President Donald Trump has declared an open-ended suspension of asylum admissions following a fatal shooting incident near the White House that resulted in the death of a National Guard member. The administration’s immigration pause, initially implemented after the November 26th attack, now appears set to continue indefinitely according to the President’s Sunday statements.
The policy specifically targets nationals from 19 countries already subject to existing U.S. travel restrictions, including Afghanistan, Cuba, Haiti, Iran, and Myanmar. When pressed about the duration of this measure, Trump explicitly stated he had ‘no time limit’ in mind for maintaining the asylum freeze.
The shooting incident involved Rahmanullah Lakanwal, a 29-year-old Afghan national who entered the United States through a resettlement program following the 2021 military withdrawal from Afghanistan. Despite being granted asylum under the current administration in April 2025, Lakanwal has been charged with first-degree murder in connection with the attack that killed 20-year-old Sarah Beckstrom and critically wounded another guardsman.
Trump attributed the tragedy to what his administration characterizes as insufficient vetting procedures during the previous Biden administration’s handling of the Afghan evacuation. The Department of Homeland Security has directly linked the asylum pause to the list of countries already facing travel restrictions since June.
The President reinforced his position with strong rhetoric, stating ‘We don’t want those people’ and asserting that ‘many have been no good, and they shouldn’t be in our country.’ This policy shift represents a significant hardening of the administration’s immigration stance following the security incident.