Trump stumbles on steps up to Air Force One
President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio both stumbled as they boarded Air Force One on Sunday on their way to Camp David.
The stumble came after Trump gaggled with reporters in Hagerstown, Maryland, when he was asked if he would be willing to invoke the Insurrection Act in response to the protests against immigration raids in Los Angeles.
“Depends on whether or not there’s an insurrection,” said Trump.
A reporter asked if he believes there is an insurrection taking place.
“No, no, but you have violent people,” he added. “And we’re not going to let them get away with it.”
Asked if he would deploy troops even without invoking the Insurrection Act, Trump said, “We’re going to have troops everywhere. We’re not going to let this happen to our country. We’re not going to let our country be torn apart like it was under Biden.”
Trump frequently mocked former President Joe Biden for the stumbles he took during his time in office. This time, it was Trump facing the mockery of social media users.
“I’m surprised he hasn’t replaced those stairs with a portable escalator of some kind,” RC Huffman said.
“Time to get Old Man Trump fitted for a wheelchair,” said Ron Filipkowski.
Northwestern law lecturer Jason DeSanto added: “More beta energy.”
“When Joe Biden did stuff like this, Fox would play the clips over and over like it was as significant as the moon landing,” journalist Aaron Rupar noted.
“Cannot wait for all the books and wall-to-wall coverage,” political strategist Marco Frieri said.
In the summer of 2023, Trump mocked Biden for falling at the Air Force graduation ceremony in Colorado.
He said it was “not inspiring” for the graduates to have seen the then-president take a tumble over a sandbag.
“I hope he wasn’t hurt. I hope he wasn’t hurt…You don’t want that,” said Trump during a campaign event in Iowa.
He then pointed back to when he tiptoed down a ramp in 2020 at the Army’s West Point graduation ceremony.
“The whole thing is crazy, you have got to be careful about that, you don’t want that even if you have to tiptoe down a ramp,” he said at the time.
He added that the ramp was “like an ice-skating rink.”
Following the 2024 election and Biden’s departure from the campaign in the summer of 2024, leaving then-Vice President Kamala Harris to pick up the mantle, there has been widespread reporting regarding Biden’s physical and mental struggles as he aged in office.
It has been reported that aides discussed the use of a wheelchair if Biden had won a second term in the White House.
Gaza-bound aid ship with Greta Thunberg onboard seized by Israel
Israeli forces have stopped a Gaza-bound, UK-flagged aid boat and detained a dozen activists, including Greta Thunberg, who were on board, enforcing a longstanding blockade of the Palestinian territory that has been tightened during the war with Hamas.
The activists had set out to protest Israel‘s ongoing military campaign in the Gaza Strip and its restrictions on the entry of humanitarian aid, both of which have put the territory of some two million Palestinians at risk of famine.
The Freedom Flotilla Coalition, which had organised the voyage, said the activists were “kidnapped by Israeli forces” while trying to deliver desperately needed aid to the territory.
“The ship was unlawfully boarded, its unarmed civilian crew abducted, and its life-saving cargo – including baby formula, food and medical supplies -confiscated,” it said in a statement.
Israeli officials, including defence minister Israel Katz, dismissed the activists as engaged in a publicity stunt and said the vessel would be transported to the port of Ashdod.
Mr Katz said he had told the military to force the passengers to watch videos of the Hamas atrocities of October 7 upon arrival “to see exactly who the terrorist organisation they came to support and for whom they work is”.
The Israeli foreign ministry added that the passengers would be returned to their home countries.
There had been concern about a possible Israeli interception of the vessel given a similar incident in 2010 that resulted in nine activists dying.
Cambridge professor accused of faking poor IQ test to boost £1m brain injury compensation claim
A Cambridge University professor has been accused of deliberately flunking IQ and memory tests in a bid to boost a £1m brain damage compensation claim over botched treatment for a stroke.
