Travel ban may shut door for Afghan family to bring niece to US for a better life
June 7, 2025
Mohammad Sharafoddin, his wife and young son managed to make it out of Afghanistan as refugees nine years ago, at one point walking 36 hours in a row over mountain passes. Sharafoddin hoped his wife’s niece could follow them to their new home in South Carolina. But President Donald Trump’s travel ban on people from Afghanistan and 11 other countries appears to have shut that door. Sharafoddin says his niece wants to be a doctor, and it is especially hard because she can’t study in her home country under the Taliban, who returned to power in 2021 .