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The White House explained the reasoning behind these decisions. “Nations on the list have severe deficiencies in screening, vetting, and information-sharing to protect the Nation from national security and public safety threats,” the fact sheet said.
“It is the President’s duty to take action to ensure that those seeking to enter our country will not harm the American people,” it continued, underscoring the administration’s focus on protecting Americans first.
The proclamation also narrows broad family-based immigrant visa carve-outs that had been vulnerable to fraud, while still allowing for case-by-case waivers. “The Proclamation narrows broad family-based immigrant visa carve-outs that carry demonstrated fraud risks, while preserving case-by-case waivers,” the White House noted.
According to the fact sheet, many of the restricted nations suffer from systemic corruption, unreliable civil documents, and missing birth-registration systems, making accurate vetting impossible. Some countries also have high rates of visa overstays and refuse to repatriate citizens who violate U.S. immigration rules.
The proclamation further highlighted the danger posed by Citizenship-by-Investment programs. “Some nations on the list permit Citizenship-by-Investment schemes that conceal identity and bypass vetting requirements and travel restrictions,” the fact sheet said.
Trump himself framed the policy as a matter of national security. “It is the policy of the United States to protect its citizens from foreign nationals who intend to commit terrorist attacks, threaten our national security and public safety, incite hate crimes, or otherwise exploit the immigration laws for malevolent purposes,” he wrote on the White House website.
The proclamation provided specific examples to justify the bans. “At least one country lacks mechanisms in hospitals to ensure births are reported, and widespread corruption, combined with a general lack of vetting and poor recordkeeping, result in any non-citizen being able to obtain any civil document from that country, particularly if that person is willing to pay a fee or engage an individual that specializes in assisting in such fraud,” Trump explained.
Another example highlighted education system corruption. “Corruption in another country even extends to the national school system, which has provided falsified diplomas and grade information in the past to fraudsters who have tried to obtain student visas and eligibility for large athletic scholarships,” the proclamation noted.
Trump also cited criminal activity among citizens from the listed countries. “According to United States law enforcement reporting, foreign nationals from countries named in this proclamation have been involved with crimes that include murder, terrorism, embezzling public funds, human smuggling, human trafficking, and other criminal activity,” the document said.
The administration pointed to the challenge of screening applicants from high-crime nations. “Many of these countries are ranked in the top third of countries for criminality, and widely unreliable foreign civil documents and lack of authoritative criminal information make it extremely difficult for United States screening and vetting authorities to assess prior criminal activity and other grounds of inadmissibility,” the proclamation concluded.
