Flights to Washington's Ronald Reagan airport briefly paused following DC shooting, authorities say

WASHINGTON: The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration said on Wednesday that flights to Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport were briefly paused following the shooting of two members of the National Guard near the White House.

The ground stop temporarily “paused arrivals into Reagan Washington International Airport because of the locations of aircraft involved in responding to today’s shooting incident,” the FAA said in a statement. “Normal operations have resumed.”

The brief disruption came a day before Thanksgiving, which is among the busiest periods of the year for air travel in the United States.

The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services said late on Wednesday it has stopped processing all immigration requests relating to Afghan nationals indefinitely, after two National Guard soldiers were shot and critically wounded in Washington.

President Donald Trump said that the shooting near the White House was “an act of terror,” saying the suspect came from Afghanistan in 2021.

The move follows Trump’s call for his government to re-examine Afghan immigrants who entered the United States when Joe Biden was President.

“The protection and safety of our homeland and of the American people remains our singular focus and mission,” the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services said in a post on X about Afghan immigration in the US.