How Trump Denying Visas to Chinese Students Could Backfire on the US

One night in 1978, President Jimmy Carter got a phone call at 3 a.m. from a top adviser who was visiting China.

“Deng Xiaoping insisted I call you now, to see if you would permit 5,000 Chinese students to come to American universities,” said the official, Frank Press.

“Tell him to send 100,000,” Mr. Carter replied.

By Christmastime that year, the first group of 52 Chinese students had arrived in the United States, just ahead of the formal establishment of U.S.-Chinese diplomatic relations on New Year’s Day. A month later, Mr. Deng, China’s top leader, made a historic visit to America during which he watched John Denver sing “Take Me Home, Country Roads” and was photographed wearing a cowboy hat.

It’s almost hard to believe how little contact there had been between the United States and modern China before that. The Sinologist John K. Fairbank wrote in 1971: “Since 1950 Washington has officially sent more men to the moon than it has to China.” The visits by Mr. Deng and, more important, by those first Chinese students began a new chapter that would fundamentally change China — and the world. The United States gained access to a vast market and talent pool, while China found a model and a partner for transforming its economy.

Now that chapter has closed, after the Trump administration announced on Wednesday that it would begin “aggressively” revoking the visas of Chinese students.

For the millions of Chinese who have studied in the United States, myself included, it is a sobering and disheartening development. It marks a turning point that America, long a beacon of openness and opportunity, would start shutting its doors to Chinese who aspire to a good education and a future in a society that values freedom and human dignity.