Trump travel ban

On December 7, 2015, as a candidate for president, Donald Trump called for "a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country's representatives can figure out what the hell is going on."[4][5] His comments were condemned by several of his competitors for the Republican nomination, including Chris Christie, Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, and Lindsey Graham, as well as by several Republican state party chairmen, civil rights activist Ibrahim Hooper of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), and Democratic candidates for president Bernie Sanders and Martin O'Malley.[4][5]

• Executive Order 13769 (January 27, 2017) – The original travel ban.
• Executive Order 13780 (March 6, 2017) – The second and revised travel ban superseding the original travel ban. This ban was effective for only 90 days.
• Presidential Proclamation 9645 (September 24, 2017) – A third travel ban to replace the second one, which expired after 90 days.
• Presidential Proclamation 9723 (April 10, 2018) – A proclamation removed the travel restrictions on Chad.

In the days after the first executive order was issued, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer objected to the characterization of the executive order as a "travel ban".[6] However, Trump himself referred to his actions as a "travel ban".[7] In early May 2017, Spicer was asked by a reporter "If this White House is no longer calling this a 'Muslim ban'...why does the president's website still explicitly call for 'preventing Muslim immigration'?" After the question was asked, the text "DONALD J. TRUMP STATEMENT ON PREVENTING MUSLIM IMMIGRATION" was removed from Trump's campaign website.[8]

All three travel bans were challenged in court, and Presidential Proclamation 9645 and its accompanying travel ban was upheld in the Supreme Court.

In January 2020, the Trump Administration announced plans for an expansion of the travel ban.[9]

Over 135 million people fall under the ban. The Muslim countries are the ones who are most affected by this, the biggest being Iran with more than an 80 million population.[10] 12 months after the implementation of the travel ban in 2018, only 537 immigrant visas were issued for individuals born in Iran.[11] Whereas in 2017, 6643 visas were issued to Iranian born individuals, depicting a staggering 92% decrease in the 12 months following the travel ban.[11] Iran wasn't the only Muslim country affected by the ban, other countries faced a similar effect. 12 months after the travel ban was in effect, Somalia experienced an 86% reduction in the number of immigrant visas and Yemen saw a decrease by 83%, Libya saw an 80% decrease and Syria 77%. [11] However, the per month immigrant visas issued to non-Muslim countries on the travel ban barely changed. Actually, the number of visas issued to North Koreans increased by 40%. [11]

The expanded travel ban will suspend issuance of visas that can lead to permanent residency for nationals of Eritrea, Kyrgyzstan, Myanmar, and Nigeria. The expanded travel ban also stated that Sudanese and Tanzanian nationals will no longer be issued with diversity visas.[12]

The United States government has a system to provide 'waivers' as exceptions to people affected from the countries who need visas. The waivers are granted at the discretion of the consular officers who review the applications. [10] The waiver is granted to those facing a lot of undue hardship that requires them to be with their loved ones in the United States. For example, if a family member in the United States is dying, a person from the country with a travel ban on it would be granted a waiver to see their family member one last time.[10] However, getting a waiver doesn't guarantee entry to the country. After being approved for the waiver the applicants must still apply for a visa.[10] Only 2% of the people who applied for the waiver were granted one. From 33,176 applicants through April 30, 2018, 579 applicants had been granted the waiver.[10]