President Donald Trump has expanded the US travel ban, doubling the number of nations affected by sweeping limits announced earlier this year on who can travel and emigrate to the US.
The Trump administration included five more countries as well as people traveling on documents issued by the Palestinian Authority to the list of countries facing a full ban on travel to the US and imposed new limits on 15 other countries.
Full-entry restrictions will be imposed on people from Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, South Sudan and Syria as well as Palestinian Authority passport holders.
The administration also moved Laos and Sierra Leone, which were previously subject to partial restrictions, to the full ban list and put partial restrictions on 15 other countries.
The additional 15 countries being added to the list of countries facing partial restrictions include Angola, Antigua and Barbuda, Benin, Ivory Coast, Dominica, Gabon, Gambia, Malawi, Mauritania, Nigeria, Senegal, Tanzania, Tonga, Zambia and Zimbabwe. The restrictions apply to both people seeking to travel to the US as visitors or to emigrate there.
The White House said that the restrictions were intended “to protect the security of the United States” and will come into force on January 1, 2026.
People who already have visas, are lawful permanent residents of the US or have certain visa categories such as diplomats or athletes, or whose entry into the country is believed to serve the US interest, are all exempt from the restrictions.
The Trump administration said in its announcement that many of the countries from which it was restricting travel had “widespread corruption, fraudulent or unreliable civil documents and criminal records” that made it difficult to vet their citizens for travel to the US.
It also said some countries had high rates of people overstaying their visas, refused to take back their citizens whom the U.S. wished to deport or had a “general lack of stability and government control,” which made vetting difficult. It also cited immigration enforcement, foreign policy and national security concerns for the move.
In justifying its decision to ban people with Palestinian Authority passports from emigrating to the US, the administration said that several “US-designated terrorist groups operate actively in the West Bank or Gaza Strip and have murdered American citizens.” The administration also said that the recent war in those areas had “likely resulted in compromised vetting and screening abilities.”
The Trump administration also said that Turkmenistan had improved enough to warrant easing some restrictions on travelers from that country. Restrictions remain for immigrants but have been lifted for non-immigrant visas.
Everything else from the previous travel restrictions announced in June remains in place, the administration said.
The move is part of ongoing efforts by the administration to tighten US entry standards for travel and immigration, in what critics say unfairly prevents travel for people from a broad range of countries.
The announcement followed the arrest of an Afghan national suspected of shooting two National Guard troops over the Thanksgiving weekend, an incident the White House pointed to in highlighting its security concerns.
The administration suggested it would expand the restrictions after the arrest of the Afghan national suspect.
In June, President Donald Trump announced that citizens of 12 countries would be banned from coming to the United States and those from seven others would face restrictions. The decision resurrected a hallmark policy of his first term.
At the time the ban included Afghanistan, Myanmar, Chad, the Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen and heightened restrictions on visitors from Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan and Venezuela.
Affected Countries Evaluate Trump’s Travel Ban
Countries that were newly placed on the list of banned or restricted countries said that they were evaluating the news.
The government of the island nation of Dominica in the Caribbean Sea said that it was treating the issue with the “utmost seriousness and urgency” and was reaching out to US officials to clarify what the restrictions mean and address any problems.
Antigua and Barbuda’s Ambassador to the United States, Ronald Saunders, said that the “matter is quite serious” and he’ll be seeking more information from US officials regarding the new restrictions.
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