13 ms·

Arizona State Students from China Detained at LAX, Denied Entry to US

82 points by jseliger 7y ago

ericmay 7y ago
"The Chinese students were deemed inadmissible to the United States based on information discovered during the CBP inspection," the CBP statement said. Look. The Feds don’t always have bad reasons for doing things. I know we have a lot of problems and the social media and computer searches aren’t something I find myself condoning, but before we jump to any conclusions we should at least wait to see why exactly they were denied entry. It could be BS, or they could be targeting Hong Kong supporters amongst Chinese students currently studying in the US or Canada or elsewhere. It seems odd to me that the Feds would target these specific 9 students so I think it’s worth the time to wait until we hear more.
- PhasmaFelis 7y ago
  > Look. The Feds don’t always have bad reasons for doing things. This is true, but they've done nothing to deserve the benefit of the doubt, especially when they continue to conceal information. Right now, unfortunately, assuming malice until proven otherwise is the rational thing to do with CBP.
  - ericmay 7y ago
    certainly not from a volume standpoint, since millions of people, including Chinese university students have no problems at the border.
    - viraptor 7y ago
      Does volume matter here? I'd rather go with "times CBP were right". As in how many of the time they were involved, they got involved for the right reasons.
  - diminoten 7y ago
    Hardly rational, considering these 9 are excluded while a large percentage of the ~360k or so Chinese students studying in the US (and the ~3 million Chinese tourists that come to the US every year) seem to be able to travel in and out of the US. It's buzzword bingo. China + CBP = web traffic. It's hot right now, so this is a good article to write if you're interested in clicks. The implication here that a policy change has happened is (thus far) false. These 9 people were flagged for some specific, long standing reason, and it's generally not news except for the buzzwords that make it "interesting".
    - nraynaud 7y ago
      The policy has changed, there is no precedent according to professionals. There were way more students flagged than that on that day, ASU is the only one coming forward for now. But they had never seen such a high secondary screening rate, detained for so long, such a weird return “deal”, nor that many visa revoked in a single day.
      - pbourke 7y ago
        What do you mean weird return deal? Isn’t that a common practice when someone is found inadmissible? If nothing else is out of order, you’re given the chance to withdraw your request to enter the US.
        nraynaud 7y ago
        After the visa as been revoked?
        mikelward 7y ago
        I thought normally the airline paid in this case?
        mikelward 7y ago
        I misunderstood. It sounds like the airline must fly them back, but they can recover their costs from the passenger. https://travel.stackexchange.com/questions/23622/who-pays-for-the-return-air-ticket-when-a-country-refuses-entry-by-air https://travel.stackexchange.com/questions/23622/who-pays-fo...
- wheelerwj 7y ago
  > It seems odd to me that the Feds would target these specific 9 students so I think it’s worth the time to wait until we hear more. agreed, but its important to understand the role of the media is bring things to light, for the sake of transparency so that society can hold people accountable. While we should absolutely resolve to get more information before making any kind of decision, we should also ask why the CBP is able to operate with such a lack of transparency that these kind of stories are a requirement.
  - mises 7y ago
    > we should ask why the CBP is able to operate with such a lack of transparency that these kind of stories are a requirement This is why we have habeas corpus. CBP has to charge them in reasonable time or let them go (though I'm not sure they have to let them into the country). There is a legal framework for this kind of stuff, though it's almost certainly worth waiting until we actually get information. Let's consider the other side: if CBP thinks it found something, it's possibly got a reason to flag some one. However, it's probably not good for CBP to then go around telling every one, "Hey! We think we found some thing on these people!"
- nraynaud 7y ago
  They did not target those 9, there were about 20-30 of them in the secondary room according to witnesses, all Chinese (but LAX is big so they might have a special Chinese secondary room, couldn’t clear that up). Only one university decided to come forward for now. This behavior of CBP is highly unusual according to professionals.
  - caf 7y ago
    I feel like the unreported yet actually interesting background here is that the Administration seems to have decided, for some reason, to pick a fight with the universities. The reason that other institutions involved haven't come forward is likely because this kind of thing is terrible advertising for the international student industry.
    - nraynaud 7y ago
      I speculate that UCLA must be impacted (just size and in the west), but they had a Chinese student cheating ring scandal recently, so they probably will have a public perception if they come forwards. In a strongly sinophobe time, Americans believe all one billion Chineses are the same.
  - LorenPechtel 7y ago
    I can easily see sorting them out by language. While they no doubt spoke decent English CBP would want an inspector that could read Chinese to do the inspection.
- goda90 7y ago
  Why would the US have problems with Hong Kong supporters?
  - isostatic 7y ago
    I read it as the Chinese students could be targeting HK supporters / relatives at US universities.
    - ArtDev 7y ago
      Reminds me of the Chinese students protesting the Dalai Lama in Seattle. Poor brainwashed morons. I almost, but not quite, felt sorry for them.
- aqme28 7y ago
  > before we jump to any conclusions we should at least wait to see why exactly they were denied entry I understand it's not as easy, but we should at least try for "innocent until proven guilty" when it comes to the government denying privileges. I'm all for the government denying entry, but it should be clear what the offense was.
  - taxidump 7y ago
    >we should at least try for "innocent until proven guilty" This method of justice is reserved for our court system inside the US and most likley not work for our borders due to the fact agents must make educated or gut decisions. >I'm all for the government denying entry, but it should be clear what the offense was. This seens to be a contradiction to your other thought.
    - dragonsh 7y ago
