Senegal's women's basketball team becomes first sports casualty of Trump's visa ban
Incidentally, Senegal was among the 25 African countries listed in a recent memo outlining nations that could potentially be added to the next phase of President Trump's expanded travel ban.
Although the restrictions have not yet been formally enforced, the inclusion of such a large number of African countries raises concerns that the final list may ultimately target the continent on a much broader scale
The policy, framed as a national security measure, targets countries allegedly lacking adequate passport controls, deportation cooperation, or security vetting systems. It has drawn widespread international criticism for its sweeping scope and potential discriminatory effects.
According to the BBC, five Senegalese players and 13 team officials were denied visas as they prepared to join teammates and their coach who had already arrived in the U.S. The training camp was intended as a warm-up for the 2025 Women's AfroBasket tournament, scheduled to take place in Côte d'Ivoire next month.
The incident marks a significant moment in the fallout of the Trump administration's immigration strategy, as it extends beyond traditional visa categories to affect international sporting participation.
Senegalese government responds
Senegalese Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko announced the cancellation of the planned training camp in the United States for the national women's basketball team after several members were denied entry visas.
The decision marks a clear diplomatic response to what Senegal views as discriminatory treatment under President Donald Trump's expanded visa restrictions.
"Informed of the refusal of issuing visas to several members of the Senegal women's national basketball team, I have instructed the Ministry of Sports to simply cancel the ten-day preparatory training initially planned in the United States of America," Sonko said in a statement.
According to the Prime Minister, the team will now conduct its preparations in Dakar, which he described as a " sovereign and conducive setting."
The move signals Senegal's rejection of a policy it sees as unjust, particularly as the team becomes the first high-profile African sports delegation directly affected by the new U.S. visa rules.
The visa denials not only disrupt the team's preparations for the upcoming 2025 Women's AfroBasket tournament in Côte d'Ivoire but also raise broader concerns about the unintended consequences of immigration policies on international sports and cultural exchange.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
8 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Human rights ‘worsened' in UK over the past year, says US
A Trump administration report has accused the UK of backsliding on human rights over the past year, citing increased antisemitic violence and growing restrictions on free speech. The annual US State Department assessment, which analyses human rights conditions worldwide, flagged what it described as 'serious restrictions' on freedom of expression in the UK. 'The government sometimes took credible steps to identify and punish officials who committed human rights abuses, but prosecution and punishment for such abuses was inconsistent,' the report read. The report specifically said laws limiting speech around abortion clinics, pointing to 'safe access zones' curbed expression, including silent protests and prayer. 'These restrictions on freedom of speech could include prohibitions on efforts to influence others when inside a restricted area, even through prayer or silent protests,' the report read. In the wake of the 2024 Southport attack, the report said government officials 'repeatedly intervened to chill speech'. Criticism over the handling of free speech was also directed at the governments of Germany and France. A UK government spokesperson told the BBC: 'Free speech is vital for democracy around the world, including here in the UK and we are proud to uphold freedoms whilst keeping our citizens safe.' Sentiments echoed those previously made by vice president JD Vance. In February, Mr Vance criticised the UK over a legal case in which a former serviceman who silently prayed outside an abortion clinic was convicted of breaching the safe zone around the centre. In a wider attack on what he suggested is a shift away from democratic values across Europe, Mr Vance claimed the 'basic liberties of religious Britons, in particular' are under threat. He referred to the conviction of Adam Smith-Connor, 51, who had denied doing so but was found guilty last year of failing to comply with a public space protection order at the centre in Bournemouth in November 2022. Speaking at the Munich Security Conference, Mr Vance said that the US' 'very dear friends the United Kingdom' appeared to have seen a 'backslide in conscience rights'. 'A little over two years ago, the British government charged Adam Smith-Connor, a 51-year-old physiotherapist and an Army veteran, with the heinous crime of standing 50 metres from an abortion clinic and silently praying for three minutes, not obstructing anyone, not interacting with anyone, just silently praying on his own,' he said. The report also said the Government 'effectively' enforced laws around freedom of association and the rights of workers. The UK Government has been contacted for comment.
Politico
38 minutes ago
- Politico
‘They created this impasse': Lula, Trump at a standstill on tariffs
Trump has tied tariffs so large they are effectively sanctions to an issue Lula's government has made clear it won't negotiate on. President Donald Trump and then-Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro approach the podiums for a joint news conference at the White House on March 19, 2019 in Washington, D.C. |By Megan Messerly 08/12/2025 05:55 AM EDT President Donald Trump has used tariffs to pressure world leaders on a host of non-trade issues. Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is one of the few who isn't budging. The left-wing South American president has taken a forceful response to the 50 percent tariffs Trump announced in July, last week calling on India, China and other emerging economies to unite against the U.S. levies. Lula, as Brazil's president is known, called the tariffs 'unacceptable blackmail' and filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization, after Trump tied the levies in part to the prosecution of former Brazilian president and far-right Trump acolyte Jair Bolsonaro. Unlike countries that have caved to Trump's demands on digital services taxes or defense spending, Trump has tied tariffs so large they are effectively sanctions to an issue Lula's government has made clear it won't negotiate on.
