WASHINGTON - U.S. Senator Charles Schumer urged immediate passage of his bipartisan legislation to increase oversight of the student visa program.  Schumer’s push comes after Quazi Mohammad Rezwanul Ahsan Nafis, a Bangladesh native, was yesterday arrested after attempting to blow up the Federal Reserve building in lower Manhattan; Nafis was here on a student visa.  Schumer said that while the facts of this case are still being revealed, and there is no evidence of wrongdoing on the part of Nafis's school, there are gaping holes in our student visa system that serve as a dangerous backdoor for foreign nationals to enter this country. 

Schumer also called for a State Department Inspector General investigation into the issuance of the visa, and a Department of Homeland Security Inspector General investigation into whether ICE should have denied this individual’s attempt to transfer schools.

“This foiled attack must serve as a wakeup call – we need to shut down gaping loopholes allowing foreign nationals, some of whom may wish to do us harm, from entering the country through the student visa program,” said Schumer.  “While the facts of this particular case are still coming to light, we do know that thousands of people have entered this country through sham universities like hand out student visas like candy, and that practice must end now.”

The legislation was introduced this summer by Senators Schumer, Claire McCaskill (D-MI), Diane Feinstein (D-CA), and Charles Grassley (R-IA), in the wake of a Congressional investigation and a Judiciary Committee hearing on the subject of “sham universities”.  The issue was raised after an enormous visa mill was discovered in California. Tri-Valley University, had enrolled over 1,500 foreign students until a federal investigation exposed the school as a scam. Tri-Valley officials were caught giving F-1 visas to undercover agents, posing as foreign nationals, who explicitly professed no intention of attending classes.  Students paid $5,400 per semester in tuition to the school to obtain those student visas until the school was shut down.