Malcolm Turnbull's deal with Barack Obama for the United States to accept potentially more than 1000 refugees held in Australian offshore detention centres is at risk of unravelling, with new US President Donald Trump poised to temporarily ban immigrants from some countries deemed to be dangerous.
As part of his pledged hardline crackdown on immigrants to keep America safe from terrorism, Mr Trump will this week suspend immigration from some Muslim-majority nations such as Iraq, Syria, Iran, Somalia and Sudan, US media reported.
In an initial crackdown on illegal arrivals from central America, Mr Trump signed two executive actions on Wednesday in Washington to quickly begin building a big wall on the US-Mexico border to halt, what he called, the "unprecedented surge" of illegal immigrants.
At a press conference at the Department of Homeland Security, he paid tribute to attending families of Americans killed by illegal immigrants and announced efforts to boost the deportation of criminals without visas.
"Beginning today the United States of America gets back control of its borders," Mr Trump said.
He said the actions would save "thousands of lives, millions of jobs and billions and billions of dollars".
The new President insisted in a television interview that he would force Mexico to repay the estimated $US10 billion-plus cost of the wall, even though US taxpayers would initially fund the construction and Mexico's president has said he will not pay.
The President signed the orders alongside Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, whose 29-year old son died when he stepped on a land mine in Afghanistan in 2010.
White House spokesman Sean Spicer flagged that the President would soon sign other executive orders to apply "extreme vetting" of "people who are from a country who has a propensity to do us harm".
The US would take "appropriate steps", he said, to ensure that people from countries that "have a predisposition or a higher degree of concern" were "coming to this country for all the right reasons".
"The guiding principle for the President is keeping this country safe," Mr Spicer said in Washington overnight.
The precise impact is unclear on the November agreement struck by Prime Minister Turnbull and then president Obama for the transfer of hundreds of refugees to the US currently held under Australian oversight on Papua New Guinea's Manus Island and in Nauru.
But the pact could become collateral damage or the refugee swap be delayed or curtailed from Mr Trump's flagged actions.
Most of the refugees under Australian control are from the Middle East and Africa, including Somalia, Syria, Pakistan, Iran, and Sudan.
Already disappointed
It is understood the Turnbull government is still hopeful the US-Australia resettlement deal can ultimately survive.
The precise number of refugees slated for transfer has not been released by Immigration Minister Peter Dutton, though Republican politicians confidentially briefed on the plan have claimed it could be more than 2000, though the actual number is likely to be less than that.
Mr Trump has already disappointed Mr Turnbull this week by confirming the US would quit the 12-country Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade deal that the Prime Minister has championed as vital to maintaining US influence in the Asia Pacific.
More positively for US-Australia relations, new US Defence Secretary James Mattis spoke by telephone to Defence Minister Marise Payne on Wednesday, to express thanks for "Australia's support to counter-ISIL operations in the Middle East, as well as for Australia's continued contributions in Afghanistan", the Pentagon said.
Secretary Mattis will make his first trip overseas to Japan and South Korea next week, signalling the Pentagon wants to be engaged in the Asia Pacific.
During the election campaign Mr Trump called for a "total and complete shutdown" on Muslims entering the US, before watering-down the religious test to preventing immigration from countries "compromised by terrorism".
The new President will reportedly suspend refugee intakes and slash president Obama's annual cap of 110,000 refugees once refugee programs are resumed after security assessments over the next few months.
Immigration sceptics
US newspapers including The Wall Street Journal, citing anonymous Trump administration officials, said Mr Trump plans to cancel the Syrian refugee program.
The President has previously said the US would help set up safe zones around Syria for people fleeing the civil war involving President Assad and his Russian-backed troops, Islamic State fighters and anti-Assad rebels.
In December, the Obama administration's State Department said the referrals from Australia via the UN High Commissioner for Refugees would not change the size or scope of the US refugee admissions program and they would be subject to the highest level of security checks involving multiple security and intelligence agencies.
Mr Trump has several immigration sceptics on his team, including Islam-critic and national security adviser Mike Flynn, attorney general Jeff Sessions and senior adviser Stephen Miller.
Separately, some influential Republican politicians have raised serious concerns about the US-Australia deal.
House Judiciary Committee chairman Bob Goodlatte and Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Chuck Grassley have labelled the agreement "unprecedented" and pressured the Obama administration to publicly release more details.
At a victory rally after the election in December, Mr Trump linked a violent rampage by a Somalian immigrant Abdul Razak Ali Artan at Ohio State University to refugee programs "stupidly created by our very stupid politicians".
He said at the time the US will "suspend immigration from regions where it cannot be safely processed".
"We have no idea who they are, where they come from, what they're thinking and we're going to stop them dead cold flat."
