Following the Nov. 13, 2015 attacks in Paris and the Dec. 2 shootings in San Bernardino, California, Republicans and White House officials cobbled together an overhaul of the VWP. Jamal Abdi, policy director of the National Iranian American Council, suggests Republicans had been goaded by Trump’s call for an outright ban on Muslims entering the US in the wake of the two attacks, and “forced Obama’s hand.”