The US State Department has confirmed that the administration of President Donald Trump is suspending the processing of immigrant visas, including family-based green cards, for applicants from dozens of countries.
“The State Department is pausing immigrant visa processing for 75 countries,” an official from the agency said on Wednesday.
China is not included in the list, which has countries like Thailand, a US ally, and Brazil, a close neighbour in the western hemisphere, along with Russia, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, Bhutan, Egypt, Jordan and Kuwait.
The review is unlikely to cover all visa categories, including F-1 student visas and L and H-1B visas for skilled workers.
The pause will begin next week, on January 21, and will continue indefinitely. The department would reassess the process to check “abuse” of taxpayer-funded benefit programmes.
“The freeze will remain active until the US can ensure that new immigrants will not extract wealth from the American people,” the State Department said in a social media post.
It added that the administration was “working to ensure the generosity of the American people will no longer be abused”.
The decision, the latest move affecting legal immigration pathways, is expected to have an immediate impact on applicants awaiting immigrant visas, particularly those married to US citizens.
Since Trump returned to the White House last year, the State Department has intensified efforts to restrict migration, expanding a full or partial travel ban to 39 countries and pausing asylum, citizenship and green card processing for affected nationals.
The administration has also moved to tighten visa eligibility rules, arguing that current policies allow immigrants to rely on public benefits, a claim critics dispute.
David Bier, director of Immigration Studies at the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank in Washington, described the Trump administration as “the most anti-legal immigration agenda in American history”.
“This action will ban nearly half of all legal immigrants to the United States, turning away about 315,000 legal immigrants over the next year alone,” he said.
Bier contended that those legal immigrants would have “benefited” the US, “paid taxes, reduced the deficit and increased economic growth”.
“Instead, the agency is adopting policies based on bad economic research,” he added, emphasising the need for Congress to immediately limit executive power over legal immigration.
