Gov. Greg Abbott said Monday that his administration is examining whether Texas taxpayer dollars are being used in connection with employees working under H-1B visas at public K-12 schools and universities.

Internal emails obtained by Quorum Report show the governor’s office asked Texas A&M University System leaders Friday to provide data on employees working under H-1B visas, including their roles and country of origin, by close of business Monday.

Abbott told Mark Davis, a conservative radio talk show host, Monday that the state has inquiries out to public schools and universities and expects to announce an “action plan” later this week based on what is learned.

“I don’t see any reason why we need any H-1B visa employees in our public schools in the state of Texas. But we’re going to find out if there’s some unique skill set or whatever the case may be,” Abbott said.

He also suggested that some visa holders may have been admitted before or during the Biden administration and may have overstayed.

“Those, again, are the type of people that the Trump administration is trying to remove,” Abbott said.

The request follows reporting by conservative news site The Dallas Express on Thursday that it had sought public records related to Texas A&M University’s use of H-1B visas for months and filed a complaint with the Texas attorney general before receiving the information.

H-1B visas let employers hire foreign workers for specialized jobs that usually require at least a bachelor’s degree. Public universities and academic medical centers often use the visas to hire professors, researchers, doctors and other highly trained staff. Federal immigration data show some of the state’s largest education-sector employers of H-1B visa holders include Dallas ISD as well as academic medical centers, such as UT Southwestern Medical Center and UT MD Anderson Cancer Center.

The Texas Tribune reached out to the governor’s office and the Texas A&M University System for comment, as well as several University of Texas System institutions to ask whether they received requests for visa information from the governor’s office. They did not immediately respond. Several schools, including Texas A&M University and the University of Texas-Austin, were closed Monday due to winter weather.

Higher education advocates say restricting universities’ ability to hire international faculty and researchers could have economic consequences for Texas and weaken the state’s innovation pipeline.

“What has made U.S. higher education the best in the world is that we have been able to attract the best people for these positions,” said Miriam Feldblum, co-founder and CEO of the Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration, a national coalition of college and university leaders focused on immigration policy.

She added that recent federal policies, including a $100,000 fee for some new H-1B hires from abroad, already threaten U.S. universities’ competitiveness.

The Texas Tribune partners with Open Campus on higher education coverage.

Disclosure: Texas A&M University, Texas A&M University System, UT Southwestern Medical Center and University of Texas System have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here.

This article first appeared on The Texas Tribune.