ONE of Donald Trump’s first acts as president was to try to introduce a version of the ban on Muslims entering America that he promised on the campaign trail. Judges stayed his executive order, which went through several iterations, until June 26th, when the Supreme Court allowed a modified version to proceed. According to data from the State Department, just 2,095 visas were issued in July to nationals of the countries effected (Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen). That is 55% lower than the monthly average from 2012-16.
Yet that total differs only slightly from the monthly average of 2,526 new visas granted between March and June, a period when the courts had suspended the ban, and policy was formally the same as it was before Mr Trump took office. The State Department has not published figures on how many applications it received from the affected countries since the president announced the measure, so it is hard to know if the decline early in the year stemmed from consular...Continue reading
Source: United States http://ift.tt/2eXdfiO
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