WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The Trump administration aims to tighten the duration of visas for students, cultural exchange visitors and members of the media, according to a proposed government regulation issued on Wednesday, part of a broader crackdown on legal immigration.

President Donald Trump, a Republican, kicked off a wide-ranging immigration crackdown after taking office in January. The latest move would create new hurdles for international students, exchange workers and foreign journalists who would have to apply to extend their stay in the U.S. rather than maintain a more flexible legal status.

The proposed regulation would create a fixed time period for F visas for international students, J visas that allow visitors on cultural exchange programs to work in the U.S., and I visas for members of the media. Those visas are currently available for the duration of the program or U.S.-based employment.

There were about 1.6 million international students on F visas in the U.S. in 2024, according to U.S. government data. The U.S. granted visas to about 355,000 exchange visitors and 13,000 members of the media in fiscal year 2024, which began on October 1, 2023.

The student and exchange visa periods would be no longer than four years, the proposed regulation said. The visa for journalists – which currently can last years – would be up to 240 days or, in the case of Chinese nationals, 90 days. The visa holders could apply for extensions, the proposal said.

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The Trump administration said in the proposed regulation that the change was needed to better “monitor and oversee” the visa holders while they were in the United States.

The public will have 30 days to comment on the measure, which mirrors a proposal put forward in 2020 at the end of Trump’s first term in office.

NAFSA, a non-profit organization representing international educators at more than 4,300 institutions worldwide, opposed the 2020 proposal and called on the Trump administration to scrap it. The Democratic administration of then-President Joe Biden withdrew it in 2021.

The Trump administration has increased scrutiny of legal immigration, revoking student visas and green cards of university students over their ideological views and stripping legal status from hundreds of thousands of migrants.

In an August 22 memo, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services said it would resume long-dormant visits to citizenship applicants’ neighborhoods to check what it termed residency, moral character and commitment to American ideals.

(Reporting by Ted Hesson; editing by Frances Kerry and Mark Heinrich)

Germany will not support recognition of a Palestinian state at September’s United Nations General Assembly, Chancellor Friedrich Merz confirmed on Tuesday.

Speaking at a news conference with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, who said in July that Canada would recognize such a state, Merz said bluntly, “The position of the federal government is clear, as far as the possible recognition of the state of Palestine is concerned. Canada knows this. We will not join this initiative. We don’t see the requirements met.”

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán recently called a two-state solution an “illusion.” Speaking on a YouTube show titled “Warriors’ Hour,” he said, “I think keeping the two-state solution on the agenda actually hinders the kinds of agreements that could otherwise be achieved. It means keeping an illusion alive, one that, under current circumstances, reduces or outright prevents cooperation.” He also suggested that if the percentage of Muslim voters in the country increases compared to that of Jewish voters, the government will become pro-Palestinian and pro-Islamic policy, and “the Jews will have to pack up and leave.”

Unlike Merz and Orban, leftist British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron have publicly called for the establishment of a Palestinian state.

The arguments against recognizing a Palestinian state are many and varied. The criteria of statehood are reflected in the 1933 Montevideo Convention on the Rights and Duties of States, which require an effective and independent government, which does not exist, as the Palestinian Authority was created under the Oslo Accords as an interim solution, and is not effective, as it has spent millions of dollars inciting terror against Israel with  its “pay-to-slay program.”

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Additionally, the Palestinians have claimed sovereignty over all of the territories which Israel won in the 1967 war, including the city of Jerusalem and the Temple Mount, the holiest site in Judaism.

As Israeli International Affairs Advisor Caroline Glick has stated bluntly, “Gaza was a sovereign Palestinian state from August 16, 2005-Oct.7, 2023. After October 7, support for a ‘two-state solution’ is nothing less than support for the annihilation of the Jewish state, the genocide of the Jews of Israel and the subjugation of Diaspora Jewry.”

Gaza was a sovereign Palestinian state from August 16, 2005-Oct.7, 2023.
After October 7, support for a “two-state solution” is nothing less than support for the annihilation of the Jewish state, the genocide of the Jews of Israel and the subjugation of Diaspora Jewry. https://t.co/PFG4tTDSx1

— Caroline Glick (@CarolineGlick) September 6, 2024