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USA Today
a day ago
- USA Today
Which country has the most visitors impacted by Trump's travel restrictions?
Which country has the most visitors impacted by Trump's travel restrictions? South Florida, home to large Venezuelan, Haitian and Cuban communities, will be hit hard by Trump's travel ban Show Caption Hide Caption President Trump bans travel from several countries around the world President Donald Trump signed a proclamation that bans travel from 12 countries and restricts seven others. Reaction to President Donald Trump's new travel bans was swift in South Florida, home to what are believed to be the largest Venezuelan, Haitian and Cuban communities in the United States. "I am deeply concerned by this decision which further divides us as Americans and harms hardworking families contributing to the essential fabric of our community," Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava said in a June 5 social media post. "The work of our federal government should be to protect our borders and pass comprehensive immigration reform, not tear down our communities." Trump's proclamation, signed on June 4, takes effect June 9. The administration cited security reasons for the bans on travelers from a dozen countries and restrictions on those from seven others. It prohibits entry into the U.S. of foreign nationals from Afghanistan, Burma, Chad, the Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen. Travel restrictions, including suspensions, will be placed on those from Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan, and Venezuela. Of the nearly 1.7 million visas issued to people from those countries between 2014 and 2023, almost half were from Venezuela. They reunited with family, shopped and visited Disney World and other theme parks and attractions, according to recent media and social media accounts. Venezuelans and Haitians speak out against the travel ban The proclamation suspends entry into the United States for Venezuelan nationals with temporary work, study and tourist visas. "Venezuela lacks a competent or cooperative central authority for issuing passports or civil documents and it does not have appropriate screening and vetting measures," the proclamation said. It also mentioned the overstay rate on visas from the country is nearly 10%. A mother from Venezuela who moved to South Florida six years ago told CBS News she's unsure whether her adult son, who remains in the South American country, will be allowed to visit her. The announcement also prompted concern among bloggers who write about Disney parks in California and Florida, who questioned the impact the restrictions could have on the thousands who visit the parks each year from Venezuela. Members of South Florida's Haitian community also spoke out about the ban. More than 230,000 native Haitians live in the metropolitan area, roughly 4% of the region's population, according to the Migration Policy Institute. Marleine Bastien, who was born in Haiti and now serves on the Miami-Dade Board of County Commissioners, said she's "deeply disheartened" by the ban. In a statement, she called it "cruel and xenophobic" and a "blatant attempt to scapegoat an already suffering people." "This unjust policy will sow chaos in our communities, separating families, and disrupting lives," said Bastien, founder of Family Action Network Movement, a South Florida-based organization. The decision is a "betrayal of the values America claims to uphold – compassion, justice, and opportunity for all," she said. Haitians averaged 24,337 non-immigrant visas for the U.S. over a decade and Cubans averaged 12,464. Travel from the countries plunged during the pandemic but had begun to increase again by 2023. Haitians received 10,515 non-immigrant visas that year and Cubans received 6,146. Trump's proclamation stated he had directed the Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, and others to identify countries where the vetting and screening information is "so deficient as to warrant a full or partial suspension" of nationals of those countries into the U.S. and the group had found a number of countries deficient. Rubio, a South Florida native whose parents migrated from Cuba in 1956, shared on X a post from the White House, attributed to Trump: "We cannot have open migration from any country where we cannot safely and reliably vet and screen … That is why today I am signing a new executive order placing travel restrictions on countries including Yemen, Somalia, Haiti, Libya, and numerous others." USA TODAY looked at how many visas were distributed to foreign nationals from the countries in question over the past decade. A nonimmigrant visa is a temporary document, issued for tourism, temporary work, medical care, study or business. How many visitor's visas were issued? Combined, foreign nationals in the countries now facing travel bans accounted for fewer than 63,000 non-immigrant visas in 2023, the most recent year for which statistics are available. At least two dozen other countries not included in the ban each accounted for more visitor visas that year. While Venezuela leads all the 19 recently restricted countries in visitors to the U.S., Iranians received 17,634 non-immigrant visas in 2023, more than any of the dozen countries facing total travel bans. Myanmar, which U.S. documents recognize as Burma, received the next-most with 13,284. Here are the number of non-immigrant visas granted to nationalities of the other countries facing bans: Sudan, 4,506 Yemen, 4,204 Afghanistan, 2,665 Libya, 2,259 Congo Republic, 2,175 Chad, 2,090 Equatorial Guinea, 1,534 Eritrea, 931 Somalia, 463 Looking at the decade overall, Haitians topped the list, receiving the most non-immigrant visas among the banned countries at 243,369. Iran was second with 162,356 and Burma/Myanmar was third with 115,520. Among the countries facing travel restrictions rather than bans, foreign nationals from five of those – Sierra Leone, Togo, Laos, Turkmenistan and Burundi – received fewer than 8,500 non immigrant visas combined in 2023. Which country's residents received the most non-immigrant visas? Mexico led the world at 2.3 million non-immigrant visas in 2023. The figure also includes border crossing cards, laminated cards that allow Mexicans to cross the border between the nations for periods of less than 30 days. More than 1.3 million people planning to visit the U.S. from India received non-immigrant visas in 2023 and 1.06 million from Brazil. Other countries whose nationalities received the most visiting visas in 2023 include: Colombia, 476,293 China, 417,008 Argentina, 291,892 Ecuador, 274,799 Philippines, 285,860 Israel, 190,415 Vietnam, 133,781 Dominican Republic, 130,360 Turkey, 130,168 Nigeria, 113,695 Peru, 111,851 Dinah Voyles Pulver, a national correspondent for USA TODAY, writes about climate change, violent weather and other news. Reach her at dpulver@ or @dinahvp on Bluesky or X or dinahvp.77 on Signal.
