Trump Administration Orders Foreign Nationals to Apply for Green Cards From Home Countries
Why It Matters
The Trump administration announced a sweeping change to U.S. immigration policy Friday that would require foreign nationals currently residing in the United States to leave the country and apply for permanent residency — green cards — from their home nations. The shift affects a broad range of visa holders and could disrupt hundreds of thousands of pending immigration cases annually, with significant implications for Texas families, employers, and universities.
What Happened
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced the policy change, stating that temporary visa holders — including students, tourist visa holders, and workers — must return to their country of origin to seek lawful permanent resident status, except under what the agency termed “extraordinary circumstances.” USCIS officers would evaluate those exceptional cases individually.
For more than 50 years, foreign nationals with valid legal status have been permitted to complete the entire green card process without leaving U.S. soil. Friday’s announcement reverses that longstanding practice. The agency framed the move as returning to “the original intent of the law” and closing a procedural “loophole.”
“Nonimmigrants come to the U.S. for a short time and for a specific purpose,” USCIS said in a statement. “Their visit should not function as the first step in the green card process.”
In a separate statement to the Associated Press, the agency indicated that individuals who provide an “economic benefit” or serve a “national interest” may be permitted to remain in the country during their application. All others would be required to process their applications abroad.
By the Numbers
- ~600,000 foreign nationals already in the U.S. apply for green cards each year, according to a former senior USCIS adviser.
- 50+ years of established practice allowed in-country adjustment of immigration status — a policy the new rule now reverses.
- Dozens of countries are currently subject to U.S. travel restrictions or visa processing pauses, complicating the ability of some applicants to comply.
- 1+ year wait times for visa appointments exist at certain U.S. consulates abroad, immigration attorneys warned.
- The U.S. Embassy in Afghanistan has been closed since August 2021, leaving Afghan nationals with no viable consular path under the new policy.
Who It Affects
The policy’s reach is wide. Immigration attorneys said the change would apply to spouses of U.S. citizens, holders of work visas including doctors and other professionals, students, asylum seekers with humanitarian protections, and religious visa holders, among others.
Humanitarian organizations raised particular concern about family separation. World Relief, a refugee resettlement group, warned that requiring family members to return to countries where visa processing is suspended or nonexistent would create indefinite separations. “These policies will effectively create an indefinite separation of families,” the organization wrote.
The American Immigration Lawyers Association called the announcement a major disruption to decades of established processing. “This applies very broadly to anyone seeking a green card,” said the group’s senior director of government relations.
Zoom Out
Friday’s announcement is part of a broader pattern of the Trump administration tightening legal immigration pathways. The administration has already imposed travel bans affecting nationals from multiple countries and paused visa processing in others. A Texas town has offered an early preview of related administration efforts to remove noncitizens from federally assisted housing — another front in the administration’s immigration enforcement push.
Former USCIS officials from the Biden era characterized the move as part of a deliberate effort to reduce the overall number of people achieving permanent residency, which serves as a pathway to U.S. citizenship.
What’s Next
USCIS did not specify an effective date for the new policy, nor did it clarify whether applicants who have already begun the green card process in the U.S. would be required to restart their cases abroad. The agency also left unresolved whether applicants would need to remain outside the country for the entire duration of their application.
Immigration attorneys said Friday they were still working through the details of the policy memo to determine its full scope. Legal challenges from advocacy organizations and law firms are widely anticipated. The administration’s use of aggressive legal tools along the southern border — including litigation over land seizures near El Paso — signals that it is prepared for protracted court battles over its immigration agenda.