(Reuters) The U.S. government granted waivers to just 6 percent of visa applicants subject to its travel ban on a handful of countries during the first 11 months of the ban, new data reviewed by Reuters shows.
Trump administration officials have pointed to the waiver process embedded in the travel ban as proof it was not motivated by animus toward Muslims, as critics have charged, but rather serves to protect the United States.
In June 2018, after legal challenges defeated earlier iterations of the ban, the Supreme Court upheld a revised version and wrote in its majority opinion that the waiver program supported the government’s claims that the ban served “a legitimate national security interest.”
But new data shows that only 6 percent of people subject to the travel ban were ultimately granted waivers during the first 11 months of the ban’s full implementation.
