US Travel Ban: Sudan Faces New Restrictions

On 31 January 2020, the Trump administration announced that it was restricting immigrants from Sudan and five other countries in obtaining certain visas to come to the US, as part of an election-year push to further clamp down immigration.

According to the administration, the expanded travel ban came to effect as the six countries including Sudan, Kyrgyzstan, Myanmar, Eritrea, Nigeria and Tanzania failed to meet minimum security standards.

As of 21 February 2020, citizens of Sudan, Eritrea, Myanmar, Kyrgyzstan, Nigeria and Tanzania will no longer be eligible for immigrant visas to the US.

However, the expanded travel ban does not apply to tourist, business or other types of visas to the US.

For citizens of Nigeria, Eritrea, Myanmar and Kyrgyzstan, the restrictions apply to immigrant visas for people who intend on living in the US permanently, including spouses or family members of US citizens or family members of permanent US residents.

For citizens Sudan and Tanzania, the ban applies to the Diversity Visa (DV) programme. Section 203(c) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) provides for a class of immigrants known as “diversity immigrants” from countries with historically low rates of immigration to the US. A limited number of visas are available each fiscal year.

According to statistics by the US Department of State, in 2018, more than 500,000 Sudanese registered for that programme of which 3,781 were selected and given a chance to apply for an immigrant visa to the US.

According to the expanded travel ban, anyone outside the US, who does not already have a valid immigrant visa when the order comes into force on 21 February, may be affected.

Sudan, along with Syria, Libya, Yemen, Somalia, Iran and Iraq, was already included in the politically labeled Muslim travel ban, which is the Executive Order 13769, titled Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States, which came into effect in January 2017 by United States President Donald Trump.