Leading US Research Lab Appears to Be Squeezing Out Foreign Scientists

One of the US government's summit scientific research laboratories takes steps that could expel foreign scientists, a shift lawmakers and sources tell WIRED could cost the country valuable expertise and damage the agency's credibility.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) helps determine the frameworks that underlie everything from cyber security to semiconductor manufacturing. Some of NIST's recent work includes establishing guidelines for security of AI systems and identifying health care workers with air purifiers and firefighter gloves. Many of the agency's thousands of employees, postdoctoral scientists, contractors and visiting researchers are brought in from around the world for their specialized expertise.

“For weeks, rumors of draconian new measures have spread like wildfire, while my staff's questions to NIST have gone unanswered,” Zoe Lofgren, the top Democrat on the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology, said. wrote in a letter sent to Acting NIST Director Craig Burkhardt on Thursday. April McClain Delaney, a fellow Democrat on the committee, signed the message.

Lofgren wrote that while her staff has heard about multiple rumored changes, what they have confirmed through unnamed sources is that the Trump administration “has begun taking steps to limit the ability of foreign researchers to carry out their work at NIST.”

The congress letter follows a Boulder Reporting Lab article on February 12 that said international graduate students and postdoctoral researchers would be limited to a maximum of three years at NIST going forward, despite many of them needing five to seven years to complete their work.

A NIST employee tells WIRED that some plans to bring in foreign workers through the agency's Professional Research and Experience Program were recently canceled because of uncertainty over whether they would get through the new security protocols. The employee, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media, says the agency is not yet communicating broadly what the new obstacles will be or why it thinks they are justified.

On Thursday, the Colorado Sun reported that “noncitizens” lost after-hours access to a NIST lab last month and could soon be banned from the facility altogether.

Jennifer Huergo, a spokeswoman for NIST, tells WIRED that the proposed changes are aimed at protecting American science from theft and misuse, echoing a similar statement issued this week to other media outlets. Huergo did not want to comment on who must approve the proposal before it is finalized and when a decision will be made. She also did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the lawmakers' letter.

Preventing foreign adversaries from stealing valuable American intellectual property has been a bipartisan priority, with NIST among the agencies in recent years to receive Congressional control about the adequacy of their background checks and security policies. Just last month, Republican lawmakers renewed calls to put in place restrictions preventing Chinese nationals from working at or with national laboratories run by the Department of Energy.

But Lofgren's letter claims that the rumored restrictions on non-U.S. scientists at NIST go beyond “what is reasonable and appropriate to protect research security.” The letter demands transparency about new policies by February 26 and a pause thereafter “until Congress can consider whether these changes are necessary at all.”

The potential loss of research talent at NIST would add to a series of other Trump administration policies that some US tech industry leaders have warned will dismantle the lives of immigrant researchers already living in the US and hinder economic growth. Hiking fees on H-1B tech visasrevoking thousands of student visas, and implementing legally dubious mass deportations all tend to drive people who like to work on scientific and technical research in the US to go elsewhere instead. The Trump administration has also announced to limit plans post-graduation job training for international students.