TimesLIVE
2 days ago
- Politics
- TimesLIVE
Officials from Sudan, Chad, Somalia express dismay at Trump travel ban
The visa ban takes effect on June 9 at 12:01 a.m. EDT (0401 GMT). Visas issued before that date will not be revoked, the order said. In total, just under 162,000 immigrant visas and temporary work, study, and travel visas were issued in fiscal year 2023 to nationals of the affected countries in the now banned visa categories, according to the Migration Policy Institute. The ban is likely to face legal challenges. But Stephen Yale-Loehr, a retired professor of immigration law at Cornell Law School, said he expected those lawsuits to face an uphill climb, because the latest ban contains various exemptions and cited specific security concerns with each country. The ban includes exemptions, such as for dual nationals, permanent residents, immigrant visas for immediate family members of US citizens and athletes traveling for major sporting events like the World Cup. "Trump has learned from the mistakes of earlier travel bans," he said. Some foreign officials said they were prepared to work with the US to address Trump's security concerns. "Somalia values its longstanding relationship with the United States and stands ready to engage in dialogue to address the concerns raised," Dahir Hassan Abdi, the Somali ambassador to the United States, said in a statement.
Telegraph
5 days ago
- General
- Telegraph
ICE officials ‘threatened' over low deportation numbers
Immigration officers were 'eviscerated' for not deporting illegal migrants fast enough during a heated meeting with senior Trump administration officials in Washington. Stephen Miller, the White House's deputy chief of staff and a key architect of Donald Trump's immigration policy, left 50 senior officers feeling their jobs were at risk, according to the Washington Examiner. A string of officials described Mr Miller's fury. 'Miller came in there and eviscerated everyone. 'You guys aren't doing a good job. You're horrible leaders.' He just ripped into everybody. He had nothing positive to say about anybody, shot morale down,' said an official who spoke with those in the room during the meeting. 'Stephen Miller wants everybody arrested. 'Why aren't you at Home Depot? Why aren't you at 7-Eleven?'' There is growing tension that Mr Trump's mass deportations is not proceeding quickly enough. He was elected on a promise to enact the biggest deportation operation in history and set a target of removing one million people each year. However, with fewer migrants presenting themselves at the border, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers face the more complicated prospect of identifying illegal immigrants already in the country. Data released so far suggest the administration is on course to deport about half a million people this year, according to analysis by the Migration Policy Institute. That is fewer than the 685,000 deported by Joe Biden during his final year in office. Collapsing morale within ICE Against that background, dozens of top ICE officers were ordered to attend an emergency meeting in Washington DC, on May 20. Axios reported that Mr Miller and Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, ordered them to adopt a target of arresting 3,000 people a day. Insiders said the result was collapsing morale within ICE. 'They've been threatened, told they're watching their emails and texts and Signals,' the first official said. 'That's what is horrible about things right now. It's a fearful environment.' An administration spokesmen said the reporting mischaracterised the meeting. 'Stephen Miller did not say many of the things you state,' said Laszlo Baksay, ICE deputy assistant director of media affairs.