      > This method of justice is reserved for our court system inside the US and most likley not work for our borders due to the fact agents must make educated or gut decisions. You mean there are two standards in USA one at the borders another in the country. So all countries denying reporters, human rights workers or dissidents or protestors to enter their borders are doing it correct, because the rule of law is inside borders not outside. So your thought justify very much the border agents analysing your phones and electronic media before entering, like the way in recent memories happening in Hong Kong borders due to protests. You might, but personally I cannot agree with such a notion of dual standards of law. I understand entry to a country and visa is a privilege not a right. But if a country believes in rule is law and on foundations of "Innocent until proven guilty", then it should abide by it.
      - throwaway77778 7y ago
        It is really a difficult call. On one hand, “first they came after the Jews”. On another, by Chinese laws their citizens have obligations to cooperate with their intelligence agencies. China is a technologically advanced mass surveillance state, with dictatorship regime on the rise. This dictatorship regime and its intelligence services have no issues with controlling their citizens by any means possible (from requests to follow their laws to intimidation of family members, etc).
- boomboomsubban 7y ago
  >we should at least wait to see why exactly they were denied entry. Is there any obligation for them to tell us that? Unless Arizona State continues bringing this up, we may not hear anything else.
mud_dauber 7y ago
Maybe I'm just dense - but it seems much more sensible to grant or deny permission to enter from a flight's originating airport.
- dawnerd 7y ago
  It's not a crazy idea, US already does that with preclearance in a few countries. I already really like preclearance. Makes landing back in the States a lot easier. https://www.cbp.gov/border-security/ports-entry/operations/preclearance https://www.cbp.gov/border-security/ports-entry/operations/p...
- wallace_f 7y ago
  When there's no competitive incentive for a service provider to do well, remaining incentives to this effect are difficult.
- nraynaud 7y ago
  Like not issuing a visa, and then creeping even more on people once at the port of entry.
- reaperducer 7y ago
  it seems much more sensible to grant or deny permission to enter from a flight's originating airport. It's a thing that happens in every country. That's how people occasionally end up living at airports or days, weeks, or months. They can't enter the country, and they can't go home for various reasons. (There was a movie made about this a while back, I don't remember if it was about a real person.) Back during the first bird flu scare (90's, I think), one of my family members was denied entry into Hong Kong from Macau because she was scanned with a high temperature. No country is going to say, "Hey, you're undesirable. How about you stay here with us?"
  - saganus 7y ago
    The movie is The Terminal. Supposedly based on this person https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehran_Karimi_Nasseri https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehran_Karimi_Nasseri Interestingly, there's also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_who_have_lived_at_airports https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_who_have_lived_...
Trias11 7y ago
It's unclear when it happened. 12 hours ago or 12 days ago? If CBP is concealing information for a long time - this will certainly cause lots of negative grief amplified by press.
solotronics 7y ago
Meanwhile the Chinese visa process is extremely strict and a Chinese citizen has to account for you and explain why you are there. They are finally getting reciprocity in the actions the Chinese government takes against everyone else.
- mikeash 7y ago
  A Chinese visa is way easier to obtain for an American than vice versa.
  - mieseratte 7y ago
    Is that across the board or for certain types of visas?
    - LorenPechtel 7y ago
      For normal tourist and business visas it certainly is. A US citizen applying for a Chinese visa has little concern about being denied so long as they do not in any way resemble a reporter. A young adult Chinese citizen applying for a US visa is probably going to be turned down and everyone will have to travel to a consulate for an interview. Despite a pile of Chinese visas I have never so much as laid eyes on a Chinese consulate.
- rahimnathwani 7y ago
  "Chinese visa process ... a Chinese citizen has to account for you and explain why you are there" This is untrue. I have had multiple tourist visas for China (without requiring any invitation/vouching from anyone), and written invitation letters for family to visit me (without being a Chinese citizen). The process for getting work visas and business visas is more involved and requires more documentation, but this is the case nearly everywhere. I haven't heard of a foreigner being offered a professional job in China and then not being granted a visa, although this type of difficulty is common in developed countries.
- LorenPechtel 7y ago
  Try again. I've had many a Chinese visa. While the applications always have a relative over there listed never have they had to vouch for us--and the only reason we even have that listed is visiting her relatives has always been one of the reasons for our trips. Most people simply leave that part of the form blank as they aren't going to visit someone over there. She actually is subject to a slightly greater amount of scrutiny as she's a former Chinese citizen and they want to ensure she's not trying to be a dual citizen. (They do not recognize dual citizenship other than of minors. At 18 a dual citizen must pick one or the other.) So long as you don't put down "reporter" or the like as your profession and you don't work for a major media company the visa application is not an issue.
Leary 7y ago
A few days ago a Palestinian Harvard student was denied entry into the US after the CBP searched her phone for social media content and found anti-American posts made by her friends that she had no control over. https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2019/8/27/incoming-freshman-deported/ https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2019/8/27/incoming-freshm...
- mieseratte 7y ago
  Was covered in TFA: > Earlier this week, the Harvard Crimson reported a Palestinian student was detained by Customs and Border Protection and sent home to Lebanon. In that instance, the student claims customs officials found posts from people that included political views that opposed the U.S. on his friends' list.

