Because Silicon Valley needs immigration

Katie Drummond: I have to shop in a special hat store. Because in reality my head I don’t … I can’t wear.

Lauren Goode: What is the name of this shop?

Katie Drummond: I can’t wear normal hats.

Lauren Goode: Is it called Bobblehats?

Katie Drummond: No, I will look for it. It comes from strange hats. The last hat I bought is called Big Running Hat. Only large racing hats.

Lauren Goode: Do you also have one called Big Walking Hats?

Katie Drummond: Probably. Probably.

Lauren Goode: OH.

Michael Heat: Oh, it’s too much.

Lauren Goode: All right.

Michael Heat: Should we enter it?

Katie Drummond: Let’s do it.

Lauren Goode: Let’s do it.

Michael Heat: This is wired Valley incrediblyA show on the people, the power and influence of Silicon Valley. Today we will talk about the Trump administration policies on immigration and effect that these policies are ready to have on the technological sector. From the first day of the current administrative immigration policy has been overhauled, the asylum process was practically closed, the dark Alies Enemy Act was invoked to expel hundreds of people and the citizenship of the birth right has been challenged in the Supreme Court of the United States. The visas were subjected to increased control. Wired recently reported how the H-1b Visa candidacy process is becoming more hostile and last week the administration has declared that it will begin to revoke the visas of the students of some Chinese students who are currently studying in US schools. So today we will immerse ourselves in the impacts that these changes could have on the technological industry from the pipeline of talents to future innovations. They are Michael Calore, director of consumer technology and culture here in Wired.

Lauren Goode: I am Lauren Goode. I am a correspondent senior to wired.

Katie Drummond: And I am Katie Drummond, wired global editorial director.

Michael Heat: I want to start concentrating on how the Trump administration has managed students’ visas. Just last week, the secretary of state Marco Rubio announced that the administration would start “aggressively” to revoke visas for Chinese students. The State Department stated that it would focus on students from critical fields and those with ties with the Chinese Communist Party, but also that in general it would improve control over the whole line. The vagueness of these guidelines has sent students, parents and universities in an emotional tail. What do we do with the latter developments?

Lauren Goode: So in reality there were two directives that came out last week and I’m sure we would have heard more, but I think they both go to notice. The first was that a directive was sent to the US embassies all over the world by telling them to pause new interviews for visas for students and visitors, and this included visas F, M and J, up to further notice. And all this idea was that it was in preparation for an expansion of the screening and control of social media. So basically the State Department will examine the online activities of the students much more closely, the activity of social media and will consider it as part of their interview process when they require a visa in the United States. It was already a part of the application process, but now it will only be expanded. We don’t really know what it means. The other was the revocation of visas for Chinese students, as you said, Mike. And I really think this is doing is adding another tool to this sort of cold war that we are having with China, whether with rates or whether it is measures like these, it is clear that the current administration wants to have the upper hand. And what we have reported to Wired is that if this continues and the courts allow it, all this would have a significant effect on higher education because about a quarter of the international student population in the United States comes from China. And also, this is something that I think many people do not realize, personally I have not realized until I started doing further research in this, international students often pay complete or close lessons to it when they come here in the United States for school, which makes it an anchor of economic life for many of these universities and also in this way helps to compensate for costs for domestic students, the US students who are getting scholarships of study that obtain a partial reduction in Tuition and for this type. I think that in general it is a dangerous territory to begin to target students in a specific nationality for these alleged reasons of national security. There will be questions about how effective in the long term it is, but also on how this could potentially weaken the long -term American technological sector.