Federal Judge Strikes Down Trump’s Immigrant Visa Ban Targeting 75 Countries as ‘Patently Unlawful’

NEW YORK — A federal judge in Manhattan struck down a Trump administration policy Friday that had suspended the issuance of immigrant visas to applicants from 75 countries, ruling that the policy exceeded the statutory authority of Secretary of State Marco Rubio and violated federal immigration law.

U.S. District Judge Jeannette Vargas of the Southern District of New York issued the ruling in a lawsuit brought by immigrant rights groups, along with individual visa applicants and U.S. citizens sponsoring family members from the affected countries. Vargas, an appointee of former President Joe Biden, found that the policy, implemented in January, was “contrary to law” and fell outside Rubio’s legal authority.

In her written decision, Vargas was direct in her characterization of the policy’s legal standing. “The Policy, which categorically prohibits the issuance of immigrant visas based upon the nationality of the applicant, represents a direct abrogation of this statutory scheme,” Vargas wrote, according to Reuters. The judge determined the policy ran afoul of a 1965 federal law barring nationality-based discrimination in the granting of visas, as well as a separate statutory provision that strips the secretary of state of direct authority over how individual consular officers adjudicate visa applications.

According to CNN, Vargas found that, in practice, U.S. consular officers were being directed to reject immigrant visa applications, even from applicants who could demonstrate they were financially self-sufficient, solely based on the applicant’s country of origin. The policy specifically halted permanent-residence visas for individuals seeking to join family members or take up employment in the United States, though it did not extend to nonimmigrant visas such as those issued for tourism or academic study.

A State Department cable sent by Rubio to every diplomatic and consular post worldwide, which was entered into the court record as part of the case, directed officers to refuse applicants even in cases where an applicant “provides additional evidence that demonstrates he or she overcomes the public charge refusal,” according to CNN’s review of the document. Vargas characterized the practical effect of that directive bluntly in her ruling. “The outcome is predetermined,” she wrote. “The visa will be refused.”

The State Department had defended the policy by arguing that applicants from the 75 designated countries posed a heightened risk of becoming a “public charge,” meaning they might rely on local, state or federal government assistance after arriving in the United States, according to Reuters. The suspended countries spanned a wide geographic range, including Latin American nations such as Brazil, Colombia and Uruguay; Balkan countries including Bosnia and Albania; South Asian nations Pakistan and Bangladesh; and numerous countries across Africa, the Middle East and the Caribbean, according to Reuters’ reporting.

The lawsuit challenging the policy was filed by the Catholic Legal Immigration Network and African Communities Together, immigrant rights organizations that joined with individual visa applicants and U.S. citizens sponsoring family members from the affected countries as plaintiffs in the case, according to Reuters.

According to reporting from SCOTUS Wire, Vargas specifically distinguished her ruling from the Supreme Court’s 2018 decision in Trump v. Hawaii, which had upheld a separate Trump administration travel ban permitting nationality-based restrictions on entry into the United States. Vargas drew that distinction on the grounds that the current policy directly restricted the issuance of visas themselves, rather than restricting entry at the border for individuals who had already obtained valid travel documents, a legal difference the judge found significant in assessing the scope of the executive branch’s authority under existing immigration statutes.

Al Jazeera’s coverage of the ruling noted that Vargas’ decision centered specifically on the question of statutory authority, finding that Congress had explicitly reserved to consular officers, rather than the secretary of state directly, the authority to adjudicate individual immigrant visa applications, a structural allocation of power the judge found the January policy had improperly overridden.

The State Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the ruling, according to Reuters. As of this report, it remained unclear whether the administration intended to appeal Vargas’ decision to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, a step commonly taken by the federal government following adverse rulings on major immigration policy matters.

Friday’s ruling adds to a broader, ongoing pattern of legal challenges facing the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement priorities during its second term. The administration has pursued what Reuters described as an aggressive approach to restricting various forms of visa issuance and immigration processing since returning to office, a strategy that has repeatedly drawn legal challenges from immigrant rights organizations, state attorneys general and individual plaintiffs affected by specific policies.

The 75-country visa suspension represents one of several immigration-related policies from the current administration to face significant legal setbacks in federal court. Earlier iterations of broad, nationality-based travel restrictions pursued by the Trump administration during its first term similarly drew successful legal challenges in multiple jurisdictions before the Supreme Court ultimately upheld a narrower, revised version of that earlier travel ban in the 2018 Trump v. Hawaii decision, a precedent Vargas’ ruling explicitly distinguished from the current case.

Immigrant rights advocates involved in the litigation are likely to view Friday’s ruling as a significant victory, given the broad geographic scope of the policy the judge struck down and the explicit finding that the policy’s practical operation left consular officers with no genuine discretion to approve applications regardless of individual applicants’ financial circumstances. For families and individuals affected by the suspension, including U.S. citizens seeking to sponsor relatives for immigrant visas from any of the 75 designated countries, Vargas’ ruling would, if it stands, restore the ability to have those applications processed and adjudicated on an individual basis rather than being categorically denied based on nationality alone.

As the legal fight over the policy continues, with an appeal from the administration considered a likely next step, immigration attorneys and advocacy organizations are expected to closely monitor how quickly the State Department moves to comply with Vargas’ order and resume standard visa processing for applicants from the affected countries, pending any further action either from the administration or from a higher court reviewing the case.