One of President Donald Trump’s most high-profile and most popular pledges while campaigning to retake the White House last year centered on securing the nation’s borders and restoring national sovereignty and security. His latest executive action aims to do just that. In a presidential proclamation signed Wednesday, Trump imposed complete travel restrictions on 12 countries designated as high risks for terrorism, national security threats, and crime: Afghanistan, Burma, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen. Trump also placed partial travel restrictions on Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan, and Venezuela.

“It is the President’s sacred duty to take action to ensure that those seeking to enter our country will not harm the American people,” the White House said in a statement regarding the travel restrictions. The White House added, “The restrictions and limitations imposed by the Proclamation are necessary to garner cooperation from foreign governments, enforce our immigration laws, and advance other important foreign policy, national security, and counterterrorism objectives.”

In comments to The Washington Stand, FRC Action Director Matt Carpenter said, “There’s no doubt that President Trump has made American sovereignty a cornerstone of his second administration. Look around today at the state of Western Civilization, and it becomes clear that national sovereignty is under assault.” He expounded, “Everything from illegal mass migration, unaccountable and unelected globalist bureaucrats co-opting public health initiatives, and multinational corporations influencing public policy weakens the sovereignty of Western nations.”

Carpenter continued, “Restricting travel from certain nations that either cannot adequately vet their own people or are openly hostile to the United States is just another good initiative taken by the president to protect America from the possibility of foreign terrorism making its way to our shores.”

On Thursday’s episode of “Washington Watch,” Rep. Kevin Hern (R-Okla.) praised the president’s travel restrictions as a measure to ensure Americans’ safety. “One thing about the president: he cares about the safety of the American people. You’ve seen what he’s done to the southern border. No laws were changed,” the congressman said. He continued, “People understand safety. You don’t have a nation if you don’t have a safe nation. And this president, President Trump, is going to make sure that happens.”

The affected countries were identified in a report from Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the State Department which designated certain countries as having “inadequate screening and vetting processes, hindering America’s ability to identify potential security threats before entry;” exhibiting “high visa overstay rates, demonstrating a disregard for U.S. immigration laws and increasing burdens on enforcement systems;” not cooperating with U.S. authorities “in sharing identity and threat information, undermining effective U.S. immigration vetting;” having “a significant terrorist presence or state-sponsored terrorism, posing direct risks to U.S. national security;” or having a track record of failing or refusing “to accept back their removable nationals, complicating U.S. efforts to manage immigration and public safety.”

Countries such as Afghanistan, Iran, Libya, and Somalia were identified as terrorist hotbeds, while Eritrea, Haiti, Sudan, and Yemen were criticized for lacking a “competent” central government authority and their poor screening and vetting processes. Haiti was additionally singled out for the “hundreds of thousands of illegal Haitian aliens” that “flooded into the United States during the Biden Administration.” The White House stated, “This influx harms American communities by creating acute risks of increased overstay rates, establishment of criminal networks, and other national security threats,” adding that Haiti’s abysmal screening and vetting record creates a serious risk of undermining U.S. national security.

Other countries, like Burma, Chad, the Republic of the Congo, and Equatorial Guinea were put on the list due to a high volume of visa overstay rates and a refusal or failure to cooperate in accepting back deported nationals, which the White House said “is unacceptable and indicates a blatant disregard for U.S. immigration laws.”

Partial travel restrictions were placed on Burundi, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, and Turkmenistan for their high visa overstay rates and, in some cases, failure to cooperate with U.S. authorities attempting to deport nationals to their home countries. Cuba was designated “a state sponsor of terrorism” that “does not cooperate or share sufficient law enforcement information with the United States” and also refuses to repatriate deported nationals, while Venezuela was identified as lacking “a competent or cooperative central authority for issuing passports or civil documents and it does not have appropriate screening and vetting measures,” in addition to not cooperating with U.S. deportation efforts and maintaining a relatively high rate of visa overstays.

“These regulations seem entirely reasonable and common sense from the perspective of getting control of our borders and knowing who is coming into our country – and why," Family Research Council's Travis Weber told The Washington Stand. "The underlying rationale laid out in the order itself, 'foreign policy, national security, and counterterrorism goals,' along with 'screening and vetting capabilities, information sharing policies, and country-specific risk factors — including whether each country has a significant terrorist presence within its territory, its visa-overstay rate, and its cooperation with accepting back its removable nationals' – lists myriad factors that appear grouped into either national security related risk factors, or immigration-related policy incentives (specifically the last two)," he explained. "This is entirely reasonable if we are going to know who is coming into our country, why they are coming, and if we are going to be in control of the process."