Resurrecting the infamous “Muslim ban” from his first term, President Trump has signed a proclamation preventing people from 12 countries—including Iran—from entering the United States. But this time, “only” two-thirds of the countries are Muslim-majority.
The main reasons described for the ban on issuing visas to nationals of these countries is that they are unable or unwilling to provide the United States with adequate information needed to make judgments about issuing visas, or because large numbers of their citizens getting US visas in the past have never returned home, or because they send terrorists around the world.
will hit Iranians hardest, as this chart shows. More
than a quarter of all temporary visas (mainly for
visitors and students) issued last year to citizens of
the 12 countries on President Trump’s new ban list
were issued to Iranians. The only other country
receiving a large number of such visas was
Myanmar. Afghans were the major recipients of
permanent (immigrant) visas. But most of those
visas were issued under the program for Afghans
who worked for the US government in Afghanistan,
and that program is not hit by the new visa ban.
The underlying concern that Trump aired eight years ago in issuing the first “Muslim ban” was that the people coming to the United States from these countries were terrorists. That’s a minor issue this time; terrorism is cited only with regard to Iran, Afghanistan and Somalia.
But the oddity is that Iran doesn’t appear to be a logical fit given the reasons Trump gave for banning visas for Iranians. It is true that Iran does not cooperate with the United States and won’t answer questions about visa applicants. But no Iranians issued visas in the past have been charged with terrorism in the US; Iran tends to hire non-Iranians to do its dirty work, so a visa ban is irrelevant. As for visa holders overstaying their visas, Iran’s record (4.3 percent overstayers) is not as good as Europeans (fewer than 1 percent) but much better than all the other counties on the list (19 percent to 50 per cent).
In recent years, about 20,000 Iranians have annually received US visas. Most are either students who are paying their own way (because Iran won’t provide stipends to those attending US universities) or relatives of Iranian-Americans. Those are the people who will be hurt— despite the headline in the daily Hamshahri, which said, “Trump’s new order against all Iranians in the world.”
The 12 countries on the new ban list are the Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Haiti, Myanmar, Afghanistan, Chad, Eritrea, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. The last eight counties are Muslim-majority. The first four are not.
In addition to the ban— which took effect at 12:01 a.m. Monday, June 9, four days after Trump announced the policy— there are heightened restrictions on giving visas to visitors from Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan and Venezuela. Of those seven countries, only Sierra Leone and Turkmenistan are Muslim-majority.
In his proclamation, Trump made clear that he was aiming to stop terrorists from entering the United States, even though in the country-by-country listing he doesn’t mention terrorism for nine of the 12 countries—an interesting but unexplained contradiction. He said, “The United States must be vigilant during the visa-issuance process to ensure that those aliens approved for admission into the United States do not intend to harm Americans or our national interests.”
The proclamation provides some clear exemptions that were obviously written in to avoid the total chaos caused by Trump’s 2017 “Muslim ban.” For example, it says that lawful permanent residents (green card holders) can freely enter the US as can people who already hold US visas. He forgot them in 2017, didn’t mention them in his order then and immigration officials generally turned them around and sent them back abroad in 2017.
The new proclamation also allows immigrant visas to be used “for ethnic and religious minorities facing persecution in Iran.” Curiously, it does not allow visas to be issued to minorities facing persecution in the other 11 countries. The bias against Muslims in Myanmar is especially vicious.
It allows immigrant visas to be issued to relatives of people living in the US (but says nothing about visitor visas), and it allows visas for children being adopted.
Iranian media have expressed concern in recent weeks that Iranian athletes would not be allowed into the US for the World Cup next year. The proclamation specifically says that athletes and coaches can come into the US for the World Cup, Olympics and other “major” sporting events. But it does not allow fans from the 12 countries into the US to watch games; World Cup matches will be played in Canada and Mexico as well as the US. Until the draw next year, it will not be known where Iran’s matches will be played.
The 12-country list stems from a January 20 executive order Trump issued requiring the Departments of State and Homeland Security and the Director of National Intelligence to compile a report on “hostile attitudes” toward the US and whether entry from certain countries represented a national security risk.
In the first week of his first term, Trump issued an executive order in January 2017 banning travel to the US by citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries — Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. They are 87 percent to 99 percent Muslim. But there were more than 40 other Muslim majority countries that were not impacted.
It was one of the most chaotic and confusing moments of US history. Travelers from those seven nations were either barred from getting on their flights to the US or detained at US airports after they landed. They included students and faculty as well as businesspeople, tourists and people visiting friends and family.
The ban took effect immediately on issuance. As a result, immigration staff at airports had no instruction on what they were supposed to do. Most didn’t even have access to the executive order. The result was pandemonium.
The order was challenged in court, and it wasn’t until its second revision that it finally passed legal muster before the Supreme Court in 2018.
Trump and others defended the initial ban on national security grounds, arguing it was aimed at protecting the country and not founded on anti-Muslim bias. However, the president had called for an explicit ban on Muslims during his first campaign for the White House, so few believed he was not aiming at Muslims in his visa order.
Trump’s proclamation states precisely why he is now banning visas to each of the 12 countries. Interestingly, he cites the threat of terrorism only with regard to three—Iran, Somalia and Afghanistan. For the others, the chief reasons stated are that a) huge percentages of their citizens getting visas in recent years have not gone home (eight of the 12 countries, not including Iran), b) their governments are not “competent or cooperative” and the United States can’t learn much about visa applicants from those countries (seven of the 12 countries, including Iran as uncooperative) and c) they refuse to accept back their citizens when the US wants to deport them (four of the 12 countries, including Iran). With regard to Iran, the proclamation states, “Iran is a state sponsor of terrorism. Iran regularly fails to cooperate with the United States in identifying security risks, is the source of significant terrorism around the world, and has historically failed to accept back its removable nationals. The entry into the United States of nationals of Iran as immigrants and non-immigrants is hereby suspended.”
The secretary of state is permitted to make exceptions and issue visas on a case-by-case basis. That would theoretically cover cases like one in Trump’s first term where an Iranian American required a kidney transplant and a cousin living in Iran was identified as a suitable and willing donor. It was only with great difficulty and delay that a visa was eventually issued for that cousin.
While a visa could be issued for such a case now, it will take high-level intervention and won’t be easy or quick.
The new Trump visa ban was announced just three days after an Egyptian man in Colorado was charged with carrying out an attack on a group of Jews honoring hostages being held in Gaza.
“The recent terror attack in Boulder, Colorado, has underscored the extreme dangers posed to our country by the entry of foreign nationals who are not properly vetted, as well as those who come here as temporary visitors and overstay their visas,” Trump said in a video message announcing the travel ban. “We don’t want them.” The new policy would have done nothing to stop any Egyptian from entering the US.
The proclamation made a major point of punishing countries whose citizens get visas for visits to the US, but then stay after the visas expire. Of the 10 countries with the largest percentage of overstayers in 2023, eight are on the ban list. But Laos, where 35 percent of visa holders overstayed—the second highest percentage—is not on the list. Nor is No. 7 Djibouti, with a 24 percent overstay rate. Just 4.3 percent of Iranians with visas overstayed.
In Tehran, the Foreign Ministry responded by saying the new visa ban “is an example of racial discrimination and systematic racism in the American ruling elite.” The 12-nation visa ban applies to six Black.
