The US State Department announced on Monday that it has canceled over six thousand student visas since Marco Rubio took office as Secretary of State seven months ago. Rubio has used a vague law allowing him to cancel visas of individuals considered opponents to US foreign policy interests, which has pleased President Donald Trump’s right-wing base. The Trump administration has also sought broader mass deportations of illegal residents in the US. A State Department official told AFP that most visa cancellations were due to overstaying and legal violations including assaults, drunk driving, theft, and support for terrorism. Around four thousand visas were canceled due to legal infractions. The State Department did not specify visa cancellations by nationality. Rubio pledged strict measures against Chinese students.

In March, Rubio told reporters he cancels visas daily, stating about activist students, “Every time I find one of these lunatics, I cancel their visas.” He focused especially on students protesting against Israel and accused of anti-Semitism, which they denied. However, the US administration faced setbacks in two prominent cases. Mahmoud Khalil, a permanent legal US resident who led pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia University, was released by a judge’s order in June. Khalil, whose child was born during his detention, filed a lawsuit accusing the Trump administration of “intimidation.” Also, in May, a judge released Remisa Ozturk, a Turkish graduate student at Tufts University who wrote an article criticizing Israel in a university newspaper, pending hearings. She was arrested by masked plainclothes officers in a Massachusetts street.

Rubio stated the US administration has the right to issue or cancel visas without judicial review and that non-citizens do not have the US constitutional right to free speech.