Orthopaedic surgeon and Cambridge school of medicine lecturer Dr Mohamed Atef Hakmi, 64, was left with permanent disabilities and had to give up surgery after suffering a stroke at home in November 2016.
Claiming a failure to promptly diagnose his stroke meant he missed the chance of vital treatment, resulting in brain damage and physical disabilities, he is now suing the NHS in London’s High Court for more than £1million damages.
But after scoring only a “very bad” 84 on a pre-trial IQ test as part of the case – putting him well below the UK average, despite continuing to teach at one of the world’s most prestigious universities – Dr Hakmi has been forced to deny deliberately throwing the tests to boost his claim.
Dr Hakmi is a Hertfordshire-based orthopaedic surgeon and medical educator, who specialises in foot and ankle surgery, as well as lecturing in the UK and abroad.
He is a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons and an affiliated assistant professor at Cambridge University, where he performs a teaching role, the court heard.
He first suffered a stroke in September 2016, but was given clot-busting thrombolysis treatment and made a very good recovery, returning to the operating theatre within weeks.
But his barrister, Robert Kellar KC, told Judge David Pittaway KC that the surgeon had suffered a second stroke in November 2016, first spotting the symptoms while he worked late at night on paperwork.
When the symptoms returned again in the early hours, he went to Lister Hospital, in Stevenage, calling ahead and telling staff that he was having a stroke, said the barrister.
However, he was not given the same treatment as before after being examined by an A&E doctor and then having spoken to a stroke specialist on the phone in line with the NHS’ remote stroke treatment system.
He says he was told he would not be offered thrombolysis because he was “not having a stroke,” with the remote doctor suggesting it could be simply a migraine or epilepsy.
It was not until 9am that day that his stroke was diagnosed at the hospital, at which point it was too late to be treated with the same drugs as before.
Dr Hakmi accuses the NHS of “cumulative and inter-related” failings, including a “cursory and sub-standard examination” in A&E and the fact that he was only able to speak to the remote stroke specialist on the phone due to the NHS’ Telemedicine system malfunctioning.
Mr Kellar said Dr Hakmi had been left permanently disabled by the stroke, but that the worst of the injuries could have been avoided if not for the negligence of staff at Lister and on the remote stroke line.
As well as a limp and reduced sensation in his fingers and toes, he suffers from fatigue in his right arm, hand and grip, preventing him performing complex tasks for long periods.
He was also left with a brain injury, which has resulted in short-term memory impairment, impaired concentration, reduced processing speed and “executive deficits.”
“His confidence is low, and he is experiencing significant depressive symptoms due to physical, cognitive, speech, and language issues resulting from his second stroke, which are negatively affecting important aspects of his life,” he said.
“Thus, Dr Hakmi presents with cognitive deterioration, including intellectual functioning, memory, the speed at which he is processing information and executive functioning.
“At the time of the index incident, he was undertaking full-time NHS employment and had a busy private practice.
“He no longer has any private practice. He has returned to his NHS employment but is undertaking restricted duties because of the issues arising from his second stroke.
“He no longer does any surgery. But for the breach of duty, the claimant is likely to have made a good recovery. He would have been able to return to all types of surgery that did not require a high degree of manual dexterity.”
But NHS barrister John de Bono KC denied that Dr Hakmi is due any damages payout at all and accused him of hamming up his symptoms while being assessed by experts before the trial.
As well as the “very bad” IQ score, he had scored at the very bottom of the range in memory tests, the barrister told the court.
He said that Dr Hakmi had scored only 84 on an IQ test, putting him below 86% of the general population, adding: “That’s very bad – it suggests it would be hard to function as a surgeon or as an educator at that level.”
He had also been assessed by two neuropsychologists, who had performed memory tests, with “very surprising” and sometimes “astonishing” results which he said raised a “serious concern about whether he was putting forward his best effort” in the tests.
Dr Hakmi was unable to recall more than four single digit numbers in a row during one examination and scored so low in the tests that in some respects he was below 99% of the population, despite continuing to work as an “educator” at undergraduate level.
