Follow Us on Google
From Aidoghie Paulinus, Abuja
In a bid to further protect the security of the United States, President Donald Trump, has added Nigeria to a list of countries whose entry into the United States has been restricted.
The action, according to the United States, was taken to strengthen national security through common sense restrictions based on data.
Trump disclosed this on Tuesday in a signed Proclamation which restricted entry to the United States for nationals from countries of high-risk who have demonstrated persistent and severe deficiencies in screening, vetting, and information-sharing.
This, the United States stated, threaten its national security and public safety.
Trump particularly said of Nigeria that: “Radical Islamic terrorist groups such as Boko Haram and the Islamic State operate freely in certain parts of Nigeria, which creates substantial screening and vetting difficulties. According to the Overstay Report, Nigeria had a B-1/B-2 visa overstay rate of 5.56 percent and an F, M, and J visa overstay rate of 11.90 percent.”
Trump further said “The entry into the United States of nationals of Nigeria as immigrants, and as nonimmigrants on B-1, B‑2, B-1/B-2, F, M, and J visas, is hereby suspended.”
He added that “Consular officers shall reduce the validity for any other nonimmigrant visa issued to nationals of Nigeria to the extent permitted by law.”
Those on partial restrictions were citizens of Burundi, Cuba, Togo, and Venezuela remain under partial restrictions.
Countries that attracted full restrictions which were the original 12 high-risk countries were Afghanistan, Burma, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen, while Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, South Sudan, and Syria were also added.
Other News
Others on the list were individuals holding Palestinian-Authority-issued travel documents, including Laos and Sierra Leone that were earlier put to partial restrictions, now face full restrictions.
Nigeria and 14 other countries such as Angola, Antigua and Barbuda, Benin, Cote d’Ivoire, Dominica, Gabon, Gambia, Malawi, Mauritania, Senegal, Tanzania, Tonga, Zambia, and Zimbabwe had partial restrictions and entry limitations slammed on them.
In the proclamation, Trump said: “During my first Administration, I restricted the entry of certain foreign nationals into the United States to prevent national security and public safety threats from reaching our borders. The Supreme Court upheld these restrictions. I reinstated these successful policies in Executive Order 14161 of January 20, 2025 (Protecting the United States From Foreign Terrorists and Other National Security and Public Safety Threats), and Proclamation 10949 of June 4, 2025 (Restricting the Entry of Foreign Nationals To Protect the United States From Foreign Terrorists and Other National Security and Public Safety Threats).
“It is the policy of the United States to protect its citizens from foreign nationals who intend to commit terrorist attacks, threaten our national security and public safety, incite hate crimes, or otherwise exploit the immigration laws for malevolent purposes.
“The United States must exercise extreme vigilance during the visa-issuance and immigration processes to identify, prior to their admission or entry into the United States, foreign nationals who intend to harm Americans or our national interests. The United States Government must ensure that admitted aliens do not intend to threaten its citizens; undermine or destabilize its culture, government, institutions, or founding principles; or advocate for, aid, or support designated foreign terrorists or other threats to our national security.
“In order to protect our Nation, as directed in Executive Order 14161, the Secretary of State, in coordination with the Attorney General, the Secretary of Homeland Security, and the Director of National Intelligence, identified countries throughout the world for which screening and vetting information was so deficient as to warrant a full or partial suspension of the admission of nationals from those countries pursuant to section 212(f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), 8 U.S.C. 1182(f). Accordingly, in Proclamation 10949, I restricted the entry of foreign nationals into the United States from countries with deficient screening and vetting information to protect the national security and public safety of the United States and its people. The proclamation also directed the United States Government to immediately engage countries identified in the proclamation on measures that must be taken to comply with the screening, vetting, immigration, and security requirements of the United States.
“Despite those engagements, most of the countries identified in Proclamation 10949, as well as others, continue to exhibit woeful inadequacies in screening, vetting, and provision of information. At least one country lacks mechanisms in hospitals to ensure births are reported, and widespread corruption, combined with a general lack of vetting and poor recordkeeping, result in any non-citizen being able to obtain any civil document from that country, particularly if that person is willing to pay a fee or engage an individual that specializes in assisting in such fraud. In that same country, law enforcement records are not maintained with the accuracy or consistency necessary to provide representations of individuals’ criminal histories to the United States Government. In another country, civil documents like marriage licenses and birth certificates are handwritten and stamped on regular paper, making them highly susceptible to alteration, and there is a fraudulent document market that produces all types of falsified records, making written corroboration of any visa application practically impossible. In yet another country, criminal records are widely unreliable and inaccessible. And in another, United States visas are used as a tool for illicit transborder movement of assets by corrupt government officials and organized criminal groups. Corruption in another country even extends to the national school system, which has provided falsified diplomas and grade information in the past to fraudsters who have tried to obtain student visas and eligibility for large athletic scholarships. The government of another country refuses to provide passport exemplars, undermining the United States Government’s ability to detect fraudulent documents. In another country, the population, for the most part, does not formally document life events. This makes effective verification of basic biographical data such as birthdates, marriages, and parentage exceedingly difficult, if not impossible. Such countries warrant continued or new travel restrictions.
“Further, after continuing their review, and in light of the experience gained since the issuance of Proclamation 10949 and the reaction of foreign countries to the issuance of that proclamation, the Secretary of State, the Attorney General, the Secretary of Homeland Security, and the Director of National Intelligence have identified additional countries that cannot meet basic criteria for identifying their nationals and residents who pose national security and public safety threats and for sharing information with the United States. For example, only 40 percent of one country’s territory is under complete government control, and officials there have noted that their ability to securely process, house, or monitor non citizens is constrained. In another country, corruption in various forms is pervasive. Other countries have been subject to successful efforts to overthrow or undermine their governments, with the result that radical terrorist groups operate with minimal, if any, interference from law enforcement, engaging in forced labor, sex trafficking, illegal drug manufacturing and distribution, and other activities that destabilize such countries. And, because of the poor documentation practices and corrupt governments in these countries, there can be little assurance that the foreign nationals from these countries who seek to come to America on immigrant or nonimmigrant visas are not bringing these criminal enterprises with them to the United States.”
