Nima Abdollahpour. Courtesy photo
Davis Enterprise: Last week, after a year of getting graduate school applications and travel documents in order, Nima Abdollahpour prepared to travel from Iran to California to begin a Ph.D. program at UC Davis. On Sept. 9, Abdollahpour flew from Tehran to Istanbul. Three days later, he went to the airport to take a direct flight to San Francisco, a flight he was never allowed to board.
When Abdollahpour presented his passport and his F-1 student visa at the Turkish Airlines check-in counter, the airline officer asked him to wait. The officer then took out a piece of paper that Abdollahpour was able to see at one point. “It is recommended that Nima Abdollahpour does not board this flight,” Abdollahpour says the paper read. After consulting with someone, the officer told Abdollahpour he would not be allowed to fly.
Abdollahpour is not the only Iranian student who was barred this month from flying to the United States. He says he is in touch with 17 other students who were prevented from boarding flights out of Doha, Tehran, Isfahan and Mashhad on their way to the U.S. The students, many of whom studied together at the Sharif University of Technology in Tehran, have shared information with each other as they search for answers from the U.S. government.
The Trump administration’s travel ban, which bars Iranians and nationals of six other countries from traveling to the U.S., does not apply to Iranian students, an exception that helped the ban get through the U.S. Supreme Court. Abdollahpour and the other students were all traveling with valid student visas issued by the U.S. State Department. The first of them was prevented from flying on Sept. 3 or 4, Abdollahpour says.
Officials at the University of California and the National Iranian American Council independently confirmed that, beginning in early September, the Trump administration has prevented Iranian students admitted to American universities from traveling to the United States.
“Roughly a dozen grad students from Iran with valid visas from the U.S. State Department have been denied entry onto flights bound for the United States,” an official at the UC Office of the President says, referring only to those admitted to UC campuses.
On Friday, the NIAC issued a statement saying it is “deeply concerned by reports that a large number of Iranian students with visas were barred from boarding their flights at the last minute by the Trump administration.”
The NIAC has worked directly with students, provided a confidential online form for them to report their circumstances, and coordinated with universities. “This is a widespread thing,” NIAC Policy Director Ryan Costello says. While NIAC is aware of 16 students who were barred from flying, Costello estimates that “dozens of Iranian students” admitted to universities across the U.S. have been stopped at airports this month.
While some newly admitted Iranian students have successfully arrived at U.S. campuses this month — one at UCD, another at UC Santa Cruz — NIAC says the rate of denial is high enough to effectively constitute a travel ban. “There seems to be a change in policy that imposes a second level of the Muslim ban on students from Iran who have been accepted to study in the United States,” Costello says. “It hasn’t been every student, but it does seem like a large chunk of this new class of Iranian students has been blocked.”
Timeline
For Abdollahpour, the last-minute rejection has come as a blow just when he thought he had reached the end of a long, complicated and costly process. Because there is no U.S. Embassy in Iran, students living in Iran must travel abroad to interview for their visas, most often to Turkey, Armenia or the United Arab Emirates, which host the only U.S. embassies with officials who speak Farsi.
In May, Abdollahpour travelled to the U.S. Embassy in Turkey to interview for his visa, flying first to Istanbul and then taking a seven-hour bus ride to Ankara. There was no guarantee his visa would be approved. Since the travel ban was implemented, Iranian students have been subject to rigorous screening and vetting that has lengthened processing times and diminished the chances of approval.
On July 9, Abdollahpour received an email from the State Department notifying him that his visa was approved. He paid an Iranian courier service to retrieve his passport from the embassy in Ankara and began making arrangements for his move to Davis.
On Sept. 6, three days before his flight from Tehran to Istanbul, Abdollahpour heard that a few students had just been prevented from boarding their flights to the U.S., though they were not told why they were not allowed to fly. One student, flying out of Doha, said he was shown an email sent from U.S. Customs and Border Protection to Qatar Airlines.
Another of the students who was turned away decided to check his visa status in the online system and noticed his case had been updated several weeks after his visa was issued, which he thought was unusual. He told the other students, who also found that their cases were updated long after the visas were issued. When Abdollahpour heard this, he logged into the system and saw, while his visa was issued in July, the last update to his case was made on August 30. However, as far as he could see, there was no new information or any change in his visa status.
Slightly worried, Abdollahpour contacted UC Davis. The university’s Office of Global Affairs told him they would do their best to address the issue and Abdollahpour left for Istanbul to catch his flight to San Francisco. “I said goodbye to all of my family,” he says. “I gathered all my stuff and packed my bags.”
