The US will reexamine all green cards issued to people from 19 countries “of concern” at President Donald Trump’s direction, as the Trump administration intensifies its immigration crackdown following the shooting of two National Guard members in Washington, DC.
“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,” Joe Edlow, the director of US Citizenship and Immigration Services, wrote in a post on X Thursday.
Asked for additional details, including which countries are considered to be “of concern,” USCIS pointed CNN to 19 countries listed in a June presidential proclamation.
The 19 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.
USCIS said in a statement later Thursday that when vetting immigrants from those 19 countries, the agency will now take into consideration “negative, country specific factors,” which includes whether the country is able “to issue secure identity documents.”
Since officials last night identified the suspect of the shooting as Rahmanullah Lakanwal, an Afghan national, the Trump administration has ramped up its efforts to restrict immigration.
The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees USCIS, said Thursday the administration is also reviewing all asylum cases that were approved under former President Joe Biden.
“Effective immediately, processing of all immigration requests relating to Afghan nationals is stopped indefinitely pending further review of security and vetting protocols,” DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement to CNN, adding, “The Trump Administration is also reviewing all asylum cases approved under the Biden Administration.”
Lakanwal — who previously worked with the US government, including the CIA — came to the country in 2021 as part of Biden’s “Operation Allies Welcome” after assisting the US in Afghanistan. He applied for asylum in 2024, and the Trump administration granted it in April 2025, CNN previously reported.
The Alliance of Afghan Communities in the United States on Thursday condemned the shooting, while also expressing concerns over the impact of Lakanwal’s actions on the immigration process for other Afghan nationals.
“A single individual’s crime must not jeopardize or obstruct the legal cases of thousands of deserving Afghans who meet all U.S. legal requirements,” the alliance said in a statement, which called for federal agencies to process Afghan immigrants as usual, without delays or suspensions.
More than 190,000 Afghans have resettled in the United States since the US military withdrew from Afghanistan in August 2021, according to the State Department.
In a video address from his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida late Wednesday, Trump blamed the Biden administration for bringing the alleged shooter to the US and argued the attack “underscores the single greatest national security threat facing our nation.”
Trump said in the remarks, “We must now reexamine every single alien who’s entered our country from Afghanistan under Biden and 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 also lamented what he described as “20 million unknown and unvetted foreigners” who entered the US during his predecessor’s administration, casting it “a risk to our very survival.”
The administration’s latest move to reexamine green cards is in line with Trump’s anti-immigration rhetoric. A green card is a document that deems its holder as a lawful permanent resident of the US. It differs from refugee and asylum programs — which the Trump administration has already sought to limit — though refugees must apply for a green card after one year of being in the US.
This story has been updated with additional details.
