Trump administration expands social media checks to cover Chinese visitors
US Department of Homeland Security proposes asking Chinese 10-year visa applicants for details of social media presence
The Donald Trump administration is seeking to check the social media presence of Chinese visitors by asking visa holders to disclose information about their favourite social media platforms and user names.
The document was made available to the public on Tuesday in the Federal Register – the daily journal of the US government. It said the Department of Homeland Security proposes to include the following question to the EVUS application: “Please enter information associated with your online presence – Provider/Platform – Social media identifier.”
The social media check would only apply to non-immigrant Chinese with 10-year visas, which include business (B-1), pleasure (B-2) and combination (B-1/B-2), as they are currently the only users of EVUS. According to the notice, about 3.6 million applicants would be affected by the social media check.
The proposal also said, “Respondents who choose not to answer this question can still submit an EVUS enrolment without a negative interpretation or inference. The question will be clearly marked as optional.”