The United States will undertake a comprehensive review of all green cards issued to individuals from 19 countries deemed to be “of concern.” This directive comes from President Donald Trump as part of an intensified crackdown on immigration following a recent incident involving the shooting of two National Guard members in Washington, DC. Joe Edlow, the director of US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), announced this initiative in a post on X, stating, “At the direction of @POTUS, I have directed a full-scale, rigorous reexamination of every Green Card for every alien from every country of concern.”
In response to inquiries regarding which countries are classified as “of concern,” USCIS referred to a presidential proclamation issued in June that lists 19 specific nations. These countries include: Afghanistan, Burma, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen, Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan, and Venezuela.
The urgency of this review has been amplified following the identification of the shooting suspect, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, an Afghan national. The Trump administration has escalated its efforts to tighten immigration controls in light of this incident. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which oversees USCIS, announced that it is also evaluating all asylum cases that were approved during the previous Biden administration.
“Effective immediately, processing of all immigration requests relating to Afghan nationals is stopped indefinitely pending further review of security and vetting protocols,” stated DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin in a statement to CNN. She emphasized that the Trump administration will also scrutinize all asylum cases that received approval under President Biden.
Lakanwal, who had worked with the US government, including the CIA, arrived in the United States in 2021 as part of Biden’s “Operation Allies Welcome,” designed to assist Afghans who supported US efforts in Afghanistan. He applied for asylum in 2024, which was granted by the Trump administration in April 2025. The State Department reports that more than 190,000 Afghans have resettled in the United States since the military withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021.
In a video address from his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida, Trump criticized the Biden administration for allowing the alleged shooter entry into the US, claiming that the attack highlights “the single greatest national security threat facing our nation.” He asserted the need to reexamine every individual who has entered the country from Afghanistan under Biden’s policies and emphasized the importance of removing any alien who does not contribute positively to the nation.
“We must take all necessary measures to ensure the removal of any alien from any country who does not belong here or add benefit to our country,” Trump stated. He expressed concerns over what he described as “20 million unknown and unvetted foreigners” who have entered the US during Biden's administration, characterizing this as a risk to the nation’s very survival.