National Security

Trump: US should start looking ‘very closely’ at marriage visas

Greg Nash

Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump on Saturday said the government should take a look at special visas for fiancées of U.S. citizens, but he added that his campaign would have a broader statement to make about screening next week. 

The GOP presidential frontrunner’s comments came after it was found that one of the two shooters who killed 14 people and wounded dozens in San Bernardino, Calif., this week came to the United States on a special K-1 visa last year, which allows foreigners to come to the country to marry a U.S. citizen. 

{mosads}”We are going to have to start looking at things,” Trump told reporters ahead of a speech in Iowa. “And I’ll probably have a pretty good statement to make next week, because i feel very strongly about it — that we are going to have to start looking at people very closely. Because we can’t allow this to happen to our country.”

Suspect Tashfeen Malik flew to the country last year from Saudi Arabia with her fiancee and second suspect Syed Rizwan Farook. Farook was a U.S. citizen. Malik eventually obtained a temporary green card this year after the two married. 

Both died in a shootout with police earlier this week. 

When a reporter asked whether Trump would rule out support for pulling back on those so-called fiancée visas, he said, “I’m not ruling out anything. I don’t rule out anything. If people come in and blow up people, and they shoot people and they kill people, I don’t rule out anything.”

The shooting in San Bernardino is being investigated as an act of terrorism, though there is no evidence yet that the two shooters were part of a broader terrorist cell. 

Lawmakers on Capitol Hill pledged to closely review the special K-1 visas, which allow a person to come to the country for 90 days, to get married within that timeframe. 

Lawmakers, however, said the legislative calendar would likely not allow Congress to address the issue before the holidays. 

Tags Donald Trump San Bernardino shootings

Copyright 2023 Nexstar Media Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

See all Hill.TV See all Video

Most Popular

Load more

Video

See all Video