After they were turned away at airports, several students called U.S. embassies. The embassies told the students to contact Homeland Security or Customs and Border Protection. In turn, those agencies told the students to get in touch with the Embassy. “No one tells us what is wrong,” Abdollahpour says.
The National Iranian American Council and the University of California, who have coordinated with each other as well as reached out to the State Department, Homeland Security and the White House, say they are no closer than the students to getting an explanation from the government. Neither the White House nor the Department of Homeland Security could be reached by the Enterprise for comment >>>
You can see Stephen Miller's finger prints all over this. The ugly bald dude has a problem with good looking and educated Iranians. He was probably rejected by the Iranian girls when he was attending Santa Monica High School.
“Because there is no U.S. Embassy in Iran, students living in Iran must travel abroad to interview for their visas, ...” from the article above
What these “good-looking” students should do is simple: They should ask their democratic government to allow Americans to have an embassy in Tehran.
P. S.
Dude, if this kid is handsome, then I’m George Clooney!
Maybe the Americans have finally realized that "Sharif" university was named after a terrorist by the name of Sharif Vaghefi! And maybe, they have some info on this student that we are not privy to!? What if this kid has made anti American comments on his social media accounts!? Yes, they [the authorities] do monitor people's social media pages!? And thank God for that! Thank you president Trump for being vigilant and protecting America!!!!
To some clueless lunatics all the problems of the world boils down to oh yeahh... "he must have been rejected by some persian girls" some time ago.
How simplistic.
ICW
Even if the guy has made such comments , DOn't u think someone should determine the nature of those comments? are the backed up by sufficient evidence as to the individuals previous related activities? You can't just look at it through a uniform, all-condemning lens.
Yes, it would have been nice to have a thorough, precise, and perfect venting and screening process to a avoid unjustly denials but we unfortunately live in the current imperfect and sometimes arbitrary world!!! In other words, if my aunt didn't have breasts, she would be my uncle!!!
The biggest problem with the know-it-all Iranians on this site is that they forget/ignore the fact that 60% of those students who enter Sharif or other prestigious universities in Iran do so upon being recommended by someone close to regime in Tehran. Have you ever wondered why there are so many pro-regime articles in the media in the West?
Wasn't Niloufar Parsi a graduate of Sharif (terrorist Vaghefi) U.?
Javid Janh!
Maybe DHS at last found out that only the sons of the terrorist members of the terrorist group known as islamic revolutionary guards are allowed into sharif university and have the means to travel to US and live in SF Bay area!!!!
But hey, cheer up, at least the two maleh kesh azam hsaan roohAni and javaat zarif both got their visas to come to new york! Who knows, their might be some free chelokoobab going, so long as thses two ghoromsaaghs are allowed outside the 30yrd perimeter of the UN!!!
LOOL
:)))
and is that niloofar jan before or after sex change?
More LOOL
:)))
این مطلب بدجور من رو شوکه کرد! شک ندارم شما هم غافلگیر می شوید! ببینید کار ملت به کجا رسیده است! فرد شیّادی که درصد قابل قبولی جانبازی دارد، از ۴ تا دختر داوطلب کنکور، نفری ۴۰ میلیون تومان پول گرفته تا هر ۴ دختر را عقد دائم کند! به این ترتیب این چهار تا دختر تبدیل به همسر جانباز شدند تا در کنکور از سهمیه استفاده کنند! تا جائیکه قوانین سازمان سنجش هم اجازه می داد از سهمیه کنکور همسر جانباز بودن استفاده کردند و در دانشگاههای دلخواه خود قبول شدند! بعد از اعلام نتایج کنکور هم طلاق می گیرند و به سراغ درس و مشق شان می روند و چون هیچ عمل زناشویی بین آنها صورت نگرفته، قانونا می توانند شناسنامه المثنی بگیرند که هیچ اسم شوهری در آن نوشته نشده باشد! به همین راحتی و به همین سادگی از سهمیه ها استفاده می کنند، به طوری که آب از آب تکان نخورد! همونطور که می بینید زندگی در ایران هنوز قشنگی های خودش را دارد! و در انتها اینگونه می شود که طرف با رتبه تک رقمی کنکور در هیج جا پذیرفته نمی شود، چون داوطلب های سهمیه ای جای او را گرفته اند! بعضی از ایرانیان شیطان را هم درس می دهند!