82 points by jseliger 7y ago

"The Chinese students were deemed inadmissible to the United States based on information discovered during the CBP inspection," the CBP statement said. Look. The Feds don’t always have bad reasons for doing things. I know we have a lot of problems and the social media and computer searches aren’t something I find myself condoning, but before we jump to any conclusions we should at least wait to see why exactly they were denied entry. It could be BS, or they could be targeting Hong Kong supporters amongst Chinese students currently studying in the US or Canada or elsewhere. It seems odd to me that the Feds would target these specific 9 students so I think it’s worth the time to wait until we hear more.

PhasmaFelis 7y ago
> Look. The Feds don’t always have bad reasons for doing things. This is true, but they've done nothing to deserve the benefit of the doubt, especially when they continue to conceal information. Right now, unfortunately, assuming malice until proven otherwise is the rational thing to do with CBP.
- ericmay 7y ago
  certainly not from a volume standpoint, since millions of people, including Chinese university students have no problems at the border.
  - viraptor 7y ago
    Does volume matter here? I'd rather go with "times CBP were right". As in how many of the time they were involved, they got involved for the right reasons.
- diminoten 7y ago
  Hardly rational, considering these 9 are excluded while a large percentage of the ~360k or so Chinese students studying in the US (and the ~3 million Chinese tourists that come to the US every year) seem to be able to travel in and out of the US. It's buzzword bingo. China + CBP = web traffic. It's hot right now, so this is a good article to write if you're interested in clicks. The implication here that a policy change has happened is (thus far) false. These 9 people were flagged for some specific, long standing reason, and it's generally not news except for the buzzwords that make it "interesting".
  - nraynaud 7y ago
    The policy has changed, there is no precedent according to professionals. There were way more students flagged than that on that day, ASU is the only one coming forward for now. But they had never seen such a high secondary screening rate, detained for so long, such a weird return “deal”, nor that many visa revoked in a single day.
    - pbourke 7y ago
      What do you mean weird return deal? Isn’t that a common practice when someone is found inadmissible? If nothing else is out of order, you’re given the chance to withdraw your request to enter the US.
      - nraynaud 7y ago
        After the visa as been revoked?
      - mikelward 7y ago
        I thought normally the airline paid in this case?
        mikelward 7y ago
        I misunderstood. It sounds like the airline must fly them back, but they can recover their costs from the passenger. https://travel.stackexchange.com/questions/23622/who-pays-for-the-return-air-ticket-when-a-country-refuses-entry-by-air https://travel.stackexchange.com/questions/23622/who-pays-fo...
wheelerwj 7y ago
> It seems odd to me that the Feds would target these specific 9 students so I think it’s worth the time to wait until we hear more. agreed, but its important to understand the role of the media is bring things to light, for the sake of transparency so that society can hold people accountable. While we should absolutely resolve to get more information before making any kind of decision, we should also ask why the CBP is able to operate with such a lack of transparency that these kind of stories are a requirement.
- mises 7y ago
  > we should ask why the CBP is able to operate with such a lack of transparency that these kind of stories are a requirement This is why we have habeas corpus. CBP has to charge them in reasonable time or let them go (though I'm not sure they have to let them into the country). There is a legal framework for this kind of stuff, though it's almost certainly worth waiting until we actually get information. Let's consider the other side: if CBP thinks it found something, it's possibly got a reason to flag some one. However, it's probably not good for CBP to then go around telling every one, "Hey! We think we found some thing on these people!"