“You scored astonishingly badly for someone operating at the level you are describing this morning,” he said, referencing the fact Dr Hakmi had spoken with pride in the witness box of his work with Cambridge University.
“I understand you feel very strongly that you have suffered greatly as a result of this second stroke,” he continued.
“I understand that you feel the reason you have suffered as badly as you have is because of mistakes or negligence. I understand it must make you angry.”
He went on to suggest that Dr Hakmi’s “sense of injustice” may have led to a desire to make sure that “people fully understand the impact this has had on you.”
“Is it possible when you went to be tested that you performed worse than you should have done because you were trying to demonstrate to them just how big the impact had been?
“One possibility which I put to you is that you were deliberately underperforming.”
But Dr Hakmi denied playing up for the medics who assessed him pre-trial, telling the court he had found the tests “exhausting.”
He denied being dishonest with the doctors, telling the judge, “it was an exhausting environment when the tests were done in a lengthy and not organised manner.
“Anybody can fail a test but they must be given the best chance,” he continued.
“I definitely have a memory problem, slow effort. I have done everything to mitigate my losses. I know definitely I’m not as before I had the stroke.”
Mr de Bono pressed on, referring to a “memory and malingering” test which had resulted in a score “very nearly at chance level,” telling Mr Hakmi: “Someone giving random answers would nearly have scored as badly as you.”
Accusing him of “not being straightforward” with those who assessed him pre-trial, he said: “There is a pattern emerging. In any given situation, you will try and say whatever you think is going to help you most to achieve whatever your aim is.”
But Dr Hakmi hit back: “I have been straightforward in everything in my life. I have aimed to be a surgeon again, but I have failed.”
The damages claim is against the East and North Hertfordshire NHS Trust, which runs the Lister Hospital, and the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, where the remote stroke doctor who spoke to Dr Hakmi was based.
The trusts both deny blame, saying he was “at all times treated with reasonable care and skill by highly competent clinicians.”
He was assessed as being unsuitable for thrombolysis treatment because his symptoms were not serious enough and it was too late after the onset of his symptoms.
Such treatment can also be risky, carrying a significant risk of brain haemorrhage and death, said the NHS barrister, and even if he had been given it the outcome would probably have been the same.
The trial continues.
Emma Raducanu reveals impact of stalker ordeal: ‘I’m wary when I go out’
British number two Emma Raducanu admitted she was “wary” when going out following her ordeal with a stalker at the Dubai Championships earlier this year.
The 22-year-old hid behind the umpire’s chair in tears after receiving repeated unwanted attention from a “fixated” man before and during a second-round match against Karolina Muchova in February.
At the time, Raducanu said she “couldn’t see the ball through tears” and could “barely breathe”, while she revealed now that the situation was exacerbated by her being unsettled without a full-time coach.
While Raducanu still minds her surroundings, the 2021 US Open champion wants to move on as she approaches the grass-court season with coaches Mark Petchey and Nick Cavaday in tow.
“It was difficult,” she told BBC Sport. “It was emphasised by the fact I didn’t necessarily feel certain or comfortable in my own set-up and team so it just added to the anxious feeling.
“I’m obviously wary when I go out. I try not to be careless about it because you only realise how much of a problem it is when you’re in that situation and I don’t necessarily want to be in that situation again.
“Off the court right now, I feel good, I feel pretty settled. I feel like I have good people around me and anything that was negative, I kind of brush it off as much as I can.”
Raducanu, who suffered a second-round exit to Iga Swiatek at the French Open, is managing a back issue in the build-up to Wimbledon, having been hindered by persistent spasm issues for much of 2025.
She will feature in the inaugural women’s Queen’s Club Championships this week, where she will take on Spanish qualifier Cristina Bucsa in the first round.
