Secretary of State Marco Rubio is spearheading an effort to crack down on foreign nationals in the U.S. who express support for terrorist organizations like Hamas. The initiative, dubbed “Catch and Revoke,” will use AI to review the social media activity of visa holders, including students, to determine if they pose a national security threat.

According to senior State Department officials who spoke with Axios, the program will examine the online presence of tens of thousands of student visa holders. Officials are also reviewing internal databases to identify visa holders who had been arrested but were allowed to remain in the country under the Biden administration. Since October 2023, authorities have reportedly reviewed 100,000 individuals in the Student Exchange Visitor System to check for visa revocations due to arrests or suspensions.

Those who support designated terrorist organizations, including Hamas, threaten our national security. The United States has zero tolerance for foreign visitors who support terrorists. Violators of U.S. law — including international students — face visa denial or revocation, and…

— Secretary Marco Rubio (@SecRubio) March 6, 2025

One senior official told the outlet, “We found literally zero visa revocations during the Biden administration,” adding that this “suggests a blind eye attitude toward law enforcement.”

Beyond social media activity, officials are also investigating news reports of anti-Israel protests and lawsuits from Jewish students that highlight instances of foreign nationals engaging in antisemitic activities without consequences. The effort involves coordination between the State Department, the Justice Department, and the Department of Homeland Security.

While some critics have raised concerns over AI’s role in the process, a senior State Department official defended the technology, stating, “It would be negligent for the department that takes national security seriously to ignore publicly available information about [visa] applicants in terms of AI tools. … AI is one of the resources available to the government that’s very different from where we were technologically decades ago.”

Officials say that visa revocation could be warranted if a foreign national’s social media posts appear to endorse Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel. “Under President Trump, the Immigration Nationality Act is great again,” one official stated, referring to the 1953 law that gives the Secretary of State authority to revoke visas from foreign nationals deemed a threat to the U.S.

This move comes as Trump has pledged to take action against anti-Israel demonstrations. “All Federal Funding will STOP for any College, School, or University that allows illegal protests,” Trump wrote. “Agitators will be imprisoned/or permanently sent back to the country from which they came. American students will be permanently expelled or, depending on the crime, arrested. NO MASKS! Thank you for your attention to this matter.”

The crackdown follows Hamas’s October 7 terrorist attack on Israel, which killed over 1,200 people and saw hundreds taken hostage. In response, anti-Israel protests and encampments have emerged on college campuses nationwide, with demonstrators occupying parks and buildings in what they call Gaza solidarity protests.