{"id":130870,"date":"2026-08-07T19:49:05","date_gmt":"2026-08-07T14:49:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/?p=130870"},"modified":"2026-08-07T19:49:06","modified_gmt":"2026-08-07T14:49:06","slug":"us-to-vet-social-media-of-foreign-journalists-applying-for-visas-report-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/130870\/","title":{"rendered":"US to vet social media of foreign journalists applying for visas, report says"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">WASHINGTON(National Times)- The US State Department will \u200bvet the social media accounts of foreign journalists applying for visas to work in the United \u200cStates, according to a media report on Thursday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The&nbsp;<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dailysignal.com\/2026\/08\/06\/trump-vetting-foreign-visas\/\">report<\/a>&nbsp;in the conservative news outlet&nbsp;<em>The Daily Signal<\/em>&nbsp;cited an internal memo that said an initiative by President Donald Trump\u2019s administration that requires applicants for many visa types to make their social media accounts public \u200bfor screening was being expanded to include foreign media representatives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Applicants for another type of visa for \u200bworkers from Canada and Mexico also will now be included in the screening, it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The \u2060White House and the State Department\u2019s official accounts on X shared a link to the article, but the \u200bState Department declined to confirm the specifics of the report, citing a policy of not commenting on \u201cpurported internal documents\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A \u200bState Department spokesperson said that what the department calls \u201conline presence vetting\u201d is used to ensure that applicants are eligible for a visa under US law.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThe Department of State is screening and vetting to the maximum extent possible every foreign national seeking admission to \u200bthe United States to ensure they will respect US law including the terms of their admission and do \u200bnot pose a threat to US security, public safety or national interests,\u201d the spokesperson said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cOfficers use a variety of methods to \u200cmake \u2060informed decisions that protect national security, prevent fraud and ensure a thorough review of applicants,\u201d the spokesperson added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It was unclear when the reported new policy would take effect.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Department of Homeland Security&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/2016619\">tightened<\/a>&nbsp;rules last month around how long foreign journalists working in the United States, as well as other visa holders including foreign students, could remain in \u200bthe country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It also builds \u200bon a series of \u2060<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/1932949\">steps<\/a>&nbsp;that Trump\u2019s administration has taken since he began his second term in taking office in January 2025 to make online speech a factor in immigration and visa decisions. \u200bThese steps have raised concerns among civil liberties advocates about freedom of speech.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">US Citizenship \u200band Immigration Services \u2060has said it will screen the social media posts of immigrants and visa applicants, including for what it deems antisemitic content and \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/1913977\">anti-Americanism<\/a>\u201d. The administration has canceled the visas of foreign students in the US who engaged in pro-Palestinian activism, \u2060in some cases attempting to \u200bdeport those students.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The State Department said in October 2025 that it \u200brevoked the visas of six foreign nationals over&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/1941417\">comments<\/a>&nbsp;about the assassination of conservative activist&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/1941091\">Charlie Kirk<\/a>, and said it would continue identifying visa \u200bholders it believed had celebrated the killing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>WASHINGTON(National Times)- The US State Department will \u200bvet the social media accounts of foreign journalists applying for visas to work in the United \u200cStates, according to a media report on Thursday. The&nbsp;report&nbsp;in the conservative news outlet&nbsp;The Daily Signal&nbsp;cited an internal memo that said an initiative by President Donald Trump\u2019s administration that requires applicants for many [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":130871,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-130870","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international","entry"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v25.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>US to vet social media of foreign journalists applying for visas, report says - Nation<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/130870\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"US to vet social media of foreign journalists applying for visas, report says - Nation\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"WASHINGTON(National Times)- The US State Department will \u200bvet the social media accounts of foreign journalists applying for visas to work in the United \u200cStates, according to a media report on Thursday. The&nbsp;report&nbsp;in the conservative news outlet&nbsp;The Daily Signal&nbsp;cited an internal memo that said an initiative by President Donald Trump\u2019s administration that requires applicants for many [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/130870\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Nation\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-08-07T14:49:05+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-08-07T14:49:06+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Untitled-design-5-13.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"670\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"370\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"humza Jahangir\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"humza Jahangir\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/130870\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/130870\/\",\"name\":\"US to vet social media of foreign journalists applying for visas, report says - Nation\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/130870\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/130870\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Untitled-design-5-13.png\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-08-07T14:49:05+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-08-07T14:49:06+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/#\/schema\/person\/27efa35fa76e99f3ad7e7397d7332c16\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/130870\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/130870\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/130870\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Untitled-design-5-13.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Untitled-design-5-13.png\",\"width\":670,\"height\":370},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/130870\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"US to vet social media of foreign journalists applying for visas, report says\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/\",\"name\":\"Nation\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/#\/schema\/person\/27efa35fa76e99f3ad7e7397d7332c16\",\"name\":\"humza Jahangir\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/43feedd99bd6a90080d1621b7e6604364acb673ee979d3ffe5075557c14c68b9?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/43feedd99bd6a90080d1621b7e6604364acb673ee979d3ffe5075557c14c68b9?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"humza Jahangir\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/author\/humza\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"US to vet social media of foreign journalists applying for visas, report says - Nation","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/130870\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"US to vet social media of foreign journalists applying for visas, report says - Nation","og_description":"WASHINGTON(National Times)- The US State Department will \u200bvet the social media accounts of foreign journalists applying for visas to work in the United \u200cStates, according to a media report on Thursday. 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