ASIATODAY.ID, WASHINGTON – US President Donald Trump has expanded America’s travel ban, adding eight new countries and entities to the list, including Syria, the Palestinian Authority, and Laos from Asia. The new restrictions are set to take effect on January 1, 2026.
The White House said the move is part of a broader effort to tighten entry restrictions on foreign nationals from countries deemed to have “chronic deficiencies in traveler vetting,” making it difficult for US authorities to assess admissibility.
“These gaps could be exploited to threaten United States national security,” the proclamation issued on Tuesday said.
Under the expanded ban, entry is barred for citizens of Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, South Sudan, Syria, Laos, and Sierra Leone, as well as individuals traveling on documents issued by the Palestinian Authority.
Syria was added to the list just days after two US soldiers and a civilian were killed in the country in a shooting attack blamed on a suspected Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS) gunman.
The decision came despite Trump’s recent diplomatic outreach to the new government in Damascus, which took power last year after jihadist groups ousted longtime president Bashar Assad.
The White House clarified that the restrictions do not apply to individuals who have already been granted asylum in the United States.
The latest expansion follows an earlier June 2025 proclamation that restricted entry for nationals from 19 countries on national security grounds.
Trump has also intensified his rhetoric on immigration in recent weeks, particularly targeting migrants from Somalia, one of the countries already on the list.
His remarks followed the emergence of a fraud scandal involving the Somali diaspora in Minnesota. “We’re going to go the wrong way if we keep taking in garbage into our country,” Trump said last month, urging Africans to return home.
Earlier this month, US Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said she had urged Trump to impose “a full travel ban on every country flooding our nation with killers, leeches, and entitlement junkies.”
Her comments came after the arrest of an Afghan asylum seeker charged with first-degree murder in connection with the shooting of two members of the US National Guard in Washington last month. One of the victims later died at a local hospital. (AT Network)
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