For Venezuelans in the United States, a new White House proclamation has reopened old wounds and deepened fears that exile in the U.S., once a certain path to safety, will now mean permanent separation from their loved ones.

On Wednesday, the Trump administration announced sweeping travel restrictions on nationals from more than a dozen countries—including Venezuela, Cuba, and Haiti. The order bars entry for most applicants seeking tourist, student and business visas, further narrowing the few remaining legal pathways for families torn apart by dictatorship, displacement and economic collapse.

Among the thousands left in anguish is Sasha Escalante, a 44-year-old Venezuelan radio producer living in Miami. In the past year, Escalante has fought to stay alive while battling Stevens-Johnson Syndrome, a rare and severe skin condition that left her hospitalized with rashes resembling second- and third-degree burns covering 75% of her body. Today, she is still recovering — and fighting for the chance to reunite with her elderly parents, whom she hasn’t seen in years.

Escalante had applied for a humanitarian visa to bring her parents to the U.S. while she was in intensive care fighting for her life. Her parents’ previous tourist visas had expired in October 2022. Despite the urgency of her condition, her request was denied. Her parents later secured a tourist visa appointment for this coming August, this time in Madrid, because of the absence of a U.S. embassy in Venezuela.

That appointment had offered a faint for reunion. Now, with the travel ban in place, even that hope has all but disappeared.

“Being away from family as a refugee is already painful,” Escalante said. “But it’s even harder when you’ve come close to death. I don’t know what else I can do.”

Her father, a retired engineer, was trained in manufacturing and technology in the 1980s in Japan. Over the years, he returned to the U.S. numerous times to update his skills. But under the new travel policy, his decades of professional and personal ties may count for nothing.

A former television journalist who fled Venezuela in 2012 after the Hugo Chávez shut down her station, Escalante now works as a content producer at Miami’s Actualidad Radio, a Spanish-language station. In addition to her serious health struggles, she is also a mother to a son on the autism spectrum.

“This country gave me refuge,” she said. “But it is devastating. That appointment was my hope”

Escalante’s story echoes the growing fear and frustration spreading to the nearly 1 million Venezuelans living in the United States. The new proclamation suspends most immigrant and non-immigrant visas for Venezuelans — affecting tourism (B-1/B-2), students (F and M), and exchange visitors (J), with limited exceptions.

While green-card holders and immediate family members of U.S. citizens remain exempt from the travel ban, the practical effect is clear: For countless Venezuelan Americans, family reunification is once again out of reach.

Alberto Argüelles, a Venezuelan attorney and longtime asylum seeker in Doral, said he is depressed. Like many, he fled persecution at home only to feel persecuted again in exile. “We Venezuelans are trapped between two oppressors — one who hunts us at home, and another who now targets us in the U.S.,” he said.

Although the Trump administration first included Venezuela in a travel ban in 2017, that version targeted only government officials and their families. The current policy is far broader. Beginning June 9, it affects the vast majority of Venezuelan visa seekers, citing concerns over identity verification and Venezuela’s refusal to take back deportees from the U.S.

Yet data reviewed by The Miami Herald shows that the U.S. has already carried out more than 21 deportation flights, returning more than 3,400 Venezuelans since Trump resumed deportations — including 150 people deported just one day after the proclamation was signed. At the same time, approximately 1,500 Venezuelans have voluntarily returned from Mexico through Maduro’s Vuelta a la Patria (Return to the Homeland) program. In total, more than 5,000 Venezuelans have returned to their country since Trump took office.

The proclamation comes as the U.S. government moves to terminate Temporary Protected Status for Venezuelans, a policy that had shielded more than 600,000 migrants from deportation. More than 350,000 have already lost that protection, with the remainder at risk by September, pending a federal court ruling.

Adelys Ferro, executive director of the Venezuelan American Caucus, condemned the policy as racially motivated and strategically cruel.

“They didn’t even try to hide the racism, discrimination, and xenophobia when drawing up this list,” she said. “The countries affected are all places devastated by war, dictatorship, famine and death.”

Even before the new restrictions, Venezuelans were facing high rejection rates for U.S. visas. In 2024, 37.4% of all tourist visa applications were denied, according to the State Department. A Miami Herald analysis shows the average denial rate under President Joe Biden was 33%, compared to 60% during Trump’s first term.

Despite the high denial rate, demand remains strong. In fiscal year 2025 through April, more than 35,500 B1/B2 visas and 205 student visas (F) were issued to Venezuelan nationals. The administration claims the ban is justified due to a 10% overstay rate for Venezuelans — higher than average but not unique.

Still, for Venezuelans like Escalante, the numbers pale in comparison to the human cost.

Back home, Venezuela’s main opposition coalition, Plataforma Unitaria Democrática, has also condemned the new Trump policy. In a statement Thursday, the group called it a measure that “further aggravates the already complex immigration situation faced by Venezuelans.

“Penalizing individuals based solely on their nationality only increases the suffering of innocent Venezuelans,” the statement read. “We deserve the support of the free world — not more punishment.”

The travel ban was announced shortly after the expiration of Chevron’s oil license in Venezuela — a move widely interpreted as a political blow to Maduro’s regime. The timing of the ban may also be aimed at deterring a potential new wave of Venezuelan migration, as the U.S. cracks down on immigration.

More than 8 million Venezuelans have fled their country in recent years, and nearly 1 million now reside in the United States.

The consequences of the ban go beyond the U.S. border. In some Latin American countries, a valid U.S. visa is often a gateway to mobility. Countries like Panama now require visas for Venezuelans—but waive them for travelers holding valid U.S. visas. The new ban will likely sever those options as well.

And with no U.S. embassy in Caracas and direct flights between the U.S. and Venezuela suspended since 2019, even navigating the application process has long been a logistical and financial burden.

Now, the door has been all but slammed shut.

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