The Trump administration has reportedly paused immigrant visa applications worldwide as part of efforts to provide additional training to consular officers and strengthen screening of applicants who may be considered likely to rely on US public assistance.
According to the Financial Times, applicants with scheduled interviews at US embassies and consulates have received notices that their appointments are being rescheduled. They have been told they will be informed of new dates and times.
“A more prosperous America means ensuring that visa applicants are not likely to become a public charge, as defined under US law and regulation, and not likely to become dependent on US public benefits reserved for qualified Americans in need,” a State Department spokesperson told the Financial Times.
The State Department said it had launched “a global training initiative” this month to ensure consular officers are better equipped to assess visa applicants consistently and comprehensively.
“To accommodate this in-depth training, appointments for visa services will be adjusted,” the department said, without providing a date for when appointments would resume.
Brian Simmons, a senior US consular manager at immigration law firm Fragomen, said many applicants had “already spent thousands of dollars and disrupted their lives to attend scheduled interviews, only to have their appointments cancelled at the last minute”.
US plans further visa revocations
Separately, the State Department said the US government plans to revoke visas of foreign nationals who entered the country as tourists or business visitors but later applied for asylum in an attempt to remain permanently.
The administration is working with the Department of Homeland Security to identify individuals who it says entered the US as temporary visitors before seeking asylum.
“Obtaining a visa in order to seek asylum is fraud — which is grounds for visa revocation,” State Department spokesperson Tommy Pigott said.
The White House suggested that “up to two hundred thousand visas” could be affected, describing the move as potentially the “largest mass visa revocation in history”. However, the State Department did not confirm the figure.
Pigott said, “The number of revocations remains dynamic and will be done on a rolling basis.”
Earlier this month, the State Department said around 175,000 foreign nationals had had their US visas revoked since Donald Trump returned to office in January 2025. The revocations were linked to various reasons, including criminal offences and other conduct considered grounds for visa cancellation by the administration.
The administration has also revoked visas issued to several Mexican officials, including the son of former president Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, prompting criticism from Mexico’s current president, Claudia Sheinbaum.
Trump has made tighter immigration controls a central part of his administration’s agenda. Alongside efforts to remove undocumented migrants, his government has also introduced measures targeting people who overstay visas and those seeking to enter the country legally.
Some of these policies have faced legal challenges. Last Friday, a federal judge struck down a government ban on visas for nationals of 75 countries seeking to settle permanently in the United States.
The Trump administration is also planning to expand scrutiny of visa applicants’ social media accounts.
“We are making clear that a visa is a privilege — not a right,” Pigott said.