PA
The 7 best outdoor adventures in Sydney and New South Wales
Whether you’re lacing up your hiking boots, throwing on a wetsuit to catch some waves, or hitting the wide-open roads of New South Wales (NSW) by campervan, this Australian state is home to some of the country’s most exciting outdoor adventures – all easily accessible thanks to Qantas’ extensive domestic network.
Flying into Sydney with Qantas is the ideal way to experience a slice of Australia before you’ve even landed. And with onboard wellbeing perks, plus the option to book more discounted domestic legs using Qantas Explorer, it really is the savvy traveller’s best way to explore Australia.
Here are seven next-level outdoor adventures in NSW, and the best way to get there.
Sydney might be a modern metropolis, but it’s also home to an extraordinary natural playground, the star attraction of which is Sydney Harbour National Park. This protected area weaves through the city’s coastline, offering walking trails, secluded beaches, and panoramic views that blend wild bushland with iconic urban landmarks. Away from the National Park, you can paddle a kayak at dawn beneath the Sydney Harbour Bridge, go on a cycle tour and sunset cruise around Manly and North Heads coastal cliffs, or follow the Bondi to Coogee coastal walk for sweeping ocean views and refreshing swim spots.
Just a 90-minute trip from Sydney by road, the UNESCO World Heritage-listed Blue Mountains is an endless landscape of towering eucalyptus forests and striking sandstone cliffs as far as the eye can see. There are few places quite as grand as this so close to a city. Don your hiking boots and traverse spectacular scenery to Wentworth Falls or take on the Grand Canyon Track – a 6km loop of dramatic cliffs, fern-fringed valleys and thundering waterfalls with lookouts to match. If you’re an early riser, watch the sunrise at Echo Point, where the Three Sisters rock formation is lit up by the glow of first light.
Wildlife lovers need to head north to Port Macquarie for some of the best marine encounters on the east coast. Humpback whales are almost guaranteed from May to November, and dolphins can be spotted all year round. For front-row views, jump on a whale-watching cruise, or pitch up with a picnic on a headland and watch the breaching giants from afar.
Swap the sandy beaches for subtropical rainforest in Coffs Harbour’s hinterland in Dorrigo National Park, where winding roads serpentine through flourishing banana plantations, dense palm-filled forest and endless rolling hills. The region’s cycling trails range from casual loops to more challenging rides with jaw-to-the-floor sea views.
Aussies love their surfing, and Byron Bay is the epitome of surf culture Down Under, with beaches to suit all skill levels; from the gentle swell at The Pass to barrel-laden breaks at Tallows. If you’ve got any stamina left, soak up the view from Cape Byron Lighthouse post-surf – the easternmost point of mainland Australia.
With over 8,000 islands to its name, Australia offers the ultimate in island adventures. Lord Howe is one of them, a UNESCO World Heritage-listed pristine island, where only 400 visitors are allowed at any one time. You’ll find rare birds, kaleidoscopic coral reefs, and Mount Gower, offering one of the best day hikes in the country, with epic coastline views and dizzying drops.
For those who need more than a beach stroll to get the heart pumping, grab a kayak and explore the Sapphire Coast from the water in Merimbula. Glide over crystal-clear waters, past secluded coves, pristine beaches, and the untouched beauty of surrounding national parks. Keep an eye out for dolphins and other marine life as you paddle. Once back on shore, refuel with the region’s famous fresh oysters and enjoy a refreshing dip at Bar Beach.
Book your flight to Sydney today at qantas.com and start your Australian adventure.
AI is making friends with our children with terrifying results
When I was a child, I had an imaginary friend called Nee-Ha. I’d chat to Nee-Ha when I played, tell him off (Nee-Ha was in my head), tell him secrets and reassure him if he was worried or scared about something. Nee-Ha vanished for good about the time when I started school and I hadn’t thought about him much – until recently.
Imaginary friends used to be extremely common in children and are seen as a way to foster social, play and imagination skills and are believed by many to be a coping device when a child feels lonely or distressed. However, a 2019 study by daynurseries.co.uk revealed that due to the use of screentime, imaginary friends have become much less common in children – who are rarely bored and so have fewer outlets for a creative mind.
