MPSA Urges the White House to Rescind the Executive Order on Visas and Immigration
February 1, 2017
On Friday, January 27, 2017, a White House Executive Order was issued on visas and immigration that prevents scholars from certain countries from being able to enter or return to the United States. This EO will harm MPSA members, the broader scientific community, and the development of research relevant to important public policy issues as well as scientific knowledge. MPSA urges the Administration to rescind it.
MPSA is an international academic association of political scientists, with a membership of 8,000 scholars from over 100 countries. With a conference of 6,000 presenters where more than 20% are from outside the United States, the MPSA conference is one of the largest gatherings of non-American political science researchers in the discipline. This Executive Order harms all of our members, colleagues and graduate students across the world.
The effect of this Executive Order goes beyond the citizens of the seven countries who are banned from entry. It will discourage many of the top international students, scholars, and scientists from studying, working, or attending academic conferences in the United States, and it will discredit the United States as a leader in the scientific community.
These efforts to limit the ability of researchers to meet freely and exchange ideas will weaken academic freedom and will further limit the ability of the broader scientific community to conduct research and expand knowledge.
We urge the White House to rescind this Executive Order.
Jan E. Leighley, President
Paula D. McClain, Past President
Vincent L. Hutchings, President-Elect
William D. Morgan, Executive Director