The State Department said Tuesday it had revoked the visas of six people for making incendiary comments on social media about the killing of a conservative activist. Charlie Kirk.
The six people, who were not named, were from Argentina, South Africa, Mexico, Brazil, Germany and Paraguay, the agency said in a series of publications. X messages. Some of them expressed the opinion that Kirk deserved to die.
“The United States has no obligation to accept foreigners who wish Americans dead,” the State Department wrote on X. “The State Department continues to identify visa holders who celebrated the heinous murder of Charlie Kirk.”
The State Department did not say whether any of these people are currently in the US or what types of visas they have. CBS News has reached out to the department for more information.
The day after Kirk was killed on the Utah college campus, a senior State Department official vowed to take “appropriate action” against any visa holders who praise or disparage Kirk's death, and invited people to send in any messages they see.
A few days later, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said“Visas are being cancelled.”
Kirk was shot and killed Sept. 10 while speaking to Utah Valley University students at an event sponsored by Turning Point USA, a group he co-founded. Authorities said the gunman shot Kirk with a rifle from the roof of a nearby campus building.
After a two-day manhunt, the 22-year-old Utah man was identified as Tyler Robinson. was arrested in murder. State prosecutors charged a fee Robinson with aggravated murder.
Review is part wider repression on comments that ridicule or celebrate Kirk's death. Pentagon And Secret service sidelined military personnel or agents who wrote negative social media posts about Kirk, and Vice President J.D. Vance urged people to call the employers of anyone celebrating Kirk's killing.
The Trump administration has tried to revoke visas in other circumstances. He insists on deporting several foreign students which are linked to campus protests against Israel's war in the Gaza Strip, accusing them of anti-Semitic rhetoric, which students deny. And this withdrawn Last month, Colombian President Gustavo Petro was given a visa for urging US troops to disobey President Trump's orders during a protest in New York.
Social media comments are also monitored by USCIS, the agency responsible for processing immigration and naturalization applications. In August, USCIS instructed its officials investigate applicants for “anti-American views and activities.”
“There is such widespread support for a foreign terrorist ideology, whether Hamas or another organization, that is coupled with the clear desire of these elements to trample on the rights of others around them,” USCIS Director Joseph Edlow said in an interview with CBS News on Wednesday.
When asked if he was talking about legally protected speech, Edlow responded: “People are free to make whatever statements they want on social media or anywhere else, and anyone who you know doesn't support the same candidate that I support.”
“That's not what we're talking about here…we're talking about people who actively support the violent overthrow of this country or otherwise provide material support to terrorist organizations around the world,” he added.
The government's legal authority to deny or revoke visas based on speech is an unresolved issue. Evgeniy VolokhUCLA law professor emeritus, who has written extensively about the First Amendment, told CBS News last month. Supreme Court has rules that the government has broad discretion to deny people entry into the country, but whether federal officials can deport people who are already in the U.S. because of their speech is less clear.
Volokh stated that noncitizens “have the same First Amendment protections from, say, criminal penalties or civil liability as citizens.”
“But when it comes to the issue of deportation or expulsion from the country, the rules are unsettled,” he said.