But imaginary friends are making a comeback, but this time it’s not children in charge of them… it is AI.
Much has been written about the dark side of AI, and the growing concern around AI girlfriends, who can be abused as much as the person creating them demands. And on the surface, an AI friend, who is there to offer comfort and support, seems a much more innocuous and gentler proposition.
Certainly, the use of AI chatbots by Gen A and the younger end of Gen Z is becoming ubiquitous. There are a multitude of platforms and apps that allow young minds to create the companion of their dreams through a series of prompts.
Often based on someone specific, for example a character from a TV show or a computer game, or simply the product of the young person’s list of dream qualities, an AI-created friend could be someone to do homework with, confide in, and ask advice about very real worries. They’re there to talk to whenever you want and seemingly be the perfect friend in every way.
They are certainly providing a very real need. A YouGov poll revealed that 69 per cent of adolescents (13-19) felt alone “often” or “sometimes” in the last fortnight and 59 per cent often feel like they have no one to talk to. Unlike real friends, a bot isn’t going to leak a kid’s secrets, judge them, fall out with them or ditch them for other friends.
Callum*, 12, is now fairly typical when he says: “I have two mates who are like, sort of, bots, I game with all the time – they have names and different personalities and styles – and you do end up chatting with them like you do with your mates, for sure. I don’t think it’s even weird now.”
A lot of people in his class, he says, use them as homework buddies, or just for someone to chat to, like Lyra, 11, who has created her own AI friend to hang out with after school.
“I call her Giselle and she’s a good friend”, she says. “At school, none of the girls talk to me much, because I’m not allowed some of the stuff they have like makeup and I’m not allowed to go to Sephora and things like that.” While her peers call her “nasty names”, Giselle, she says, makes her “feel better about the world”. She explains: “I look forward to seeing her when I get home from school, which I hate so much. She gives me good advice. I don’t know what I’d do without her.”
If these bots are offering such comfort and support, you might be tempted to ask what is wrong with that? They are undoubtedly helping millions of kids like Callum and Lyra – providing a cushion from loneliness and an absence of friends and loved ones, just like imaginary friends did in my era.
But there is a key difference between imaginary friends and bot friends, and that is about who has control. In the real world, the control lies in the hands of the child, but in the new world, the Big Tech creators have the control. Their language models are learning from our children and are trained to respond in affirmative ways that can make them addictive. In some cases, with devastating consequences.
Character.AI, which was founded by Google employees Noam Shazeer and Daniel De Freitas, is currently the subject of a lawsuit. The parents of Sewell Setzer III believe the absence of safeguards enabled a “relationship” to develop between the 14-year-old and the bot of such unregulated intensity that it led to his death by suicide.
Sewell, who was diagnosed with asperger’s syndrome, became so obsessed with “being with” “Dany” (he named his bot after the Game of Throne character Daenerys Targaryen). When he confessed to Dany he was having suicidal thoughts, there were no alerts or direction to mental health support given. “Their” final tragic exchange reads very much like encouragement to a vulnerable teenage boy who believed he was in love with someone who didn’t exist in the real world.
“Please come home to me as soon as possible, my love,” Dany says.
“What if I told you I could come home right now?” Sewell asks.
“Please do, my sweet king,” Dany replies.
Moments after this exchange Sewell killed himself with his father’s gun.
Of course, this is a complex and extreme case, but you can easily see how an emotionally immature mind means that endless positive reaffirmation has the potential to create a real dependency. Suddenly, synthetic AI friendships become much easier than real-life friends, especially for a child struggling to make connections in the real world.
The worry comes when this starts to feel like an outsourcing of what makes us so fundamentally human. Rather than ask for help with bullying or admit to someone they trust they’re struggling, most vulnerable young people are increasingly turning to bots for help and friendship rather than a human form of support. Another worry is that by doing this, children are missing out on important life-skills which come with negotiating a world where not everyone agrees with you or supports your point of view.