New York Post
6 days ago
- Politics
- New York Post
Colorado attack shows why ICE can't just focus on ‘criminals'
On Sunday, Mohamed Sabry Soliman — an Egyptian national admitted under the Biden administration who overstayed a tourist visa — was named as a suspect in a heinous anti-Semitic attack in Boulder, Colo. His arrest shows why 'border czar' Tom Homan can't just focus on criminal illegal aliens. An estimated 8 million illegal migrants poured into the United States over the Southwest border under Biden, and the media's attention has almost exclusively focused on them. But illegal entrants are just a part of a US unauthorized population the Center for Immigration Studies conservatively estimates at 15.4 million. 3 Mohamed Sabry Soliman was accused of throwing molotov cocktails at Jewish people. The rest came legally as 'nonimmigrants' — students, tourists, businesspeople, etc. According to the Migration Policy Institute, there were 132.4 million admissions of foreign nationals as nonimmigrants in FY 2023, down from more than 186 million in FY 2019 but still higher than the 96.8 million who came in FY 2022, when Soliman purportedly entered. Most, but not all, went back home as they were supposed to. A US Customs and Border Protection report estimates that among the nonimmigrants who came through airports and seaports and who were expected to depart in FY 2023, 1.45%, or 565,155 in total, didn't go home like they should have. CBP estimated the overstay rate that year for Egyptian nationals who came as nonimmigrant visitors to be even higher — 7.56%, or 3,264 individual 'overstay events.' In July 2015, then-Sen. (and now Secretary of State) Marco Rubio claimed 40% of all the illegal aliens in the United States were nonimmigrant overstays. If that percentage is lower now, it's because millions of migrants entered illegally under Biden, not because more nonimmigrants have respected the law and gone home. 3 Soliman overstayed his tourist visa and was living in Colorado. CBS News President Donald Trump has tasked Homan with overseeing a 'mass deportation' program to drive down the illegal population in the United States. Thus far, that plan has largely focused on aliens with criminal arrests or convictions. For example, the White House reports that of the nearly 40,000 aliens taken into custody during the first 50 days of the current administration, 75% were accused or convicted criminals. But immigration laws require the removal of all aliens here illegally, not just the least sympathetic. They are making a mockery of our rules, and avoiding the necessary vetting for asylum seekers. 3 He injured around a dozen people in the attack. @BHflyer5 via Storyful Soliman is presumed innocent until proven guilty, but if he's responsible for this attack, his actions harken back to another Egyptian overstay, Hesham Hedayet, who murdered two and wounded three others during a July 4, 2002, attack at the El Al counter at Los Angeles International Airport. It's reported Soliman 'filed a claim with US Citizenship and Immigration Services' — likely asylum — and if true it's yet another similarity to Hedayet. Hedayet was denied asylum, but was never deported. Two years later, his wife won the fraud-riddled 'visa lottery,' allowing him to stay and carry out his attack. We can't know who the next alien criminal or terrorist will be — which is why Trump and Homan must follow through on their deportation promises. Andrew Arthur is the fellow in law and policy at the Center for Immigration Studies.
New Indian Express
31-05-2025
- Business
- New Indian Express
Why Trump is weaponising remittances
According to a report by Migration Policy Institute (MPI), a Washington DC-based think tank, the Indian diaspora comprises 5.2 million US residents who were either born in India or reported Indian ancestry or origin. Of these individuals, around 55% were born in India, and the remaining 45% were born in the United States or elsewhere. India was the third largest country of origin for immigrants who obtained a green card in 2023, after Mexico and Cuba, says a tabulation by Migration Policy Institute (MPI). Of the nearly 1.2 million people receiving a green card that year, about 78,100 (7%) were from India. The MPI further estimates that around 3,75,000 (or 3%) of the 11.3 million unauthorised immigrants in the US of mid-2022 were from India, making Indians the fifth largest among all unauthorised immigrants in the US. The Indian Diaspora in the US, which is the 10th largest in the country, stands to get most adversely affected by the new remittance tax as India is one of the biggest recipients of inward remittances from the US. About 78% Indian migrants in the US are employed in high earning sectors such as management, business, science, and arts occupations. Over 54 lakh Indians are living in the US and out of this, more than 33 lakh belong to Persons of Indian Origin (PIO) category, according to Statista. India remained the top remittance recipient in 2024. India's total remittance receipts stood at $137.7 billion during 2024 (on a calendar year basis), accounting for 3.5% of India's GDP. The annual inward remittance of $138 billion is 70% higher than India's gross FDI inflow in FY25. Therefore, strong inward remittance is a handy tool for the government of India to manage the Current Account Deficit (CAD), especially amid falling net FDI inflows (Net FDI inflows fell to $0.4 billion in FY25 from $10 billion in the previous year). According to an RBI report, 28% of India's total inward remittances came from the US – making it $38 billion of money sent to India. A back-of-the-envelope calculation suggests the 3.5% levy on remittance could add $1.33 billion of tax burden on NRIs sending money back to India. However, the real impact is yet to be known. A finance ministry official this newspaper spoke to said the government is yet to make an impact analysis of the remittance tax. According to RBI's annual report, the average cost of sending remittances of $200 to India is estimated at 5.3% in the third quarter of 2024, below the global average of 6.6%. But this is going to change after 2025, thanks to the remittance tax. The measure could place added financial pressure on Indian nationals working in the United States, says Amarpal Chadha, Tax Partner and Mobility Leader, EY India. 'Many may be forced to re-evaluate their remittance patterns, including the amount and frequency of remittances for the purpose of maintenance of family or investment in India,' he says.
