Coronavirus: Trump Rolls Out Immigration Ban To 'Save' Jobs As US Struggles Against COVID-19 Pandemic

Just as the United States grapples under the pandemic, President Donald Trump recently announced a move that could seem like a bolt out of the blue—banning immigration to the U.S. amid the COVID-19 outbreak.

Speculations are rife that the move can be attributed to the massive job losses suffered by over 22 million Americans after the novel coronavirus pushed 13.5 percent of the U.S. workforce to unemployment.

“In light of the attack from the Invisible Enemy, as well as the need to protect the jobs of our GREAT American Citizens, I will be signing an Executive Order to temporarily suspend immigration into the United States!” tweeted the president on Monday. Trump's tweet surfaced on the microblogging website soon after the U.S. death toll from the virus crossed the 42, 000 mark.

The U.S. currently is the hardest hit, with the largest number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the world—over 779,000 infections, up 20,000 as per the statistics on Monday.

As per the latest Labor Department figures released on Thursday, a massive 5.2 million new claims for unemployment benefits filed last week.

Trump has been rolling out ways to weed out the arrival of foreigners to the United States ever since the global health crisis broke out. Last month, Trump banned the entry of tourists from Europe to the U.S, while having already banned travel from China by then.

While there’s a lot of ambiguity surrounding Trump’s latest order; migrant farmworkers and medics might reportedly be exempt from this rule. The White House is yet to comment on the order.

Trump's tweet came hours after the price of U.S. oil traded below $0— a first of sorts in the history of the United States.

Dropping details on the order, NBC News White House Correspondent Geoff Bennett also tweeted: “Immigration was already functionally shut down. The WH had closed the U.S.-Canada border and started deporting asylum-seekers without due process. 'International air travel has largely been suspended. Formalizing it serves as a simple way for Trump to rile up his base.”

Experts believe the unemployment rates could skyrocket in the coming weeks— rising to 20 percent in April alone, marking the hardest hit phase for the U.s since the Great Depression in the 1930s.