U.S. Asylum Freeze Partially Lifted; Nigeria, Somalia, Iran, and Venezuela Remain Excluded

The Trump administration is scaling back a sweeping asylum crackdown introduced after the shooting of two National Guard members in Washington, D.C., but will continue to freeze processing for applicants from 39 countries subject to travel bans or steep immigration restrictions.

In late November 2025, following the incident in which an Afghan man granted asylum in 2025 allegedly shot the two guards (one of whom later died), the administration imposed an indefinite pause on asylum cases handled by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).

The move applied regardless of the applicant’s nationality and was justified on national security grounds.

According to two Department of Homeland Security sources, the administration has now decided to lift the adjudicative hold for most asylum cases. However, the pause remains firmly in place for nationals from the 39 countries currently facing full or partial entry restrictions under the expanded travel ban proclamation issued by President Trump in December.

The excluded countries include several from Africa such as Senegal, Somalia, and Nigeria; from Asia such as Afghanistan, Iran, and Laos; and from Latin America and the Caribbean such as Cuba, Haiti, and Venezuela, among others.

In a statement to CBS News, the Department of Homeland Security confirmed that “USCIS has lifted the adjudicative hold for thoroughly screened asylum seekers from non high-risk countries.” The department stressed that “maximum screening and vetting for ALL aliens continues unabated.”

The administration has also kept in place a freeze on other legal immigration applications – including work permits, green cards, and citizenship requests – filed by nationals of these same 39 countries.

These measures form part of a wider set of policies introduced in the second Trump administration to tighten the legal immigration system. They include efforts to restrict work permits for asylum seekers and to re-examine cases of refugees admitted under the previous administration.

Administration officials defend the approach as essential to combat fraud and strengthen national security vetting. Pro-immigration advocates, however, argue that the policies unfairly penalise individuals who are complying with existing rules.

The partial rollback of the asylum pause reflects a calibrated adjustment: resuming processing for lower-risk applicants while maintaining rigorous controls on those from countries the administration considers high-risk.