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The Trump administration is framing visa revocations as a national security measure, arguing that removing foreign nationals who commit crimes, including under the influence driving, is essential to protecting the American public.
“Every visa decision is a national security decision,” State Department spokesperson Tommy Pigott told Fox News Digital. “Of course, when we think of border security, we think about the Southwest border, but visa security is border security. It’s who we’re allowing into the country legally, and if they operate in a way that is grounds for revocation, we’re going to protect the American people.”
The Trump administration has taken an aggressive approach to revoking visas, announcing in January that more than 100,000 foreign nationals’ visas were revoked in 2025 — more than double the number revoked during President Joe Biden’s final year in office.
While a majority of those visas were revoked because travelers overstayed their visas, Pigott said many others lost their visas because of criminal activity, with drunk driving arrests accounting for many of those revocations.
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“Fundamentally, if you break the law, that is grounds for revocation,” Pigott said. “If you break law, you break terms of your visa, or you undermine the national security of the United States, that’s grounds for a revocation of your visas.”
Pigott cited recent examples of visa revocations involving DUI offenses, including a foreign national who injured someone while driving drunk and another who showed up intoxicated to a court-mandated DUI program.
“Driving drunk on streets is incredibly dangerous,” Pigott continued. “It’s part of a broader initiative from the Trump administration to make sure that our streets are safe. And that includes illegal immigrant drivers, that includes foreigners here on visas that are driving drunk on our streets. We’re not going to tolerate that. We are going to protect the Americans.”
In May, Oklahoma authorities charged 27-year-old Michael Rosario-Cruz, who was living in the U.S. under DACA protections, with four counts of second-degree murder, alleging he drove drunk the wrong way and crashed into another vehicle, killing four young people. Authorities reported finding empty beer bottles inside Rosario-Cruz’s car. He also faces multiple DUI, firearm and other charges.
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The four victims were all between the ages of 18 and 20.
“These young men and women had their whole lives ahead of them. This tragedy was completely preventable,” DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin said in a statement. “This illegal alien should has never been in our country. Join me in praying for the families, friends, and loved ones of these victims.”
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has placed a detainer on Rosario-Cruz, who is currently being held at the Canadian County jail in Oklahoma.
The State Department revoking visas is just the first step in the process to remove a foreign national, according to Pigott.
“When that visa is revoked, there’s a couple different elements that can happen,” Pigott told Fox News Digital, explaining that whether a foreign national is deported depends on whether the Justice Department pursues criminal prosecution.
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“You could see someone leave the country after serving a prison sentence, for example,” Pigott said. “Ultimately, DHS then makes the termination about the next step of appropriate action, whether that’s deportation, whether that is deportation after serving prison sentence, so it really is a case-by-case basis.”
“But what the revoking of the visa does is that allows us to take appropriate action as a government to remove an individual from our nation based off of the conditions that they may be in currently and taking into other considerations such as the playing out of the judicial process,” Pigott continued.
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Pigott said the administration’s visa policy is centered on continuous vetting and enforcement even after the visa is first issued.
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“We’re going to do what’s necessary to protect the American people, we’re going to enforce our immigration law and we’re gonna make clear when it comes to this visa process we are going to continuously vet people here on visas — we’re going to have an America first visa policy,” Pigott said.
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