nraynaud 7y ago
They did not target those 9, there were about 20-30 of them in the secondary room according to witnesses, all Chinese (but LAX is big so they might have a special Chinese secondary room, couldn’t clear that up). Only one university decided to come forward for now. This behavior of CBP is highly unusual according to professionals.
- caf 7y ago
  I feel like the unreported yet actually interesting background here is that the Administration seems to have decided, for some reason, to pick a fight with the universities. The reason that other institutions involved haven't come forward is likely because this kind of thing is terrible advertising for the international student industry.
  - nraynaud 7y ago
    I speculate that UCLA must be impacted (just size and in the west), but they had a Chinese student cheating ring scandal recently, so they probably will have a public perception if they come forwards. In a strongly sinophobe time, Americans believe all one billion Chineses are the same.
- LorenPechtel 7y ago
  I can easily see sorting them out by language. While they no doubt spoke decent English CBP would want an inspector that could read Chinese to do the inspection.
goda90 7y ago
Why would the US have problems with Hong Kong supporters?
- isostatic 7y ago
  I read it as the Chinese students could be targeting HK supporters / relatives at US universities.
  - ArtDev 7y ago
    Reminds me of the Chinese students protesting the Dalai Lama in Seattle. Poor brainwashed morons. I almost, but not quite, felt sorry for them.
aqme28 7y ago
> before we jump to any conclusions we should at least wait to see why exactly they were denied entry I understand it's not as easy, but we should at least try for "innocent until proven guilty" when it comes to the government denying privileges. I'm all for the government denying entry, but it should be clear what the offense was.
- taxidump 7y ago
  >we should at least try for "innocent until proven guilty" This method of justice is reserved for our court system inside the US and most likley not work for our borders due to the fact agents must make educated or gut decisions. >I'm all for the government denying entry, but it should be clear what the offense was. This seens to be a contradiction to your other thought.
  - dragonsh 7y ago
    > This method of justice is reserved for our court system inside the US and most likley not work for our borders due to the fact agents must make educated or gut decisions. You mean there are two standards in USA one at the borders another in the country. So all countries denying reporters, human rights workers or dissidents or protestors to enter their borders are doing it correct, because the rule of law is inside borders not outside. So your thought justify very much the border agents analysing your phones and electronic media before entering, like the way in recent memories happening in Hong Kong borders due to protests. You might, but personally I cannot agree with such a notion of dual standards of law. I understand entry to a country and visa is a privilege not a right. But if a country believes in rule is law and on foundations of "Innocent until proven guilty", then it should abide by it.
    - throwaway77778 7y ago
      It is really a difficult call. On one hand, “first they came after the Jews”. On another, by Chinese laws their citizens have obligations to cooperate with their intelligence agencies. China is a technologically advanced mass surveillance state, with dictatorship regime on the rise. This dictatorship regime and its intelligence services have no issues with controlling their citizens by any means possible (from requests to follow their laws to intimidation of family members, etc).
boomboomsubban 7y ago
>we should at least wait to see why exactly they were denied entry. Is there any obligation for them to tell us that? Unless Arizona State continues bringing this up, we may not hear anything else.

