Universities in Indiana will soon have to conduct a “foreign influence and research security review” for students from certain countries going into engineering and scientific fields under a new state law.
Indiana Gov. Mike Braun signed Senate Enrolled Act 256 into law March 5 and includes students who are citizens of China, Russia, Iran, North Korea or Cuba.
To admit these students into engineering, computer science, virology, microbiology or artificial intelligence programs, the university will have to conduct a background check.
The check would review the student’s current and past affiliations, support related to their education, funding, training and research, collaborations, intellectual property and employment agreements. It would also check if the student was employed by or served in the military of the foreign adversary.
The law also requires universities to determine whether the student or their relatives are employees or members of political parties or similar government-sponsored organizations in their home country.
If the student is indicated to be an “agent” of that foreign adversary, or acting on behalf or at the request of that country, the university may not enroll that student.
According to Indiana University Bloomington’s spring 2026 enrollment data, 4,146 international students are currently enrolled. The data shows 795 students are from China, 60 are from Russia and 64 are from Iran.
Armin Moczek, the chair of IU’s biology department, said China was a major source of foreign graduate students and the law would hamper the department’s ability to recruit the best graduate students from those countries.
He said there weren’t enough domestic qualified graduate students to fill the needs and opportunities that exist.
“So by reducing our ability to attract foreign grad students, including from nations like China, almost inevitably this will affect the productivity of many labs,” Moczek said.
The law came after an IU postdoctoral fellow was arrested and charged with conspiracy and smuggling goods in the United States after he requested and received plasmid DNA in a package of women’s clothing. He entered a guilty plea and received a minor sentence, a fine and deportation.
The FBI searched two IU biology professors’ labs late last year after the postdoctoral fellow was arrested. The FBI raided two homes belonging to an IU Luddy professor in March 2025.
Moczek said the searches had sparked fear and anxiety within the department, especially among those who are non-U.S. citizens.
“I can probably, at some point soon, quantify the number of papers not written, and the number of proposals not submitted, and the amount of money we won’t be able to secure a year or two from now as a result,” Moczek said.
Indiana State Rep. Matt Pierce, a Democrat representing Bloomington, was one of the few state legislators who voted against the bill. He told the Indiana Daily Student it underestimated the level of resources required by the university to do the checks.
It’s also duplicative, he said, because the U.S. Department of State is already doing background checks before giving out student visas.
“So it doesn’t make any sense to have the university duplicate all that work a second time,” he said. “Because they don’t have the resources to do that.”
He said what may happen instead was that universities could stop dealing with students from those countries altogether.
An IU spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.
At a Senate session Feb. 27, Sen. Shelli Yoder, a Democrat representing Bloomington, called the bill’s language on higher education an “unfunded mandate” and said it would ask state institutions to hire additional resources to do background reviews on potential students.
“The federal government first and foremost should not be letting anyone in on an F-1 or J-1 visa if they are already too much risk, full stop,” Yoder said.
Sen. Scott Baldwin, a Republican representing part of Hamilton County, said at the same session that Indiana couldn’t rely on the vetting track record of the federal government and needed to require a higher bar.
“People are coming here to be educated and employed from our adversaries. We are the only country in the planet that allows that,” he said. “And so we need to be careful.”
Sen. Chris Garten, a Republican representing Clark County and the bill’s author, said in a press release that the bill was intended to put Indiana first. The press release said the bill was written to expose and combat influence by “hostile foreign nations.”
“It is designed to do one thing,” Garten said at the Senate session. “Ensure that the decisions made in this chamber and the land that our farmers plow are controlled by Hoosiers, not by foreign regimes.”
Garten declined an interview with the IDS. The law goes into effect July 1, with students admitted to or enrolled in programs before August 14 exempt from the law.
