They're still doing research, and the funding hasn't completely dried up. But a lot of the people I talked to were international students, and the gallows humor of being deported was palpable. Made a slightly illegal turn in the van? Better make sure the cops didn't see you, or ICE is going to deport you back to where you came from. Hiring is completely frozen, and there is talk of potentially cutting down or "asking" students to graduate early. I overheard one of the professors talking to another about their students who were in limbo because their visas had been cancelled. It's pretty grim.
Weariness
So they check all your messages at the border? Do they dump your entire phone or what is happening there?
Everything that doesn't fit official government line is an extremism and terrorism. It has been that way in Russia and other authoritarian countries. Looks like that is getting imported into US, and without any tariffs at that. I'm perplexed though why does the US population want it (i live in CA, and that doesn't help understanding the whole US population), especially giving that any of those authoritarian countries is also orders of magnitude worse than US economy-wise (even the economy poster-child China has per capita GDP just 1/7th of that of US).
The same reason the school bully and his entourage wants see your lunch thrown on the ground. It's jealousy, it's tribalism, it's establishment of a power hierarchy. It's evil.
Our country has been taken over by a cult of cruelty and othering.
"The French researcher in question was in possession of confidential information on his electronic device from Los Alamos National Laboratory— in violation of a non-disclosure agreement—something he admitted to taking without permission and attempted to conceal.
Any claim that his removal was based on political beliefs is blatantly false."
Not at all, it's much more believable than the original story. Traveling scientists frequently work at national labs.
>It is harder to believe they didn't arrest him for this.
Nondisclosure agreements are civil in nature, not criminal.
Let's not forget that the VP literally admitted to creating fake stories to influence public opinion. At this point, any statement by the administration & people under their control should be taken as evidence to the contrary, unless it's corroborated by outside sources.
Trust the experts.
>Given the well-documented history of lies from the current administration, why should we take a statement from a person under their control as fact?
The past N administrations have well-documented histories of lying.
>Let's not forget that the VP literally admitted to creating fake stories to influence public opinion.
Sounds like exactly what this scientist did.
For example: the Canadian woman who was detained at the border. Not many people heard that she was working here illegally (self-employed while here under a TN visa that doesn't allow that).
Edit: I call it arbitrage because (oversimplifying) they manufacture a product for one hour of labor in one country and sell it for one hour of labor in a different country. It's only viable because it takes advantage of a difference in wages between the labor markets.