US Will Halt Issuing Immigrant Visas for Dozens of Countries (2)

The US State Department will pause issuing immigrant visas for people from 75 countries including Brazil, Somalia and Iran, targeting specifically foreigners who they say could require public assistance while living in the US.

The move applies only to people seeking to live and work permanently in the US, not tourists or temporary workers, according to a person familiar with the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity because the order hasn’t yet been released. The administration has already imposed stricter vetting rules for foreigners and would-be residents over the past year, layering new restrictions onto a visa-screening system long considered among the most stringent in the world.

The visa pause, which will begin Jan. 21, is expected to hit family-based immigration hardest, affecting spouses, children and other immediate relatives of primarily US citizens who would otherwise be eligible for permanent residency.

The move is meant to end “the abuse of America’s immigration system by those who would extract wealth from the American people,” State Department spokesman Tommy Pigott said. In a post on X, the department added it applies to nations “whose immigrants often become public charges on the United States upon arrival.”

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The administration’s claims that immigrants drain government resources run counter to studies from the Cato Institute, the American Immigration Council and other groups that have found immigrants use less benefits than US-born Americans.

David Leopold, a Cleveland-based immigration lawyer and partner at Thompson Hine, questioned the need for a blanket pause, saying federal immigration law already requires extensive vetting to bar applicants likely to become a dependent on the welfare system.

“I’m not sure what the utility of banning immigrant and non-immigrant visas is — we already have extraordinary vetting programs,” Leopold said, citing a century-old provision barring those likely to rely on public benefits. “The way the law is already written, it’s designed to prevent people who are going to be an economic burden on the country from coming in.”

Read More: Here’s the List of 75 Countries Affected by US Visa Crackdown

Officials said the pause does not apply to tourist or temporary work visas, suggesting the move should not disrupt vacations or the plans of hundreds of thousands of overseas visitors expected for this year’s World Cup who would be coming on tourist visas. Fox News Digital reported earlier Wednesday that the administration was planning the move.

Trump has singled out communities of immigrants from Haiti, Somalia, Venezuela, Mexico and elsewhere for years, often describing people from those countries in disparaging terms. Those moves have reached a new intensity in recent weeks amid a crackdown in Minnesota fueled by accusations that Somalis there defrauded federal social safety net programs.

Brazil’s inclusion in the latest visa pause stands out, as the country hasn’t been usually grouped in countries targeted in broader immigration crackdowns. The Brazilian embassy in Washington said it’s not been formally notified of the decision or other details from the US government.

State Department data indicates that the US issued more than 600,000 immigrant visas in 2024, the vast majority of them immediate relatives of US citizens or current green card holders.

--With assistance from Isis Almeida.

To contact the reporters on this story:
Eric Martin in Washington at emartin21@bloomberg.net;
Alicia A. Caldwell in Los Angeles at acaldwell54@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Nick Wadhams at nwadhams@bloomberg.net;
Pierre Paulden at ppaulden@bloomberg.net

Sarah McGregor

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