The two areas where the Trump Administration has been furiously pushing through new initiatives over the last 3-4 months are China and Immigration. There was a rule change proposal announced yesterday which I believe is primarily targeting Chinese grad students:

https://www.dhs.gov/news/2020/09/24/dhs-proposes-change-admission-period-structure-f-j-and-i-nonimmigrants

In essence, this would require foreign students to request an extension of stay after 2 or 4 years in the US, something they currently do not have to do if they do not depart the U.S. periodically during their academic program. As many of you may know, the Department of State collects a lot of detailed information during the visa process on what academic research Chinese students (in particular, though other nationalities are also subject to this review) pursue while attending U.S. institutions. Until now you could largely avoid this scrutiny if you just stayed in the U.S. throughout your studies and never applied for a new visa.

This new rule change would seem to be an effort to exercise more oversight over the foreign students who reside continuously in the United States for 4 or more years. I would expect that they will be asked to submit things like their research papers, curriculum vitae, conference travel, and other data to receive an extension at the grad school level. The fact that "preventing foreign adversaries from exploiting the country’s education environment" was specifically mentioned in the rule change announcement leads me to believe this is a primary motivation for this proposal.

There are also other provisions in this rule change, including increased control over the duration foreign journalists are allowed to remain in the U.S. on their "I" visa. While there was a bit of consternation in journalist circles when the U.S. announced that Chinese State Media journalists would require extensions to remain in the U.S., this provision essentially extends that to all foreign reporters. Obviously there is some potential for CCP style abuse there if the govt decides it doesn't like what a journalist has been writing.

I should also note that this rule change is being presented for comments for 30 days in accordance with the Administrative Procedures Act and as such is not likely to be successfully challenged in court on the basis of procedural deficiency. APA deficiency is the reason other rules changes have been subject to injunctions, so in this case there is a much higher chance it will go into effect as soon as the comment period ends. It will be a squeaker to get it in before the election but this is also the kind of administrative change that will not be easy to reverse should a new administration take office in January.