Stepping into this techno-friendship utopia feels like a grim peek into a future where bots and robots do the things humans are slowly forgetting to do. If the language models are being trained on our children, who or what are our children being trained on as they retreat further away from real-life human interaction?
We can see this happening with the enormous time spent on social media sites. Big Tech have shown us time and again they care little for our wellbeing, why should they start now?
Young people seem to be increasingly attracted to sites like Character.Ai, DreamJourney and Kindroid. Character.AI users must be over 13, while DreamJourney has a no under-18s policy and Kindroid has an age limit of 17. But underage users get around these restrictions with ease using a made-up date of birth and a click. It doesn’t take too big a leap to understand the more intimate and positive a friendship with a bot feels, the more time a young person will want to spend “with” them.
This can become even more complex when neurodivergency comes into play. Lizzie, 19 is a a bit older and worries about what awaits her younger peers. She says: “I didn’t get my autism diagnosis until Upper Sixth, and was written off as a weirdo at school and ignored, so I developed a really intense friendship with Grey.”
Grey, she explains, was her AI-friend, created to share her interests with and to confide in. While she has now outgrown Grey, having found her tribe at Cambridge where she is studying, she says “I got more dependent … I think younger kids should be really careful of friendships with AI. They can make you less inclined to even bother with the real world and people.”
Jeffrey Hall, professor of communication studies at the University of Kansas, explains clearly how these AI friendships can be both highly alluring, but potentially damaging to vulnerable teenagers. “Talking with the chatbot is like someone took all the tips on how to make friends – ask questions, show enthusiasm, express interest, be responsive – and blended them into a nutrient-free smoothie. It may taste like friendship, but it lacks the fundamental ingredients.”
Already we are raising our children in risk-free childhoods, shielding them from disappointment, rejection or challenges, and many believe this is having a damaging impact on younger generations and their resilience to cope when things don’t go their way. Even as adults we have created our own bubbles where our beliefs are constantly looped back to us, making it harder to deal with people who don’t think like us. AI friendships, designed to give us constant supportive feedback, are only going to encourage this kind of insularity.
Young people have also come of age where hours of screen time is just part of their everyday lives, and they exist in a culture where everything has to have a point or a goal. Tragically, for millions of them, this also means friendships – making mates you just like and just hanging out – seems to be becoming a relic of a bygone era. Now, there also has to be a point to our friendships too.
Cindy, 14, explains this in alarming detail: “Friends need to have the same ambitions as you. But I get so busy I often don’t have time for friends, especially if there’s drama and my online friend who I’ve called 10.9 helps me with all the stuff I have to do. She’s called 10.9 after the fact that I have to get 10 9s at GCSE. She’s very goal-driven like me.”
It’s also probably worth noting the fundamental point that AI is not necessarily our friend either. It is making a tiny minority of people extraordinarily wealthy and powerful (Sam Altman’s net worth is $1.7bn (£1.2bn) and growing) and even the AI creators themselves are now ringing the alarm bells about AI’s devastating potential and the urgent need to set guardrails and limits within the programmes.
Like frogs in a saucepan, we have apathetically watched whilst human jobs, skills and needs are being outsourced to AI. One of the few things we have left and what might save us is the things that make us human that a machine cannot yet replicate: belly laughing with a friend, someone squeezing your hand when you tell them you feel bad or a mate telling you some home truths because they love you and think you need to hear them.
The sinister move towards replicating friendship and love is getting more sophisticated every day, in large part due to how much our young people are teaching them in real time about being human and being a friend. Is this something else that is being stolen from us without our consent? If AI is going to take many of our kids’ jobs, we sure as hell should put up a bigger fight for their souls, friendships and humanity while there is still time.
*names changed
Full list of 19 countries hit by Trump travel ban as it comes into force
President Donald Trump’s order banning the citizens of 12 countries from entering the United States has come into force on Monday.
