CHANGES LIKELY AHEAD FOR TRUMP TRAVEL BAN
Administration revisions might add countries, affect court challenges
The long and winding road to the Supreme Court for President Trump’s travel ban may require yet another detour as the White House prepares to revise or replace it.
The U. S. Department of Homeland Security has completed an “extensive” and “methodical” review that could add more countries to a list of six nations whose citizens’ travel to the United States would be banned or restricted under a March executive order, according to an official who briefed reporters. The examination centered on the processes all foreign nations use to confirm the identity of individuals and for document security.
“This is historic; we’ve not done this in the past,” said Miles Taylor, counselor to the Homeland Security director. Citizens from countries that don’t share information about potential terrorist and criminal nationals and use e- passports, for instance, might face additional screening and possibly be banned from travel to theU. S., he said.
“We gave countries an opportunity to step up their game,” Taylor said, noting that a number of nations were given notice in July of the new U. S. standards.
“Most countries ended up meeting that baseline,” he said. “Some countries were still unable or, worse yet, deliberately unwilling to comply.”
Names of the targeted countries will be made public in the coming days, according to the White House. Taylor would not name them or say whether the list would be greater than the six covered by Trump’s original March executive order.
Changes to the system have been under consideration for weeks in preparation
“The travel ban into the United States should be far larger, tougher and more specific.” President Trump, in a tweet after the London subway attack last week
for the looming expiration of a 90- day travel ban for countries in the Middle East and North Africa. The latest development was first reported Friday by theWall Street Journal.
The list of countries affected by the new policy will increase, said an official close to the process who asked to remain anonymous because the details were not final.
The legal case, long sought by Trump and immigration officials after a series of defeats in federal courts from Maryland to Hawaii, is scheduled to be heard Oct. 10. But the ban on travelers from six Muslim- majority countries expires Sunday, and officials who briefed reporters provided no specifics on what would happen then.
Trump indicated the direction the administration might be headed in a characteristic tweet following an explosion on an underground train in London last week.
“The travel ban into the United States should be far larger, tougher and more specific,” he said.
Any change in the terms of the ban — already Trump’s second version, after the first was tossed out by the courts — presumably would require the justices to adjust the schedule. They could require more briefing from both sides, send the case back to lower courts or even declare it moot.
That would be a letdown for both sides after eight months of controversy that began with chaos at U. S. airports and resulted in two executive orders, a series of lower- court decisions blocking implementation and several Supreme Court interventions.
At last count, more than 70 groups had weighed in before the court, mostly backing the ban’s challengers.
“This may turn out to be a big dud,” said Martin Lederman, a Georgetown University Law Center professor who has predicted for months that the case would reach a dead end. “The most likely resolution here is no resolution at all.”