US rolls out partial travel ban amid confusion over exemptions

PRESIDENT Donald Trump’s travel ban on people from six mostly Muslim countries will come into force today, as controversy swirls over who qualifies for an exemption based on family ties.

Delayed by five months of legal challenges before the Supreme Court partially backed Trump, the ban comes into effect at 8pm eastern time today, according to the New York Times, putting tight restrictions on the issuance of visas to travellers from Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.

But questions remained over the Supreme Court’s decision on Monday to allow exceptions for anyone defined as having a “bona fide relationship” in the United States.

As of early yesterday, key agencies, including the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security, which controls immigration at US airport and border posts, had yet to issue any public statements on how that will be implemented.

According to the Times, citing State Department guidelines sent to embassies on Wednesday, the bona fide relationship exception will include people with close family relationships in the United States, defined to include parents, children, sons and daughters-in-law, siblings and step- and half-siblings.

But close family does not include “grandparents, grandchildren, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, cousins, brothers-in-law and sisters-in-law, fiances and any other ‘extended’ family members”, the guidelines say. Exemptions to the ban also include people with formal relationships with a US entity, who have for instance been offered a job or accepted to study or lecture at a university.

And the order stresses that nonprofit groups cannot establish relationships with hopeful travellers just to allow them to skirt the ban.

Trump first ordered the travel ban in January.

It set a 90-day halt on travellers from the six countries, plus Iraq, while the government reviewed and toughened its vetting procedures. – AFP