JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
We don't want them - that's how President Trump unveiled sweeping new travel restrictions from the Oval Office on Wednesday. Starting Monday, citizens from 12 countries will be barred from entering the U.S. Tighter rules are coming for seven other countries. Trump says it's about security vetting and visa overstays, citing the recent attack on a demonstration in Boulder, Colorado. The suspect in that attack is from Egypt - notably not on the list.
We've turned to three of our international correspondents in Asia, Africa and Latin America to find out how the travel ban is likely to affect countries it targets in those regions. First, Kate Bartlett in Johannesburg, South Africa.
KATE BARTLETT, BYLINE: Africa accounts for the lion's share of countries affected by Trump's new travel ban. Seven countries on the continent were hit with a total ban. The list is varied and includes democracies, authoritarian states and war-torn nations. But Suren Pillay, director of the Centre for African Studies at the University of Cape Town, said the list did raise questions.
SUREN PILLAY: Why this list? Why this particular group of countries? And of course, one imagines that the list could expand.
BARTLETT: Pillay did see one common thread that unites the banned countries.
PILLAY: So there is clearly a racial character to these exclusions, to the calculation of who should be removed or discouraged from coming to the United States.
BARTLETT: The reasons President Trump gave for the ban ranged from Eritrea refusing to accept back its nationals to Somalia acting as a, quote, "terrorist safe haven" and conflict-stricken Sudan's lack of ability to issue travel documents. Mostly, though, the reason given was that many of the countries, including Chad and Togo, had high visa overstay rates. But statistics showed that out of all the countries banned, the African countries accounted for the lowest number of visas. Citizens of Sudan, for example, were granted just 833 non-immigrant visas in 2023, and Somalia had a 77% refusal rate for citizens applying for U.S. entry last year.
Reaction in Africa to the bans was strong. The African Union called on the U.S. to, quote, "use a balanced, evidence-based approach" to deciding on who could enter the country, and Chad's President, Mahamat Deby, responded by slapping a ban on U.S. citizens wishing to travel to Chad.
For NPR News, I'm Kate Bartlett in Johannesburg.
EYDER PERALTA, BYLINE: Refugees International didn't mince words. They said the travel ban against Haiti was, quote, "racist." Yael Schacher, the director for the Americas, says the White House singled out the world's first Black republic by saying Haitian immigrants who came in the past few years, quote, "harm American communities."
YAEL SCHACHER: You know, it was the only country where, like, the nationals of the country were actually discussed, as opposed to just the security concerns around vetting.
PERALTA: Schacher says this is also just the latest punch against Haiti. Since Trump came into office, his administration has taken away humanitarian paroles from recent Haitian immigrants, and in August, he plans to end temporary protected status for Haitians, some of whom have been in the country for decades.
SCHACHER: You know, like, it's heaping more and more on this population, which is one of the most vulnerable, like, if not most in need of legal pathways and protection to the United States, and doesn't have options.
PERALTA: Ever since President Jovenel Moise was assassinated in 2021, Haiti has spiraled toward anarchy. Gangs now control a majority of the capital city. Nearly half the population is going hungry.
CECILE ACCILIEN: We have a saying that se lakay is se lakay (ph) - home is home - but there's no home to go to.
PERALTA: That's Cecile Accilien, who studies Haiti at the University of Maryland.
ACCILIEN: You have a country that is run by gangs. Where are people supposed to go?
PERALTA: Accilien says Haitians have been looking for hope for years now, and all they have found is a world that turns its back. This travel ban, for example, comes just as the neighboring Dominican Republic has enacted a mass deportation program of Haitians, so this new policy, says Accilien, feels especially cruel.
ACCILIEN: It's inhumane in whichever way you look at it because it's not looking at the context of where Haiti is right now, at this very moment.
PERALTA: Eyder Peralta, NPR News, Mexico City.
DIAA HADID, BYLINE: This travel ban is just the latest move by the Trump administration to target Afghans in some way. One of Trump's first moves, hours after his inauguration, was to suspend the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program, which halted the process for an estimated 200,000 Afghans. They were mostly the families of men and women who worked with the U.S. or related institutions and Afghans who fought alongside American forces. The U.S. pulled all troops and personnel out of Afghanistan in the summer of 2021, after nearly two decades in the country, as the Taliban overran the capital, Kabul. Many Afghans waiting to be resettled in the U.S. are in Pakistan, but Pakistan has been forcing them back to their home country, even if it's a risk to their lives.
The Trump administration has also cut most of America's promised aid to Afghanistan, including money that went to the World Food Programme. That fed millions of hungry men, women and children. The administration argued the Taliban was siphoning off the aid. Meanwhile, the Department of Homeland Security announced temporary protected status for Afghanistan would end this summer. And now Trump has issued this new executive order banning Afghans from entering the U.S., saying that Afghans are more likely to overstay their visas. There's an exception for Afghans meant to enter on a visa category for those who fought alongside American forces. The problem - the Trump administration is also dismantling the offices that handled their resettlement.
Advocates for America's Afghan allies say the Trump administration's blows feel relentless. Like Shawn VanDiver (ph) of AfghanEvac. He says, when you look at the sum of what the Trump administration is doing...
SHAWN VANDIVER: It is really just - this administration, the cruelty is the point, it seems.
HADID: Diaa Hadid, NPR News, Mumbai. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
