The Trump administration announced the expansion of the travel ban to more than 30 countries following the Nov. 26 shooting of two National Guard members in Washington by an Afghan national.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem confirmed the expansion of the June travel ban, which originally restricted 19 countries from partially or completely sending their citizens to the US.
“I won’t give a specific number, but it’s over 30. And the president continues to evaluate countries,” Noem said.
Noem told Fox News, “If they don’t have a stable government there, if they don’t have a country that can stand up and tell us who these individuals are and help us vet them, why should we allow people from that country to come here to the United States?”
DHS has not yet disclosed which other countries will be included or when the new restrictions will go into effect.
Prior restrictions
The existing ban fully restricted travel from Afghanistan, Burma, Chad, Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. Partial restrictions applied to Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan and Venezuela.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services also imposed a freeze on green card and citizenship applications for people from those 19 countries, announcing a freeze on “all pending asylum applications, regardless of the alien’s country of nationality.”
Trigger: DC shooting
The increased travel restrictions came after the attack on two West Virginia National Guard soldiers in Washington, DC. The gunman, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, an Afghan national who arrived as part of the Biden administration’s Operation Allies Welcome, fatally shot Specialist Sarah Beckstrom, 20, and critically wounded Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, 24 years old.
Lakanwal faces charges of murder, possession of a firearm during a violent crime and assault with intent to kill while armed.
