Pakistanis in the middle of or hoping to immigrate to the United States will face a “permanent pause” in immigration as President Donald Trump pulled the plug after a man of Afghan origin shot and killed a member of the National Guard on Thursday. Donald Trump said Thursday he would suspend migration from what the US leader called “third world countries”. His social media post, which also threatened to reverse “millions” of admissions granted under his predecessor Joe Biden, marked a new escalation in the anti-migration stance of a second term that has been dominated by Trump’s mass deportation campaign. Trump had earlier announced that Sarah Beckstrom, a 20-year-old West Virginia National Guard member deployed in Washington as part of his crackdown on crime, had died from her wounds. The FBI has launched an international terror investigation as new details emerged about the alleged gunman, a 29-year-old Afghan national who worked with a CIA counterterrorism unit in Afghanistan, according to multiple US media reports. The shooting on Wednesday, which officials described as an “ambush-style” attack, has brought together three politically explosive issues: Trump’s controversial use of the military at home, immigration, and the legacy of the US war in Afghanistan. “I will permanently pause migration from all Third World Countries to allow the U.S. system to fully recover,” Trump wrote on social media. He also threatened to reverse “millions” of admissions granted under Biden, and to “remove anyone who is not a net asset to the United States.” In a Thanksgiving video call with US troops the Republican leader said: “I want to express the anguish and the horror of our entire nation at the terrorist attack yesterday in our nation’s capital.” Joseph Edlow, Trump’s director of US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), said Thursday that he had ordered a “full scale, rigorous reexamination of every Green Card for every alien from every country of concern.” His agency later pointed to a list of 19 countries — including Afghanistan, Cuba, Haiti, Iran and Myanmar — facing US travel restrictions under a previous order from Trump in June. The Trump administration had earlier ordered an immediate halt to the processing of immigration applications from Afghanistan. The other soldier wounded in Wednesday’s attack, 24-year-old Andrew Wolfe, was “fighting for his life” Thursday, Trump said. The suspected shooter was also in a serious condition. The US attorney for Washington DC, Jeanine Pirro, said the suspected assailant — identified as Rahmanullah Lakanwal — had been living in the western state of Washington and had driven across the country to the nation’s capital. In what she called a “brazen and targeted” attack, Pirro said the gunman opened fire with a .357 Smith and Wesson revolver on a group of guardsmen on patrol just a few blocks from the White House. Officials said they still had no clear understanding of the motive behind the shooting.
Trump hints at stopping legal immigration to US
Published on: November 29, 2025 3:01 AM