAFSA's Jill Allen Murray said in Latitudes, this "trickle" does nothing to alleviate the uncertainty about funds for students and scholars in the pipeline who have not yet been posted nor quell concerns about the very survival of these programs.
As a result, we have updated the language of our current State Department "funding freeze" advocacy campaign to include a demand that Congress protect the international education programs at the Department of Education as well. Help us convey to Congress the vital importance of federal investment in international education and exchange! Approximately 20,000 letters on the State Department funding freeze have already been sent. Let’s keep the pressure on Congress to act!
As NAFSA executive director and CEO, Fanta Aw argued in a March 11 Washington Post story, “These programs are not charity. They were created with the understanding that the U.S. must exchange with the rest of the world and vice versa. This is about smart diplomacy. It is an investment in our future, and in our national security and economic interest.” We will also be carrying this message and others forward at NAFSA Advocacy Day next month. More to come on that!
In other news, we are following closely the recent arrest of Columbia University student and legal permanent resident, Mahmoud Khalil, to better understand the case the Trump administration plans to bring against him. Refer to this March 11 NPR interview with Stuart Anderson, executive director of the National Foundation for American Policy, where he discusses the rights of green card holders.
March 21 is the deadline for relevant agencies to submit a joint report that identifies “countries for which vetting and screening information is so deficient as to warrant a partial or a full suspension on the admission of nationals from those countries” according to a January 20 executive order. We will of course keep you posted.
WHAT YOU CAN DO:
Thank you for your kind attention.
Best,
Erica
Erica Stewart
Senior Director, Advocacy & Strategic Communications
NAFSA: Association of International Educators
