TRUMP LOSES BID TO REINSTATE BAN
Immigration order stays on hold; next stop could be Supreme Court
A federal appeals court refused to let President Trump reinstitute a temporary ban on travelers from seven majority-Muslim nations, ruling Thursday that it violates the due-process rights of people affected without a sufficient national security justification.
The unanimous verdict quoted a 75-year-old Supreme Court precedent that said courts have a du- ty “in time of war as well as in time of peace, to preserve unimpaired the constitutional safeguards of civil liberty.”
The quick decision from a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit could lead to a showdown at the Supreme Court within days unless the administration dials back the travel ban or agrees to try its case before the federal judge in Seattle who ordered it blocked last week.
The Justice Department said it was “reviewing the decision and considering its options.” Trump indicated more appeals are coming. “SEE YOU IN COURT, THE SECURITY OF OUR NATION IS AT STAKE!” he tweeted minutes after the ruling was released.
The 29-page order represented a wide-ranging rebuke of Trump’s travel order. The judges found that the plaintiffs in the case — the states of Washington and Minnesota — showed that the ban may have violated the dueprocess rights of foreigners who had valid visas and green cards, as well as those in the country illegally.
They said “serious allegations” about religious discrimination against Muslims raised “significant constitutional questions”
requiring a full airing in a trial court.
The order rejected a last-minute suggestion by the Justice Department to scale back the ban so it would apply only to visa holders who had never stepped foot in the USA. “It is not our role to try, in effect, to rewrite the executive order,” they wrote.
The panel said the president should get “considerable deference” in the areas of immigration and national security, but “it is beyond question that the federal judiciary retains the authority to adjudicate constitutional challenges to executive action.”
Washington state Solicitor General Noah Purcell, who tried the states’ case during Tuesday’s oral arguments, said the court “seriously considered all the government’s arguments and rejected them.”
Trump’s ban, announced Jan. 27, temporarily barred citizens of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen for 90 days, all refugees for 120 days, and Syrian citizens indefinitely. It led to chaos at U.S. and international airports as tens of thousands of visa holders were blocked from entering the country or detained after arriving in the USA.
A barrage of protests and lawsuits followed, leading to federal court rulings against the order in New York, Virginia and elsewhere. One judge in Massachusetts ruled in Trump’s favor, but on Friday, District Judge James Robart in Seattle halted the policy nationwide, citing “immediate and irreparable injury” to foreigners with valid visas and green cards.
The next day, the State Department said it would restore more than 60,000 canceled visas, and the Department of Homeland Security stopped enforcing the ban, reverting to standard inspections. Trump denounced the ruling of the “so-called judge” in starkly personal terms, and the Justice Department appealed to the 9th Circuit, the nation’s most liberal appeals court with jurisdiction over Western states.
That court required both sides to submit legal arguments by Monday and held an hour-long telephone hearing Tuesday that was live-streamed to listeners around the world. All three judges voiced skepticism about the need for the ban, but one said it did not appear to target Muslims in general.
The Trump administration contends that the president has authority under the Constitution to control immigration for national security purposes. It points to a 1952 law that allows a president to bar entry to immigrants if the president deems them to be “detrimental to the interests of the United States.”
Opponents of the travel ban, led by Washington state and Minnesota, say it discriminates against citizens of certain countries and the Muslim religion. They say the ban violates the clause of the Constitution that protects freedom of religion.
While the judges mulled and crafted their ruling, Trump renewed his verbal assault on the judiciary. He called the oral arguments at the 9th Circuit “disgraceful,” complained that courts “can be so political” and warned, “Right now, we are at risk because of what’s happened.”
His comments even drew a response from his Supreme Court nominee, Judge Neil Gorsuch of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit, who called such remarks “disheartening ” and “demoralizing ” in a private meeting with a Democratic senator. After Gorsuch’s reaction became public, Trump said it had been distorted.