Travel Ban Waiver Statistics

[salhasl 113]

Hello everyone, I have been doing some digging, and just trying to get my head around this waiver business. 

 

"

People from countries covered by the ban filed 33,176 applications for non-immigrant and immigrant visas between Dec. 8, 2017 and April 30, according to data in a June 22 letter from Assistant Secretary of State Mary Waters to Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen. The letter was received by Van Hollen’s office on Tuesday, and his office provided it to Reuters.

Of those, 4,900 applications were rejected for reasons other than the travel ban, while 1,147 were found eligible for visas based on an exception to the ban. Those exceptions apply to specific categories including refugees, dual nationals or diplomats, and people in such categories do not need waivers.

 

Of the remaining 27,129 visa applicants, 579 were “cleared for waivers” - a rate of 2.1 percent. It was unclear how many of those cleared for waivers actually received U.S. visas.

Nearly 4,200 applicants have been interviewed but are “still awaiting a determination on a waiver,” the letter states. Between April 30 and May 31, a further 189 people were cleared for waivers, but it is unclear how many more applications were filed in that time."

 

 

If we dig deeper, what they say, is 4200 are being considered for a waiver, out of which 579 were already cleared. It says 27K applied, but it does not mean all those 27K are eligible for waivers (or even need them for example, F1/M1/J1s are not banned for Iran, so are they a part of the 27k?). They are calculating 2.1 percent on basis of everyone who applied, not everyone who is actually qualified for waivers. 

 

Another way to read it is 4200 are awaiting a determination of waivers (which tells me they met the criteria for waiver and are under consideration), and close to 600 have cleared. Although there is no doubt that in the intial days they issued blanked denials to even those who clearly qualified for waivers, a number of them reported that their initial denials were later changed to waiver determination. 

 

Further, I looked at immigrant numbers (excluding f classes - brothers sisters and dv classes - who clearly are not IR's so do not meet waiver) here are numbers from 2016 (full year):

 

 

Foreign State	IR
Libya	248
Somalia	1,511
Iran	2,283
Syria	1,265
Yemen	8,447

 

Another point to note is that Yemen was at 3K in 2017 and 2K in 2015

 

So this means there are about 10-15K applications in the IR class on an yearly basis, which seems to jibe with the 5K they said they are considering for a waiver in 2018 (its half year data) out of which, they have already cleared 600 (800 by now) and the rate is increasing monthly.

 

Am i being naive in thinking that at this rate, at some point in the not so distant future (may be 3-5 years) US citizens who apply today will be united with their spouses and children stuck in these countries? 

 

 

 

 

 

[Cyberfx1024 7,978]

2 minutes ago, Aliiii said:

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/take-irans-ordinary-citizens-travel-ban-differentiate-them-their-regimes-officials-and-related-people

Not going to happen because Iran does not share information with the USA at all so they will stay on the list.

[JennaL 151]

5 minutes ago, Aliiii said:

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/take-irans-ordinary-citizens-travel-ban-differentiate-them-their-regimes-officials-and-related-people

@Aliiii, thank you, I just signed and forwarded to my family from Iran.

[Cyberfx1024 7,978]

3 minutes ago, JennaL said:

@Aliiii, thank you, I just signed and forwarded to my family from Iran.

As I said before to you is what exactly will a petition do if that country is not following simple basic procedures of sharing information with the USA?