If you're confused by the latest travel ban issued by the president, watch this video,
and I'll tell you more.
Hi, everybody.
This is Jacob Sapochnick, an immigration attorney based in San Diego, California.
And in this video, we'll talk about the latest travel ban issued by the President.
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So, let's dive right in.
So, on January 31st, the President issued a Presidential Proclamation, adding a few
more countries to the already existing travel ban, which means people from those countries
are no longer going to be able to apply for green cards.
The new countries that were announced by that proclamation of the following: there is Myanmar,
Eritrea, Nigeria, Sudan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tanzania.
Now, those countries are just an addition to already several countries that are having
on their band since 2017 when the first travel ban was was issued.
So, what I wanted to do in this video is to go over briefly of each country and explain
what is the significance of that travel ban?
Before we dive into specific countries, I want to explain the generality of the ban.
So, what the ban does, it essentially prevents people from immigrating to the United States
if their family petitions applying for a green card.
So for example, if somebody from Nigeria after February 21, 2020, what's going to happen
is that people from the countries on that list are not going to be able to apply for
green cards primarily based on family unification, it’s the most severe impact on people that
are going through the immigration process through family unification.
So for example, after February 21st, a person from Nigeria who is going to be applying for
a green card based on a spouse or marriage is not going to be allowed to get their green
cards because of the ban.
But people that are applying for student visas or tourist visas, or any other non-immigrant
visa, they're not necessarily blocked by the bar because the bar is affecting people that
are coming here on green cards.
So, at the same time, people that are here in the US already from those countries who
are applying for a green card based in adjustment or changing status with different visas are
not affected by the ban because they're already in the US.
The ban only applies to people that are coming from outside of the US specifically for green
card purposes.
So, that has to be clear.
So, let's kind of run through the list of the countries that are on the travel ban,
and kind of explain what they are.
Kyrgyzstan, the ban suspends the entry of immigrants for green card purposes, except
special immigrants who have helped the US government.
Iran, suspends the entry of immigrants specifically for green card purposes and non-immigrants,
except F students, M students, and J Exchange Visitor students.
They are also subject to very strict scrutiny.
Libya, in this case, the ban suspends entry of immigrants for green card purposes and
temporary visitors on business or tourist visas like B1, B2, and, of course, student
visas as well.
Myanmar, suspends the entry of immigrants for green card purposes, except special immigrants
who have helped the US government.
Nigeria, suspends entry of all immigrants for green card purposes, except immigrants
who have provided assistance to the US government.
And again, the reason they do that, immigrants who helped the US government, it goes back
to the days of the war in Iraq where there are certain people that were helping the US
government while they were in a hostile society.
And those people should be rewarded to be able to come to the United States on an immigrant
visa if they're able to do so.
So, those people that are subject to the ban, it's primarily for green card purposes, mostly
family unification.
Some countries also have a ban on non-immigrant visas, like we mentioned here and we'll continue
with the rest of the list.
The ban primarily bans people from coming here as an immigrant with a green card.
North Korea, suspends the entry of all immigrants and non-immigrants.
North Korea is one of those countries that has a complete bar.
Somalia, suspends the entry of immigrants and requires enhanced screening of all non-immigrants.
And again, Somalia is on high alert because of Al Shabaab and all these terrorist countries
there as well.
Sudan, the ban suspends the entry of the Diversity Visa immigrants, those people that won the
lottery, they're not able to come in.
Tanzania, suspends the entry of Diversity Visa immigrants, same thing, just like Sudan.
And Yemen, suspends the entry of immigrants and temporary visitors on B1 and B2 visas.
So, Yemen has also a general large ban.
So once again, to summarize this, the ban applies to people that are coming here mostly
on immigrant visas, green cards based in family unification.
Some countries also have a ban on non-immigrant visas.
But it's important to understand that if people are in the United States from those countries,
they are able to do Adjustment of Status and different change of status.
So, hopefully, this video was informative for you, guys.
Let me know in the comments below if you have any other questions.
Share this with somebody who may benefit, and we'll see you in our next video.