Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, is under federal investigation for its employment of people holding J-1 visas.Credit: Joe Buglewicz/Bloomberg/Getty
A US investigation into nine universities’ employment of international researchers is prompting concerns among academics at the campuses.
The investigation is focused on the universities’ use of J-1 visas, the main visa used by international postdoctoral researchers. The probe’s purpose is to reduce “visa fraud”, according to vice-president JD Vance.
“They’re using these visas way too much,” Vance said when announcing the investigation on 8 October. “They’re using them to undercut the wages of American grad students and American researchers, and it simply has to stop.”
Critics say that the rationale for the investigation is flawed, that international postdocs play a crucial part in US laboratories and that the announcement is deepening the sense of unease felt by international scientists.
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“For folks who are not US citizens, it’s pretty dire. It really makes people nervous,” says Theresa Desrochers, a neuroscientist at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, whose lab has hosted a number of visa-holding postdocs over the years. “It just contributes to an overall mood of ‘you’re not wanted here’.”
The US Department of Labor said it does not comment on active investigations.
The institutions under investigation are Harvard, Stanford, Arizona State, Yale and Brown universities; the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; the California Institute of Technology; the University of California, Davis; and the University of Pittsburgh.
When asked for comment, all of the universities except Harvard, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, responded before Nature’s deadline. Many said that they had already received a subpoena asking for information, and many emphasized that they comply with all rules and regulations surrounding visas. “Brown’s international scholars, students and employees make essential contributions on our campus, including to teaching and research that advances American innovation, competitiveness and economic vitality,” says Brian Clark, vice-president of strategic campus communications at Brown.
Numbers game
J-1 visas allow people from outside the United States to study or work in educational or cultural exchanges for a limited time, before returning to their home country. Another visa used by international postdocs and faculty members is the H-1B, which allows them to be hired in specialized fields, including in academia, when job vacancies cannot be filled with the US workforce.
The US Department of Labor’s Office of Inspector General’s press release about the investigation said that about 61% of postdoctoral workers and researchers supported by federal grants at these nine universities are “foreign nationals”, compared with 38% at other institutions. “Something weird is going on at these universities,” said Vance. The department did not respond to questions about the source of those numbers.
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According to the US National Science Foundation, of the nearly 70,000 science, engineering and health postdocs employed at US universities in 2024, 58% held temporary visas. The National Postdoctoral Association says its own data also show an average of around 60% across all disciplines. Stanford University in California has reported that 66% of its postdocs are international; with the University of Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania reporting 58%; and MIT in Cambridge reporting 65–70%.
Whatever the figures, “a university’s proportion of international researchers relative to a national average does not establish that anyone has been underpaid or that a visa programme has been misused”, says Veena Dubal, general counsel of the American Association of University Professors, a union and membership association of academic professionals in Washington DC.
Even if these nine universities do employ proportionately more international students than other institutions, it’s possible that they attract high numbers of international applicants, says legal scholar Sheldon Evans at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri.