A California professor has raised concerns about Texas imposing a freeze on new H-1B visa petitions. Jelani Nelson, a computer science professor at UC Berkeley, said in a widely shared post that the move could damage higher education and research quality across the US. Texas Governor Greg Abbott instructed state agencies and public universities to pause new H-1B petitions to prioritize jobs for Texans. But Nelson argued this risks lowering academic standards and harming the global talent pool universities rely on. Nelson highlighted famous foreign-born scholars linked to the University of Texas at Austin as examples of how international experts have boosted Texas research. These include: - Edsger Dijkstra, a Dutch Turing Award winner who shaped computer science. - Luis Caffarelli from Argentina, an Abel Prize-winning mathematician. - E. C. George Sudarshan from India, a leader in theoretical physics. - Ilya Prigogine, a Russian-born Nobel chemistry laureate. - Allan MacDonald from Canada, a Wolf Prize-winning physicist. - Keiko Torii from Japan, a top plant biologist. - George Georgiou from Greece, a biotech pioneer. Nelson warned cutting early-career visa routes for scholars could weaken US universities long-term. Many top academics start in the US on temporary visas before becoming leaders in their fields. The post sparked debate online. Critics say other visa options exist for elite academics. Supporters say limiting international talent access could undermine American higher education's future. This disagreement reflects a larger national debate on immigration policy, labour needs, and academic excellence.