Washington Post Quotes Professor Aldana on Targeted Immigration Application Halt

Professor Raquel Aldana spoke to the Washington Post for a Dec. 3 story headlined “Trump pauses immigration applications for 19 nations on travel ban list.”

The story explains that President Donald Trump’s administration has halted all immigration applications from countries it deems high risk, citing the November shooting of two National Guard members. An Afghan man who once worked with a CIA-organized counterterrorism unit is the suspect.

There has been growing concern “around an expansion of screening that is nebulous and ill-defined,” Aldana told the Post. “Congress has created quite a laundry list of grounds that could render you ineligible to immigrate. … What is happening now is that the Trump administration is creating new grounds to say that you are not fit to come to the United States.” 

Raquel E. Aldana joined UC Davis in 2017 to serve as the inaugural Associate Vice Chancellor for Academic Diversity and returned to full-time law teaching in 2020. Aldana’s research has focused on transitional justice, criminal justice reforms and sustainable development in Latin America, as well as immigrant rights. She has authored or edited five books and published over 30 law review articles or book chapters. She is a graduate of Arizona State University and Harvard Law School.