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Trump says he will issue order to suspend immigration during coronavirus crisis, closing off the United States to a new extreme

REICHSFUERHER MILLER'S PLAN ALL ALONG

STORIES
1 TRUMP TO ORDER IMMIGRATION SUSPENSION
2 DEMOCRATS CALL TRUMP XENOPHOBE IN CHIEF
3 IMMIGRATION RESTRICTION WILL HURT US HI TECH
       


Nick Miroff, Josh Dawsey, Teo Armus

President Trump announced in a tweet late Monday night that he plans to suspend immigration to the United States, a move he said is needed to safeguard American jobs and defend the country from coronavirus pandemic, which he called “the Invisible Enemy.”

“In light of the attack from the Invisible Enemy, as well as the need to protect the jobs of our GREAT American Citizens, I will be signing an Executive Order to temporarily suspend immigration into the United States!,” the president wrote, announcing the plan at 10:06 p.m.

Trump, who is running for reelection on his immigration record and his effort to build a wall on the Mexico border, has long been frustrated with the limits on his ability to seal off the United States by decree. An executive order suspending all immigration to the country would take the president’s impulses to an untested extreme.

Two White House officials said an executive order is being drafted and that Trump could sign it as soon as Tuesday. The order, which was discussed among senior staff members Monday, would suspend nearly all immigration under the rationale of preventing the spread of infection by foreigners arriving from abroad.

The United States currently has more confirmed coronavirus cases, by far, than any other country, with more than 775,000; the next highest country is Spain, with 200,000 cases. The United States also has far more confirmed virus-related deaths — more than 42,000 — than any other nation; Italy has more than 24,000 deaths and Spain just fewer than 21,000.

It remains unclear what exceptions Trump could include in such a sweeping immigration order, or if would-be immigrants could reach the United States by demonstrating they are free of the virus. The White House officials said they thought the order would not be in place long-term.

The president’s announcement caught some senior Department of Homeland Security officials off guard, and the agency did not respond to questions and requests to explain Trump’s plan late Monday.

The United States already has placed broad restrictions on travel from Europe, China and other pandemic hot spots, while implementing strict controls at the country’s land borders. International air travel has plummeted.

Halting immigration to the United States could affect hundreds of thousands of visa holders and other would-be green card recipients who are planning and preparing to come to the United States at any given time. Most of them are the family members of Americans.

For Trump’s executive order to work, it would have to direct the State Department and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services to immediately stop the issuance of immigration visas. Such a move appears to have no modern precedent and would potentially leave the fiancees, children and other close relatives of U.S. citizens in limbo.

The State Department issued about 460,000 immigration visas last year, and USCIS processed nearly 580,000 green card approvals for foreigners who applied for permanent residency, the latest U.S. statistics show.

Alex Nowrasteh, the director of immigration studies at the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank, said that the president likely does have the authority to issue such an order during a time of crisis.

Nowrasteh said there are at least two legal justifications for Trump to close the border to all immigration: Title 42 of the U.S. Code enables the president to halt immigration for health reasons, while a 2018 U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding his travel ban gives him legal precedent.

If such an order were in fact signed, it would be unprecedented in American history, Nowrasteh said. During the height of the 1918 flu pandemic, the United States allowed more than 110,000 immigrants to enter the country.

And during World War II, the United States accepted more than 170,000 immigrants with green cards and more than 227,000 temporary agricultural workers, mostly from Mexico, on the bracero guest worker visa program.

The president already has largely halted most forms of immigration into the United States, Nowrasteh said. This latest move continues his restrictionist immigration policies and takes them to a new level, using the pandemic as the reasoning.

On March 18, the State Department canceled most routine immigrant and nonimmigrant visa appointments at its offices overseas, effectively shutting down almost all new kinds of travel into the United States. The State Department also stopped all processing for refugee resettlement.

Later that week, however, authorities resumed processing H-2A visas for seasonal guest workers. The country's agricultural laborers have been officially declared “essential workers,” including hundreds of thousands of people who enter the country under that temporary visa.

Nowrasteh said he was surprised that it took Trump so long to use the pandemic and the cause of public health as justification to achieve one of his highest policy priorities.

“The president has been opposed to legal immigration for his entire administration,” he said. “This is an opportunity to close it down entirely, and this is about as legitimate as you can get in terms of a broad justification for doing so.”

Trump already has cited the health emergency to enact the kind of enforcement measures at the U.S. border with Mexico he has long extolled, moves that have essentially closed the border to asylum seekers and waved off anti-trafficking protections for underage migrants. During the past few weeks of the coronavirus crisis, U.S. border authorities have expelled 10,000 border crossers in an average of just a little more than an hour and a half each, which has effectively emptied out U.S. Border Patrol holding facilities of detainees.
© Sandy Huffaker/AFP/Getty Images Honduran migrants wait in line to plead their asylum cases at the El Caparral border crossing on March 2, 2020 in Tijuana, Mexico.

