Legal immigration from Muslim-majority nations falls 96% under Trump administration

Legal immigration from Muslim-majority countries collapsed by 96% between December 2024 and February 2026, according to an analysis of federal data, as the Trump administration imposed a series of travel bans, visa pauses, and vetting rules covering dozens of nations.

The administration has defended the restrictions as a national security necessity. The policies are meant to “protect the nation from foreign terrorist and other national security and public safety threats,” the White House said in a fact sheet announcing a June 2025 proclamation, citing high visa overstay rates, weak vetting systems, and terrorism concerns in the affected countries.

Zeale News verified the trend using the State Department’s own monthly visa data. Immigrant visas issued to people from 11 countries included in the analysis — Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, Nigeria, Egypt, Indonesia, and Turkey — dropped from 9,530 issued in December 2024 to 573 in February 2026, a 94% decline.

Afghanistan alone fell from 1,768 immigrant visas to nine per month. Separate State Department refugee arrival records show a similar pattern: as of Feb. 28, 2026, fiscal year 2026 refugee admissions were almost entirely limited to South Africans, with only three Afghan refugees resettled nationwide and no arrivals recorded from Pakistan, Somalia, Syria, or other Muslim-majority nations.

A recent analysis published by the libertarian Cato Institute found that legal immigration from 45 Muslim-majority countries, combining immigrant visas and refugee admissions, fell 96% over the period, compared with a 36% decline from other nations. 

Cato immigration analyst David Bier attributed the drop to seven overlapping policies, including a proclamation indefinitely barring entry from dozens of countries, a State Department pause on immigrant visa processing for 75 countries, the suspension of the diversity visa lottery and refugee program, and an August 2026 freeze on immigrant visa interviews.

The restrictions stem from a series of proclamations and memos issued by the Trump administration since January 2025. A June 2025 presidential proclamation fully barred entry from 12 countries, including Afghanistan, Iran, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen, and partially restricted seven others. Somalia, for instance, was cited because its government “lacks command and control of its territory, which greatly limits the effectiveness of its national capabilities.” A December 2025 proclamation added Syria and several African nations. Of the roughly 39 countries now covered by some form of restriction, about two-thirds have Muslim-majority populations.

Cato’s analysis also cited government and academic data on the affected population, finding that nearly half held bachelor’s degrees and 57% were employed, compared with 46% of U.S.-born Americans, and projected that immigrants from these countries would have reduced the federal deficit by $1.1 trillion over 30 years had admissions continued at prior levels. Roughly 13,000 health care workers were among those blocked, the group estimated.

Independent survey research offers a broader picture of how Muslim immigrants and their U.S.-born descendants fare in American life, though it measures a related but not identical population, since not all immigrants from the 45-country Cato analysis are Muslim.  

Pew Research Center’s 2023-24 Religious Landscape study found Muslim Americans are considerably more likely than the general public to hold a college degree, 44%, including 26% with advanced degrees, and more likely to be current students. A 2025 poll by the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding (ISPU) found Muslim civic participation has risen since 2019, with 22% contacting a federal official and 23% attending a town hall in the past year, both higher than most other groups surveyed.