The Donald Trump administration has instructed United States embassies worldwide to pause scheduling student visa interviews as it prepares to expand social media screening of applicants, Politico reported on Tuesday.

No new interviews should be scheduled “until further guidance is issued, which we anticipate in the coming days”, the news outlet quoted a cable sent by the US State Department to Washington’s missions abroad.

However, interviews that have been scheduled already can go ahead as planned, reported Bloomberg.

It was not immediately clear what the new procedure to vet the social media of applicants will involve.

The Trump administration’s move could hurt universities that depend on international students, who typically pay the full tuition fees, to help cover financial aid for US citizens, according to Bloomberg. Foreign students contributed $43.8 billion to the US economy in the 2023-’24 academic year, according to the National Association of Foreign Student Advisers.

More than 1.1 million international students were enrolled in US universities during the year, accounting for 6% of those pursuing higher education in the country. India sent the highest number of students, followed by China, according to Bloomberg.

“We take very seriously the process of vetting who it is that comes into the country, and we are going to continue to do that,” said State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce on Tuesday.

When asked about the additional social media vetting requirements, Bruce told reporters that it would be “counterproductive” to discuss them publicly.

This comes amid Trump’s clash with top US universities, including Harvard, which he has accused of promoting left-wing views, enabling antisemitism on campus and supporting discriminatory admissions policies.

His administration has taken aggressive actions to try to enforce its demands, including freezing hundreds of millions of dollars in university funding, revoking visas and attempting to deport international students. However, many of these measures have been blocked by the courts.

Trump to cut $100 million contracts for Harvard

On Tuesday, the United States government also directed federal agencies in the country to terminate any remaining contracts, estimated to be valued around $100 million, with Harvard University, The New York Times reported.

The contracts involve executive training for Department of Homeland Security personnel, studies on the health effects of energy drinks and graduate student research services, reported the Associated Press.

The action comes just four days after a federal judge temporarily blocked the Trump administration from revoking the legal status of international students at the institution.

So far, the US government has withdrawn over $2.6 billion in federal research funding from the Ivy League institution, after it said it would defy demands to overhaul its policies and curb activism on campus.

Also read: Trump’s attack on academia: An unsettling reminder that it’s happened in India and elsewhere before