U.S. border authorities say the measures are in place to help federal agents, health-care workers and the public by preventing potentially infected migrants from crossing into the United States, while minimizing the population of detainees in U.S. immigration jails.

'Xenophobe in chief': Democrats blast Trump's plan to suspend immigration to the U.S.

Rebecca Shabad, NBC News•April 21, 2020

WASHINGTON — Congressional Democrats slammed President Donald Trump after he announced that he plans to suspend immigration to the United States, arguing that such a move does nothing to protect Americans from the coronavirus and deflects attention away from his handling of the outbreak.

House Democratic Caucus Chairman Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., tweeted that Trump is the "xenophobe. In. chief."

"This action is not only an attempt to divert attention away from Trump's failure to stop the spread of the coronavirus and save lives, but an authoritarian-like move to take advantage of a crisis and advance his anti-immigrant agenda. We must come together to reject his division," tweeted Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-Texas, chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.

Shortly after 10 p.m. ET on Monday, Trump announced in a tweet, "In light of the attack from the Invisible Enemy, as well as the need to protect the jobs of our GREAT American Citizens, I will be signing an Executive Order to temporarily suspend immigration into the United States!"

There were no additional details. A senior administration official said Trump could sign the executive order as early as this week.

Download the NBC News app for full coverage of the coronavirus outbreak

The tweet came as the death toll in the U.S. from COVID-19 topped 42,000 people, according to Johns Hopkins' Coronavirus Resource Center.

Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., Democrats' 2016 vice presidential nominee, called it a "pathetic attempt to shift blame from his Visible Incompetence to an Invisible Enemy."

Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., a possible vice presidential pick for Joe Biden in his 2020 White House race, said Trump has "failed to take this crisis seriously from day 1. His abandonment of his role as president has cost lives."

"Tonight we have crossed 790,000 infections and 42,000 dead. This corrupt buffoon will will [sic] try any poisonous distraction and blame anyone to deflect from his failures that are killing our fellow Americans," tweeted Rep. Bill Pascrell, D-N.J.

A co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., tweeted that the president was "giving into racism & xenophobia."

The administration official said the ban "had been under consideration for a while."

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., who played a key role in Trump’s impeachment, said in a pair of tweets that Trump is seeking to distract people from his "fumbled" response to the coronavirus and is showing himself as "small and ineffective."

Few Republican members of Congress have reacted to the immigration announcement, though two conservatives praised him Monday night on Twitter.

"Wow! One thing about @realDonaldTrump, he knows how to put American citizens first!" said Rep. Mo Brooks, R-Ala.

And Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., wrote, "Thank you, @realDonaldTrump! All immigration to the United States should halt until every American who wants a job has one!"

Trump's announcement comes after he decided in January to restrict travel by foreigners from China and similarly decided in March to restrict all travel by foreigners from Europe.


Donald Trump's immigration ban could hit tech sector
NOT JUST 'COULD'  BUT  IT WILL

By Justin Harper - Business Reporter, BBC•April 21, 2020


President Donald Trump's immigration ban could be a big blow for the fast-growing US technology sector. AND TO TRUMPS NEW INDO AMERICAN HINDU BASE

A rising number of migrant workers, particularly from Asia, head to the US to work in Silicon Valley.

Alongside Mexico, China and India now provide large numbers of the new working population.

This supply of talent could soon be cut off under Mr Trump's temporary ban, aimed at stopping the virus spreading and protecting American jobs.

According to Pew Research Center, more than one million immigrants arrive in the US each year, although this figure has fallen in recent years.

In 2017, India accounted for most of the new foreign workforce, followed by Mexico, China and Cuba.


Immigration to US to be halted due to virus - Trump


Rise in US unemployment leads to long food bank queues - BBC News


"This will definitely impact immigration movements into the IT sector in the US from India and China, being two countries with large migration numbers globally, " said Latha Olavatth at immigration specialist Newland Chase.

"China and India also have other business sectors where the ban will impact their movements to the States, further crippling trade and the economy adversely."

According to Pew Research Center, almost half of immigrants live in just three states - New York, Texas and California, home of Silicon Valley, where tech giants such as Google, Facebook and Cisco are based.

Before Tuesday's announcement, the US government had been debating how man migrant workers to allow into the country under its seasonal H-2B programme.

Pressure has been growing on policymakers to slow immigration as the number of Americans who have lost their jobs during the coronavirus downturn moves above six million.

 PRESSURE FROM WHO, BESIDES STEPHEN MILLER, IF ANYTHING THE PRESSURE WAS FOR MORE IMMIGRATION BOTH BY THE US CHAMBER OF COMMERCE AND THE AFL-CIO FOR FARMERS.

The executive order that temporarily suspends all immigration does not apply to farm workers and healthcare workers. It is not expected to include legal immigrants already in the US.