mud_dauber 7y ago

Maybe I'm just dense - but it seems much more sensible to grant or deny permission to enter from a flight's originating airport.

dawnerd 7y ago
It's not a crazy idea, US already does that with preclearance in a few countries. I already really like preclearance. Makes landing back in the States a lot easier. https://www.cbp.gov/border-security/ports-entry/operations/preclearance https://www.cbp.gov/border-security/ports-entry/operations/p...
wallace_f 7y ago
When there's no competitive incentive for a service provider to do well, remaining incentives to this effect are difficult.
nraynaud 7y ago
Like not issuing a visa, and then creeping even more on people once at the port of entry.
reaperducer 7y ago
it seems much more sensible to grant or deny permission to enter from a flight's originating airport. It's a thing that happens in every country. That's how people occasionally end up living at airports or days, weeks, or months. They can't enter the country, and they can't go home for various reasons. (There was a movie made about this a while back, I don't remember if it was about a real person.) Back during the first bird flu scare (90's, I think), one of my family members was denied entry into Hong Kong from Macau because she was scanned with a high temperature. No country is going to say, "Hey, you're undesirable. How about you stay here with us?"
- saganus 7y ago
  The movie is The Terminal. Supposedly based on this person https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehran_Karimi_Nasseri https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehran_Karimi_Nasseri Interestingly, there's also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_who_have_lived_at_airports https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_who_have_lived_...

Trias11 7y ago

It's unclear when it happened. 12 hours ago or 12 days ago? If CBP is concealing information for a long time - this will certainly cause lots of negative grief amplified by press.

solotronics 7y ago

Meanwhile the Chinese visa process is extremely strict and a Chinese citizen has to account for you and explain why you are there. They are finally getting reciprocity in the actions the Chinese government takes against everyone else.

mikeash 7y ago
A Chinese visa is way easier to obtain for an American than vice versa.
- mieseratte 7y ago
  Is that across the board or for certain types of visas?
  - LorenPechtel 7y ago
    For normal tourist and business visas it certainly is. A US citizen applying for a Chinese visa has little concern about being denied so long as they do not in any way resemble a reporter. A young adult Chinese citizen applying for a US visa is probably going to be turned down and everyone will have to travel to a consulate for an interview. Despite a pile of Chinese visas I have never so much as laid eyes on a Chinese consulate.
rahimnathwani 7y ago
"Chinese visa process ... a Chinese citizen has to account for you and explain why you are there" This is untrue. I have had multiple tourist visas for China (without requiring any invitation/vouching from anyone), and written invitation letters for family to visit me (without being a Chinese citizen). The process for getting work visas and business visas is more involved and requires more documentation, but this is the case nearly everywhere. I haven't heard of a foreigner being offered a professional job in China and then not being granted a visa, although this type of difficulty is common in developed countries.
LorenPechtel 7y ago
Try again. I've had many a Chinese visa. While the applications always have a relative over there listed never have they had to vouch for us--and the only reason we even have that listed is visiting her relatives has always been one of the reasons for our trips. Most people simply leave that part of the form blank as they aren't going to visit someone over there. She actually is subject to a slightly greater amount of scrutiny as she's a former Chinese citizen and they want to ensure she's not trying to be a dual citizen. (They do not recognize dual citizenship other than of minors. At 18 a dual citizen must pick one or the other.) So long as you don't put down "reporter" or the like as your profession and you don't work for a major media company the visa application is not an issue.

Leary 7y ago

A few days ago a Palestinian Harvard student was denied entry into the US after the CBP searched her phone for social media content and found anti-American posts made by her friends that she had no control over. https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2019/8/27/incoming-freshman-deported/ https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2019/8/27/incoming-freshm...

mieseratte 7y ago
Was covered in TFA: > Earlier this week, the Harvard Crimson reported a Palestinian student was detained by Customs and Border Protection and sent home to Lebanon. In that instance, the student claims customs officials found posts from people that included political views that opposed the U.S. on his friends' list.