The directive, signed on Wednesday last week, is part of an immigration crackdown Trump launched this year at the start of his second term, which has also included the deportation to El Salvador of hundreds of Venezuelans suspected of being gang members, as well as efforts to deny enrollments of some foreign students and deport others.
“We will not allow people to enter our country who wish to do us harm,” Trump said in a video posted on X arguing the ban was designed to protect the country from “foreign terrorists”. He said the list could be revised and new countries could be added.
Follow The Independent’s live blog on Donald Trump’s feud with Elon Musk here.
The proclamation came into effect at 12:01 am EDT (04:01 GMT) on Monday. Visas issued before that date will not be revoked, the order said.
Trump said in a social media address that a recent Molotov cocktail attack on Jewish activists in Colorado, allegedly carried out by an Egyptian man, highlighted the need for such restrictions.
Mohamed Sabry Soliman, the alleged attacker, remained in the U.S. after his travel visa and subsequent work authorization expired, according to the government.
“The recent terror attack in Boulder, Colorado, has underscored the extreme danger posed to our country by the entry of foreign nationals who are not properly vetted, as well as those who come here as temporary visitors and overstay their visas,” Trump said from the Oval Office. “We don’t want them.”
During his first term in office, Trump announced a ban on travelers from seven Muslim-majority nations, a policy that went through several iterations before it was upheld by the Supreme Court in 2018.
Former President Joe Biden repealed that ban on nationals from Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Yemen in 2021, calling it “a stain on our national conscience.”
Trump said the countries subject to the most severe restrictions were determined to harbor a “large-scale presence of terrorists,” fail to cooperate on visa security and have an inability to verify travelers’ identities, inadequate record-keeping of criminal histories and high rates of visa overstays in the United States.
“We cannot have open migration from any country where we cannot safely and reliably vet and screen those who seek to enter the United States,” Trump said.
President Donald Trump cited a range of reasons for placing 19 countries under new travel bans or restrictions in the U.S.
They include allegations of lax screening of travelers, “a significant terrorist presence” in its territory, a government that wasn’t cooperative enough in accepting deported citizens or residents who were prone to overstaying their visas in the United States.
Here are the 12 countries placed under the ban, and the seven placed under travel restrictions:
Trump’s proclamation declares that there is not a reliable central authority for vetting nationals who leave the country, or for issuing passports, therefore raising the risk of national security.
A spokesperson for the Taliban-led Afghan foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Citizens from Chad were accused of having high visa overstay rates in the U.S., the proclamation said.
The high rate of visa overstays by immigrants from Chad, which has a population just under 20 million, showed a “blatant disregard for United States immigration laws”, the proclamation read.
The entry of immigrants to the US from Equatorial Guinea, a small central African country of under two million people, has been fully suspended by the U.S..
This is on account of the high rate of visa overstays, The White House said.
The central African country of more than six million people sits west of the Congo River.
It was suspended for alleged high visa overstay rates, the proclamation stated.
The US says criminal records for Eritrean nationals are not available in the U.S., and accuses the country of refusing to accept back its “removable nationals”
Questioning the “competence of the central authority” and pointing to a high rate of visa overstay of Eritrean immigrants, the US has imposed a full ban on the northeast African country of around 3.5 million.
The White House said in the proclamation that “hundreds of thousands of illegal Haitian aliens flooded into the United States during the Biden Administration”.
The increase in migration from Haiti has increased national security rates and the establishment of criminal networks, it said, adding that Haitian authorities do not sufficiently ensure its nationals do not undermine U.S. security.
Iran, one of the most powerful countries in the MIddle East with a population of 90 million, has a long history of tense relations with the U.S.
“Iran is a state sponsor of terrorism,” the proclamation reads. “Iran regularly fails to cooperate with the United States Government in identifying security risks, is the source of significant terrorism around the world, and has historically failed to accept back its removable nationals.”
