Mark Melson, CEO of Fort Worth\u2019s Gladney Center for Adoption, says local and national adoption agencies are in a wait-and-see period after efforts in urging Congress and President Donald Trump to provide travel ban exemptions to adoptees was followed by federal guidance allowing some exemptions.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt rectifies it for the moment,\u201d Melson said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The U.S. Department of State issued the new guidance on Jan. 28, stating that children being adopted by U.S. citizens may qualify for an exemption on a case-by-case<\/a> basis. The move comes after organizations like the Gladney Center and the National Council for Adoption urged families for several weeks to contact their Congress members to advocate for adoptee children from other counties to not be barred from Trump\u2019s recent orders on travel ban<\/a> and visa freezes<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n In June, the administration placed travel bans or restrictions<\/a> on several countries with exemptions to adoption visas. Another iteration of the order issued in December \u2014 and went into effect on Jan. 1 \u2014 no longer included exceptions for adoption visas,\u201d both Republican and Democratic lawmakers<\/a> said in a letter to the U.S. Department of State.\u00a0<\/p>\n The State Department announced mid-January the government will suspend processing immigrant visas of 75 different countries over public assistance concerns, according to the Associated Press<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n Before the exemption, restrictions made adopting families at the Gladney Center and agencies across the country \u201cgravely concerned,\u201d Melson said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Melson is also on the National Council for Adoption\u2019s board of directors. The travel restrictions brought delays for children who have already been legally cleared to immigrate to the U.S. through the adoption process, he said.<\/p>\n \u200b\u201cThey\u2019ve had a long wait already. They\u2019ve been in process for many of them for years, and now it\u2019s that magic day when they get to go and bring their child home and, yet, we\u2019re faced with this slowdown,\u201d Melson said, adding that children waiting to be picked up by their adoptive families are spending more time in orphanages or foster homes.<\/p>\n \u200bThe State Department issued new guidance Jan. 28 stating children being adopted by U.S. citizens may qualify for an exemption on a case-by-case<\/a> basis.<\/p>\n \u200b\u200b\u200bOut of the 75 countries facing restrictions, 42 are adoption-sending countries, Melson said. About 62 families, either a part of the Gladney Center\u2019s Columbia or Thailand adoptive programs, have been directly affected, he added.<\/p>\n Melson said he personally believes the absence of an adoptive exemption to the immigration restrictions was \u201can oversight, not done maliciously.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThese are children that belong to these families,\u201d Melson said. \u201cThey have gone through the steps in the process. Now we\u2019re just literally checking a box on a piece of paper, and that child can come back home and be cared for by this loving family.\u201d<\/p>\n To see how the exemption plays out is a wait-and-see kind of moment, Melson said. He\u2019s anticipating the exemption will work for a majority of families going through an adoption and have their paperwork, he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n He\u2019s thinking about a family who is currently traveling to Thailand to pick up their child early next week.\u00a0<\/p>\n If the process goes smoothly as normal, he says, then it rectifies the situation, Melson said. Until they see that family go through the process, \u201cwe\u2019re not exactly sure.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe believe it will work for its intended purposes, and accomplishes both of the goals; the adoption-based goal as well as what the government\u2019s goal is to protect our country,\u201d Melson said of the exemption. \u201cWe\u2019ll see what ultimately happens, but we believe that it will be a successful placement.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Marissa Greene is a Report for America corps member, covering faith for the Fort Worth Report. You can contact her at marissa.greene@fortworthreport.org<\/a>. This <a target=”_blank” href=”https:\/\/fortworthreport.org\/2026\/02\/02\/fort-worth-national-adoption-organizations-call-for-exemptions-to-trumps-travel-ban\/”>article<\/a> first appeared on <a target=”_blank” href=”https:\/\/fortworthreport.org”>Fort Worth Report<\/a> and is republished here under a <a target=”_blank” href=”https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nd\/4.0\/”>Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License<\/a>.<img src=”https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/fortworthreport.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/cropped-favicon.png?resize=150%2C150&quality=80&ssl=1″ style=”width:1em;height:1em;margin-left:10px;”><\/p>\n <img id=”republication-tracker-tool-source” src=”https:\/\/fortworthreport.org\/?republication-pixel=true&post=393115&ga4=2820184429″ style=”width:1px;height:1px;”><script> PARSELY = { autotrack: false, onload: function() { PARSELY.beacon.trackPageView({ url: “https:\/\/fortworthreport.org\/2026\/02\/02\/fort-worth-national-adoption-organizations-call-for-exemptions-to-trumps-travel-ban\/”, urlref: window.location.href }); } } <\/script> <script id=”parsely-cfg” src=”\/\/cdn.parsely.com\/keys\/fortworthreport.org\/p.js”><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"by Marissa Greene, Fort Worth Report February 2, 2026 Mark Melson, CEO of Fort Worth\u2019s Gladney Center for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":148156,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[116,118,117],"class_list":{"0":"post-148155","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fort-worth","8":"tag-fort-worth","9":"tag-fort-worth-headlines","10":"tag-fort-worth-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148155","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=148155"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148155\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/148156"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=148155"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=148155"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=148155"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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