Over the course of 2025, the U.S. State Department revoked an all-time record high of visas. According to the State Department’s official X account, the agency has revoked over 100,000 visas since President Donald Trump returned to the White House in January of 2025. That figure is more than double the 40,000 visas revoked by the Biden administration in 2024 and includes approximately 8,000 student visas and some 2,500 specialized work visas.

The majority of the revocations were for business and tourism visa overstays, but a number of other revocations were due to encounters with law enforcement over criminal activity. Among workers, for example, half of the revocations were for driving under the influence (DUI) arrests, nearly a third were for assault and battery or confinement charges, and the remainder of revocations were on the basis of theft, child abuse, substance abuse and distribution, or fraud and embezzlement charges. Hundreds of foreign workers lost their visas due to child abuse, the State Department confirmed. The department’s X account affirmed, “We will continue to deport these thugs to keep America safe.”

“Who you allow to visit your country should reflect the national interest. We said that from the very beginning,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters at a press conference last month. “Sometimes we’ll deny people visas because of activities they’ve undertaken overseas, other times it’s people that have visas but are in the United States doing things that run counter to our national interests,” he continued. “The law gives us the right — and, in fact, I would argue, the obligation — to remove people like that from our country.”

In comments to The Washington Stand, Jessica Vaughan, director of Policy Studies at the Center for Immigration Studies, hailed the increase in visa revocations as “a prudent and welcome development.” She explained, “Until now, the State Department has sought to distance itself from visa compliance or enforcement in favor of facilitating travel and acquiescing to demands of the higher education, travel, and tech industries to approve more and more visas.” Vaughan continued, “Now they are moving to yank the visas of people who are creating problems here and committing crimes. Not only does this help American communities, it sends a signal to all visa applicants that they had better behave while they’re here or they could be kicked out.”

Simon Hankinson, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation’s Border Security and Immigration Center and a former consular officer, told TWS, “The State Department’s announcement that it revoked over 100,000 visas over the course of 2025 shows an increase over previous years [and] is consistent with the Trump administration’s promise to secure the borders, crack down on fraud and illegal immigration, and enforce the Immigration and Nationality Act.” He added, “While consular officers are required to follow the INA and are generally prudent, some are more lax than others in issuing visas. Overstay rates from some countries are extremely high, which is unacceptable.”

“As the State Department applies more stringent vetting and standards to visa issuance and reviews already-issued visas more carefully, one would expect to see more revocations. It is in everyone’s interest that visas are properly issued, and that aliens respect the conditions,” Hankinson observed. “The more aliens know they can’t get away with it, the less they will abuse our system.”

“One major weak link now is that visa-holders can lie about their reasons for travel and claim asylum when they get here,” he continued. “A small number of asylum claims are genuine, but the majority are unfounded and simply made so that the alien can remain in the U.S. Bottom line: We need more stringent vetting of aliens for visas; we need to enforce the rules against anyone who lies, commits fraud, or breaks the conditions of his visa; we should change the law so people here on visas can’t claim asylum fraudulently to remain in the U.S. indefinitely.”

Rubio and the State Department have already put in place numerous measures to increase visa security and vetting processes. In June, the State Department introduced a stringent social media review program, requiring student, technical student, and exchange visitor visa applicants to set their social media page privacy settings to “public” so that consular officials can identify posts, content, and attitudes hostile to American citizens, culture, government, institutions, or founding principles, in addition to any support for terrorism or violence. In December, the enhanced social media vetting program was expanded to include H-1B and H-4 visa applicants, with an additional focus on credibility, inconsistencies in applications, and potential national security risks.

“Every visa adjudication is a national security decision,” the State Department’s website says of the enhanced vetting. “The United States must be vigilant during the visa issuance process to ensure that those applying for admission into the United States do not intend to harm Americans and our national interests, and that all applicants credibly establish their eligibility for the visa sought, including that they intend to engage in activities consistent with the terms for their admission.”

“It can be tough for consular officers to detect which applicants will cause problems, even if they otherwise qualify for a visa. They interview dozens of people a day, and don’t have time for a psychological assessment,” Vaughan noted. “Instead, they have to rely on proxy information, such as criminal records in the home country, socio-economic status, and other factors, including the compliance records of similar applicants. Now, under Trump, the State Department is reviewing social media histories of individuals as well.”

In August, the State Department launched the Continuous Vetting Center (CVC), dedicated to monitoring the activities of visa applicants and visa-holders and denying or revoking visas of those determined to pose a national security threat or otherwise be ineligible to hold a U.S. visa. The CVC’s chief task will be to examine the 55 million visa-holders currently in the U.S. to identify potential violations. Those found to be in violation of the nation’s rules for visa-holders will have their visas and legal status revoked and will be subject to deportation.

“The improvement that is likely to make the most difference is the Trump administration's implementation of a much more sophisticated assessment of each country’s information-sharing, document integrity, overstay rates, and other security-related factors, which has led to the targeted restrictions for certain visa applicants (the so-called travel ban),” Vaughan suggested. “This policy will result in fewer visa issuances overall in the countries whose citizens have not been compliant or who have proved to be a problem after they arrive,” she added. “This is a sound approach — deal with any problematic individuals from any country, but also reduce the risk by applying limits (with exceptions) to general classes of high-risk applicants.”