President Donald Trump has vowed to “permanently pause” migration from “all third world countries” after a National Guard member was killed in an attack near the White House.
The president’s comments are a further escalation of immigration measures ordered by Trump since two soldiers were shot Wednesday, one of whom remains in hospital. Investigators believe an Afghan national was behind the attack.
“I will permanently pause migration from all third world countries to allow the U.S. system to fully recover, terminate all of the millions of Biden illegal admissions, including those signed by Sleepy Joe Biden’s autopen, and remove anyone who is not a net asset to the United States,” Trump said on his social media platform, Truth Social.
The president said he would end all federal benefits and subsidies for “non-citizens”, adding he would “denaturalize migrants who undermine domestic tranquility” and deport any foreign national deemed a public charge, security risk, or “non-compatible with Western civilization.”
He did not provide any details on what he meant by the apparently contradictory “permanently pause” or which countries would face migration bans.
The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has already indefinitely suspended all immigration requests involving Afghan nationals after the attack, which is believed to have been carried out by Rahmanullah Lakanwal. The 29-year-old Afghan national resided in Washington state and had no known criminal history.
Sarah Beckstrom, 20, was injured in the ambush and later died. Fellow Guardsman Andrew Wolfe, 24, was “fighting for his life”, Trump said.
The president has pursued an aggressive immigration agenda since his return to the White House, and, in June, he announced a travel ban on immigrants from 19 countries, including Afghanistan.
Officials from the Department of Homeland Security said Trump has ordered a widespread review of asylum cases approved under Biden’s administration and Green Cards issued to citizens of 19 countries.
In a second Truth Social post, Trump claimed that hundreds of thousands of people poured into the U.S. totally “unvetted and unchecked”, during what he described as the “horrendous” airlift from Afghanistan.
He said his administration's goals are aimed at significantly reducing “illegal and disruptive populations”, suggesting that measures would be taken to achieve this outcome, adding that “Only REVERSE MIGRATION can fully cure this situation”.
CIA Director John Ratcliffe told Fox News that Lakanwal worked with the CIA while in Afghanistan as a “member of a partner force in Kandahar, which ended shortly following the chaotic evacuation”.
