President Trump signed a new travel ban Monday that administration officials said they hope will end legal challenges over the matter by imposing a 90-day ban on the issuance of new visas for citizens of six majority-Muslim nations, authorities said.
In addition, the nation’s refugee program will be suspended for 120 days, and it will not accept more than 50,000 refugees in a year, down from the 110,000 cap set by the Obama administration.
Trump signed the new ban out of public view, according to White House officials. The order will not take effect until March 16, officials said.
The new guidelines name six of the seven countries included in the first executive order but leave out Iraq. That nation will increase cooperation with the United States on additional security vetting under separate negotiations and its citizens are not subject to the new order, according to a fact sheet provided by the administration.
A Department of Homeland official, speaking on the condition of anonymity on a call with reporters, said Iraq was “treated differently” in part because the country had agreed to “timely repatriation” of their citizens if they were ordered deported from the United States.
The new order provides other exceptions not contained explicitly in previous versions: for travelers from those countries who are legal permanent residents of the United States, dual nationals who use a passport from another country and those who have been granted asylum or refugee status. Anyone who holds a visa now should be able to get into the country without any problems, though those whose visas expire will have to reapply, officials said.
Officials also attempted to lay out a more robust national security justification for the order, claiming that it was needed because 300 people who entered the country as refugees were the subject of counterterrorism investigations.
The officials, though, declined to say from which countries those people came, and they declined to detail the people’s current immigration status.
Source: Washintong Post