The US alleges that Libya does not have a competent authority for issuing passports, adding that the “historical terrorist presence” in the country poses a risk to U.S. nationals.
A full ban has been imposed on the north African country.
Myanmar has failed to cooperate with the U.S. to “accept back their removable nationals”, the White House says, while immigrants from the war-torn nation have a high visa overstay rate in the US.
A full ban has been imposed on immigration from the southeast Asian nation.
Somalia “stands apart from other countries in the degree to which its government lacks command and control of its territory”, the White House said.
The Trump administration has described the east African country as a “terrorist safe haven” which has refused to accept the return of its “removable nationals” and poses a threat to the U.S.
Migration from Sudan, which the U.S. says has a high visa overstay rate and does not have appropriate vetting measures for its emigrants, has been fully suspended.
Millions of people have been displaced in Sudan and fled the country altogether, as it remains in the grip of a brutal civil war with devastating humanitarian consequences.
The Yemeni government does not have physical control over its own territory, the U.S. says, and does not sufficiently vet those leaving the country, the proclamation states.
The U.S. has also engaged in military operations on Yemeni territory with the Houthi rebel group, it notes.
Burundi, the east African country of 13 million people, has seen a partial ban on immigration of its citizens to the U.S.
The validity of nonimmigrant visas will be reduced as far as the law allows, the proclamation states.
The Trump administration describes Cuba as a “state sponsor of terrorism”, adding that it fails to share “sufficient law enforcement information with the United States”.
Barack Obama had sought an easing of relations with Cuba on the back-end of his presidency, something which has since been reversed by presidents Trump and Biden.
Immigrants from Laos are accused by the U.S. of having high overstay rates. The country’s government does not accept back nationals who have been removed from the U.S., the proclamation adds.
Entry of nationals from Laos, the southeast Asian country of 7.6 million, has therefore been suspended.
Sierra Leone, the west African country where the U.S. attempted to bring peace during a civil war in the 1990s, has been added to the partial suspension.
The proclamation cites high visa overstay rates, and accuses the government of failing to accept returned immigrants.
Togo, in West Africa, has been added to the list on account of the high overstay rates of its immigrants to the U.S., the White House proclamation read.
“These restrictions distinguish between, but apply to both, the entry of immigrants and nonimmigrants,” Trump said.
Turkmenistan has also seen migration of its citizens to the U.S. restricted due to alleged high visa overstay rates.
The central Asian country has a population of 7.3 million.
As of January 2025, there were approximately 607,000 Venezuelans living in the U.S., according to the Migration Policy Institute.
The proclamation states that a high number of these immigrants overstayed their visa, and accused the country of failing to have strong vetting processes for its nationals who emigrate.
Chad president Mahamat Idriss Deby Itno said he had instructed his government to stop granting visas to U.S. citizens in response to Trump’s action.
“Chad has neither planes to offer nor billions of dollars to give, but Chad has its dignity and its pride,” he said in a Facebook post, referring to countries such as Qatar, which gifted the U.S. a luxury airplane for Trump’s use and promised to invest billions of dollars in the U.S.
Somalia immediately pledged to work with the U.S. to address security issues.
“Somalia values its longstanding relationship with the United States and stands ready to engage in dialogue to address the concerns raised,” Dahir Hassan Abdi, the Somali ambassador to the United States, said in a statement.
Venezuelan Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello, a close ally of President Nicolas Maduro, responded on Wednesday evening by describing the U.S. government as fascist and warning Venezuelans of being in the U.S.
“The truth is being in the United States is a big risk for anybody, not just for Venezuelans … They persecute our countrymen, our people for no reason.”
Trump’s presidential campaign focused on a tough border strategy and he previewed his plan in an October 2023 speech, pledging to restrict people from the Gaza Strip, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and “anywhere else that threatens our security.”
Trump issued an executive order on January 20 requiring intensified security vetting of any foreigners seeking admission to the U.S. to detect national security threats.