On Monday, President Donald J. Trump signed a new Executive Order revising a travel ban on nations with high-levels of terrorist activity. As many by now know, the original travel ban was falsely labeled a “Muslim ban” by both Democrats and members of the liberal media, and ongoing court battles forced the Trump administration to issue an updated order.
Under the new policy, there will be a “90-day ban on travelers, but it removed Iraq,” and “It also exempts permanent residents and current visa holders, and drops language offering preferential status to persecuted religious minorities.” The Executive Order also “reversed an indefinite ban on refugees from Syria, replacing it with a 120-day freeze that requires review and renewal.”
Many legal experts believe the new travel restrictions will hold up in court, but that likely won’t stop the left from suing the Trump administration and making up reasons why the order should be struck down.
But now, with the new order set to be fully implemented in a matter of weeks, President Trump’s Secretary of Homeland Security, General John Kelly, believes that apart from the 6 countries included in the order, there are “13 or 14” more nations with inadequate vetting procedures, and suggested the list of nations subject to the travel restrictions may grow.
From CNN:
“There will probably be other countries we will look at,” he told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on “The Situation Room.” “I don’t believe the list will be expanded, but there are countries out there that we will ask, like Iraq has done … to cooperate with us better, to get us the information we need to safeguard the country.”
He continued: “There’s a number of them out there, I don’t want to speculate. There’s probably 13 or 14 countries, not all of them Muslim countries, not all of them in the Middle East, that have questionable vetting procedures we can rely on. And if we overlay additional vetting procedures, the chances are these countries will be minimum citizens from those countries that visit our country.”
Here’s video of Kelly’s full comments:
Given that there are numerous impoverished, war torn countries across the world, it is not unreasonable for the United States to be skeptical of their vetting processes and restrict travel to this country.
Every country, especially the United States, has a right and an obligation to know who is entering on a daily basis, and if another nation does not know whether or not such individuals pose a threat, we should be able to prevent them from traveling here.
While General Kelly, for obvious reasons, did not release the names of the additional countries with inadequate vetting procedures, it is essential that our government work with other nations to improve their screening methods. If these unnamed countries cannot meet the U.S. requirements for vetting, then we should add them to the list of 6 nations already restricted from coming to the United States.
Do you agree with General Kelly that there are likely more nations with inadequate vetting standards that should be added to the travel ban list? Share your thoughts below!