How Trump's xenophobic rhetoric hurts communities in the US with colleges

From Asha Rangappa’s Freedom Academy

One thing that I have been thinking about since my conference is how Trump and J.D. Vance’s xenophobic rhetoric hurts our economy by discouraging international students from studying in the U.S. Universities are economy engine-drivers for their respective states — it’s one of the reasons that they were among the first to push back against Trump’s ill-conceived travel ban in 2017. And not for nothing, but many universities — including those in red states — rely on international students, many of whom (though not all) have the means to pay full freight to get undergraduate and advanced degrees here, to offset the cost and provide scholarships to U.S. students. When these prospective international students see people like themselves being accused of eating pets and targeted for harassment generally, it doesn’t make coming halfway around the world so appealing. (The gun violence doesn’t help, either — many I’ve spoken to worry that it is unsafe to study here, and I don’t blame them.) One administrator from the University of Alabama lamented that her state’s anti-DEI laws have also made it harder to create programs to help international students adjust to life in the U.S. It’s just another one of the many ways that the Trump agenda is anti-American and incredibly short-sighted…and all the more reason to make sure we bring this election back to sanity on November 5.

Editor’s note: I live in the Western New York region with cities like Syracuse, Rochester, Buffalo which are home to some of the finest educational institutions in the world and attract many international students. I had not thought before about how Trump’s xenophobic values impact our educational institutions and our communities.