Last Updated on March 2, 2023
Breaking: The Trump administration said Monday, January 29, that it will resume accepting refugees from 11 nations whose applicants it designated “high-risk,” according to The Washington Post. It also plans to implement tougher screening procedures to make it harder for potential extremists and criminals to exploit the refugee program. We will continue to monitor and update you as additional developments occur.
On Friday, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to decide the legality of the latest version of Trump’s travel ban.
Supreme Court justices are set to hear arguments for and against the ban in April, and a ruling on the travel ban is expected by the end of June. The Court will measure this third iteration of the travel ban against U.S. immigration law and the prohibitions against religious and national origin discrimination.
The initial Executive Order, Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States, was signed by the President on January 27 of last year. Since then, there have been additional iterations – one in March and one in September – banning travel from certain countries. Several federal rulings have blocked parts of the ban, but temporary injunctions were lifted by the Supreme Court in December, allowing the latest version of Trump’s travel ban to go into effect while the lower court case was pending.
In its current form, the travel ban allows the Trump Administration to prevent or restrict people from seven countries, Syria, Libya, Iran, Yemen, Chad, Somalia, North Korea and some government officials from Venezuela, from entering the United States.
Companies continue to feel the impact of Trump’s travel ban
Since discussions of the travel ban has started, lots of companies see the travel ban as a source of anxiety among workers, especially among foreign nationals who travel globally.
Recently, Jennifer Hartmann, VP of People & Culture for San Francisco-based fintech company MyVest told us about her experiences: “We have a few employees here from one or two of those nations, so there has been a lot of fear,” said Jenn. “There’s been tons of uncertainty and employees are not sure if they should travel.”
With the legality of the travel ban in question until June, employees from any of the affected countries currently residing in the United States should exercise caution if planning to travel. Our Envoy-affiliated law firm, GIA, does not recommend that those employees travel outside of the U.S. at this point in time.
How to find out which employees could be affected
If you are a currently an Envoy customer, you can find out who in your organization may be affected by the travel ban by running a quick report within the Envoy platform.
To do so, navigate to your “Company Dashboard” and click on “Immigration Population.” Scroll down to the “Country of Citizenship” section to see employee information. You can easily filter by country, and the names of employees that could be impacted will appear on the left.
Stay up to date with news impacting foreign national employees and their employers on the Policy and News hub from Envoy.
