"The Department is publicly designating Muslim Khuchiev, the Chairman (Prime Minister) of the Government of the Chechen Republic of the Russian Federation, under Section 7031(c) of the FY 2019 Department of State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs Act, due to his involvement in gross violations of human rights," the release said.
The designation means that Khuchiev is now "ineligible for entry into the United States," the release added.
"The Department has credible information that Muslim Khuchiev was involved in torture," the release said.
His wife, Sapiyat Shabazova, was also barred from entering the United States, it added.
The United States calls on the Russian government to hold Khuchiev accountable for his alleged human rights violations, the State Department said.
In December, the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) published a report stating that information in the media on allegedly serious human rights violations in Chechnya, in particular, the rights of LGBT persons, had been confirmed. The report says that the republic's authorities are authorising illegal arrests, torture and extrajudicial punishments.
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The Chechen leader's spokesman, Alvi Karimov, said that the OSCE report "does not contain a single line of objectivity," while its authors failed to double-check the reports by visiting the Chechen Republic themselves.
