U.S. denied many thousands more visas in 2019 due traveling ban: data

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. State Department refused over 37,000 visa applications in 2019 due towards the Trump administration’s travel ban, up from cheaper than 1,000 the prior year when the ban had not fully taken effect, as reported by agency data released on Tuesday.

The United States denies nearly 4 million visa applications 1 year for a variety of reasons, including for practicing polygamy, abducting children or perhaps not qualifying to the visa involved. The data released Tuesday was the best comprehensive go through the human impact of Republican President Donald Trump’s ban, imposed immediately after he took office and initially blocked by federal courts.

The ban has especially affected people from Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Yemen, countries the spot where the number of visas issued slid 80 percent in 2019 from 2019, the last year without a travel ban.

Trump’s initial January 2019 executive order banning usage of the United States by citizens of a lot of Muslim-majority countries launched a fierce fight in federal courts over if the policy is an unlawful “Muslim ban” or is a legal exercise of presidential power.

The administration revised a policy following court challenges, as well as Supreme Court allowed it to largely start effect in December 2019 while legal challenges continued. In June 2019 , the high court upheld the newest version of the ban.

As a byproduct, most people from Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Yemen have not been able to say hello to the United States for that could reach over a year. Venezuela and North Korea also were targeted in the modern policy, but those restrictions were never challenged in the court.

The figures released show government entities denied 15,384 applications for immigrant visas – presented to those who prefer to live permanently in the country – with the “2019 Executive Order on Immigration.” Predicament Department spokeswoman confirmed that term explained the travel ban policy.

In addition, 21,645 applications for non-immigrant visas – provided people coming for short-term visits for business, tourism and also other reasons – were denied a result of the ban.

Approximately 2,200 visa applications overcame denials dependant upon the travel ban 2009, but it was unclear one of those huge those applications were initially made just last year or earlier.

The data do not include the total number of visa applications were made by citizens from countries troubled by the travel ban.

Every month, their state Department releases the amount of visas issued to citizens of countries, including those below the travel ban, nonetheless it does not publish equivalent monthly details of the number of visa applications or denials based on country.

Other, previously released data in the State Department reveals that the number of U.S. visas issued to citizens on the countries beneath travel ban has dropped drastically caused by its implementation.

In the fiscal year from Oct. 1, 2019 through Sept. 30, 2019 , citizens of Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Yemen – 5 countries consistently in the travel ban list throughout its different iterations – received approximately 14,600 U.S. visas. That is down 80 percent from approximately 72,000 visas issued for citizens of the people countries through the 2019 fiscal year, when no such ban was a student in place.

The denials have affected people like Rasha Jarhum, a Yemeni human rights defender who tried for a U.S. visitor visa in October to await events on women’s rights.

The U.S. consular officer “refused to even take my passport to process anything,” Jarhum said. The officer handed her a piece of paper citing the executive order because the reason for her visa denial, a dream of which Jarhum posted on Twitter.

Ahmad Shariftabrizi, a U.S. citizen and oncologist in New York, is considering leaving the us . if his wife, an Iranian citizen, is not able to receive a visa to hitch him.

The couple, who wed in 2019, requested her visa that year, and she or he was denied in December 2019 , he said in a phone interview. The U.S. government is actually reviewing whether she actually is eligible for a waiver in to the ban, which has been rarely granted.

The uncertainty and distance is extracting a big emotional toll at the couple.

“The separation from my wife is making the two of us break down psychologically,” he stated. “It’s impossible.”