Boston Globe
39 minutes ago
- Boston Globe
When Trump meets Putin, anything could happen
Top Republicans were horrified. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., called it a 'disgraceful performance.' Trump's own national security adviser at the time, John Bolton, would later write that 'Putin had to be laughing uproariously at what he had gotten away with in Helsinki.' Trump plans to see Putin on Friday in Alaska for the first time since his return to the White House to discuss the U.S. president's goal of ending the war between Russia and Ukraine. With Putin pressing peace proposals that heavily favor Russia, many analysts and former Trump officials worry that he will once again turn a meeting with Trump to his advantage. Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up During Trump's first term, he and Putin met six times in person and had several more phone conversations. (His successor, Joe Biden, met Putin only once, in June 2021, before the Russian invasion of Ukraine.) Advertisement Those interactions alarmed many of Trump's senior aides, who watched as the U.S. president disregarded their advice, excluded them from meetings with the Russian leader and proposed impractical ideas that appeared to have been planted by Putin, like creating a U.S.-Russia 'impenetrable Cyber Security unit.' The idea was dropped as soon as Trump got back to Washington. Advertisement The relationship has grown more complicated in Trump's second term. In recent months Trump, eager to fulfill his promises of settling the war between Russia and Ukraine, has grown irritated by Putin's unwillingness to de-escalate the conflict. Putin will land in Alaska determined to rewind Trump's view of the war to February, when he berated Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at a contentious White House meeting for not showing more gratitude for U.S. support, while speaking warmly about Putin. 'Since the blowup between Trump and Zelenskyy in the Oval Office, Europeans, Ukrainians and Ukraine's supporters inside the administration have cobbled together a policy of helping Ukraine stay in the fight and preventing the lurch by Trump to embrace Russia's view of the conflict,' said Andrew Weiss, vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. 'The real test on Friday will be how much of that policy survives the first in-person contact between Trump and Putin in his second term,' Weiss added. The White House portrays the meeting as an example of Trump's dedication to stopping the bloodshed in Ukraine and defends his unconventional style as a needed break from slow-moving diplomatic customs. But critics worry that the hastily planned conversation will play into the hands of Putin, a former KGB agent known as a master manipulator. 'I think he believes he should reel Trump back in, and believes his KGB skills will do that,' Bolton said in an interview with NewsNation last week. The Russian leader may also benefit from the fact that Trump, in contrast to his first term, has few advisers pushing back against Putin's worldview. For his trip to Helsinki, for instance, Trump was surrounded by such Russia hawks as Bolton, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis. Advertisement Today, Secretary of State Marco Rubio is the lone member of Trump's inner circle with a clear record of criticizing Putin. But even Rubio, who also serves as Trump's national security adviser, has softened his tone since joining Trump's Cabinet. The Alaska meeting was set after Trump's special envoy, Steve Witkoff, met with Putin in Moscow last week. Witkoff, a friend of Trump and a fellow real estate mogul, had no diplomatic experience before joining government. He has been criticized for meeting with Putin without other U.S. officials and for echoing his talking points afterward. To be sure, the Russia hawks around Trump in his first term often had little success. When Trump called Putin after the Russian president was reelected in a March 2018 vote widely seen as illegitimate, Trump's aides placed a clear instruction in his briefing papers: 'DO NOT CONGRATULATE.' Trump did so anyway. Not even a federal investigation into 2016 Russian election interference was enough to restrain Trump. When the two leaders last met in person, on the sidelines of a 2019 Group of 20 gathering in Osaka, Japan, Trump joked with Putin about the subject. 'Don't meddle in the election!' Trump said, with a smirk and a finger wag. Putin grinned in delight. The investigation, and the presence of Putin critics at high levels of his administration, may have led Trump to conduct his conversations with unusual secrecy, however. When the men first sat down together, at a G20 summit in Hamburg, Germany, in 2017, Trump was joined only by his secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, and an interpreter. After the meeting, Trump took the interpreter's notes and ordered him not to disclose what he heard. Advertisement That evening, Trump and Putin had an impromptu conversation, initiated by Trump, at a group dinner. No other Americans were present, and the White House confirmed the meeting only after surprised witnesses spoke to reporters. Asked by reporters what he had told Trump in Hamburg about the 2016 election, Putin replied, 'I got the impression that my answers satisfied him.' For his part, Trump called a New York Times reporter in Hamburg just as he was departing from the summit and said Putin had told him that Russia could not have been involved in the 2016 election because its operations were so sophisticated they never would have been detected. Trump said he was 'very impressed' by that argument, a case he went on to make in public. Analysts said they have low expectations for the sort of breakthrough on Ukraine that Trump is hoping to achieve in Alaska. Putin has shown every sign that he believes he can gain more on the battlefield than in negotiations -- at least on the terms Trump has so far required. Maria Snegovaya, a senior fellow for Russia and Eurasia with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, noted that in his first term Trump tried to strike major deals with the authoritarian leaders of such nations as China and North Korea, with limited results. 'In general, Trump's history of meetings with strong men from Xi Jinping to Kim Jong Un does not lead to a successful deal that follows,' she said. Advertisement Fiona Hill, who was senior director for Europe and Russia on the National Security Council in the first Trump White House, agreed that any breakthrough appeared unlikely. Putin and his aides have been frustrated at a lack of diplomatic progress with the Trump administration, and Hill said she sees little fresh ground for a deal, even one favorable to Putin. The Russians 'always want something they can take to the bank, an agreement they can hold the U.S. to,' she said. 'They were excited by Witkoff at first, since he's a direct channel to Trump, but they're frustrated there's no structure around it.' While Putin might welcome a leader-to-leader meeting, she said, 'he wants the details to be worked out later. And Trump isn't a details guy.' This article originally appeared in
