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Trump Signs Executive Order Barring Muslims From Certain Countries From Entering The U.S. (Updated)
Topic Started: Jan 28 2017, 01:39 AM (887 Views)
Webster
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MSN News: Trump Bars All Refugees, and Citizens From 7 Muslim Nations
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WASHINGTON — President Trump on Friday closed the nation’s borders to refugees from around the world, ordering that families fleeing Syrian carnage be indefinitely blocked from entering the United States, and temporarily suspending immigration from several predominantly Muslim countries.

Declaring the measure part of an extreme vetting plan to “keep radical Islamic terrorists” out of the country, Mr. Trump also ordered that Christians around the globe who are seeking entry into the United States should be granted priority over Muslims, for the first time establishing a religious test for refugees.

“We don’t want them here,” Mr. Trump said of Islamic terrorists during a signing ceremony at the Pentagon. “We want to ensure that we are not admitting into our country the very threats our soldiers are fighting overseas. We only want to admit those into our country who will support our country, and love deeply our people.”

Earlier in the day, Mr. Trump explained to an interviewer for the Christian Broadcasting Network that Christians in Syria were “horribly treated” and alleged that under previous administrations, “if you were a Muslim you could come in, but if you were a Christian, it was almost impossible.”

“I thought it was very, very unfair. So we are going to help them,” the president said.

The executive order suspends the entry of refugees into the United States for 120 days and directs officials to determine additional screening ”to ensure that those approved for refugee admission do not pose a threat to the security and welfare of the United States.”

The order also stops the admission of refugees from Syria indefinitely, and bars entry into the United States for 90 days from seven predominantly Muslim countries linked to concerns about terrorism. Those countries are: Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen.

Additionally, Mr. Trump signed a memorandum on Friday directing what he called “a great rebuilding of the armed services,” saying it would call for budget negotiations to acquire new planes, new ships and new resources for the nation’s military.

“Our military strength will be questioned by no one, but neither will our dedication to peace,” Mr. Trump said.

Announcing his “extreme vetting” plan, the president invoked the specter of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Most of the 19 hijackers on the planes that crashed into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a field in Shanksville, Pa., were from Saudi Arabia. The rest were from the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Lebanon. None of those countries is on Mr. Trump’s visa ban list.

Human rights activists roundly condemned Mr. Trump’s actions, describing them as officially sanctioned religious persecution dressed up to look like an effort to make the United States safer.

The International Rescue Committee called it “harmful and hasty.” The American Civil Liberties Union described it as a “euphemism for discriminating against Muslims.” Raymond Offensheiser, the president of Oxfam America, said the order will harm families around the world who are threatened by authoritarian governments.

“The refugees impacted by today’s decision are among the world’s most vulnerable people — women, children, and men — who are simply trying to find a safe place to live after fleeing unfathomable violence and loss,” Mr. Offensheiser said.

The president signed the executive order shortly after issuing a statement noting that Friday was International Holocaust Remembrance Day, an irony that many of his critics highlighted on Twitter.
...continued in next post....
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Webster
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(The Guardian) Hamaseh Tayari, a UK resident who holds an Iranian passport, has been on holiday in Costa Rica with her boyfriend for the last week. She was due to fly back to Glasgow, where she works as a vet, this morning but was denied entry onto the flight because her flight went via New York and she would need a transit visa, which was revoked.

Tayari, who grew up in Italy, has never experienced anything like this. She says: “This has really shocked me. We just discovered [what Trump did] at the airport when we went to check-in. I want people to know that this is not just happening to refugees. I am a graduate and I have a Phd. It has happened to a person who is working and who pays tax.”

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Tayari and her boyfriend are trying to find an alternative route home. A flight to Madrid on the 30 January will cost them £2000 and they’ll still have to find a way from there to Glasgow. She says: “We had been saving for months for this holiday and it will cost me a month’s salary just to get home.

“I am destroyed. I did not know that I could cry for so long. It feels like the beginning of the end. How this is possible? I am really afraid about what is going on.”
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MSN News: Experts Question Legality Of Trump Ban On Muslim Countries
Quote:
 
The future of President Trump's executive order suspending immigration from seven predominantly Muslim countries may come down to a legal battle between his powers as commander in chief and discrimination limitations established by Congress.

A federal judge in New York issued a temporary, nationwide stay on the order late Saturday night. Lawyers, pushed along by a growing group of protesters, spent the day trying to free immigrants who were traveling when Trump's order was released, leaving them either detained at U.S. airports or stranded overseas.

But the legality of Trump's order won't be completely clear until it faces more hearings in federal court as Trump's Department of Justice squares off with a team of lawyers from civil rights and immigration advocacy groups.

Supporters of Trump's plan say he is standing on firm legal ground to ban immigrants and refugees temporarily from those countries because they pose a national security threat. Trump's order opens by citing the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, and explains that the immigration suspension is necessary to give the federal government time to strengthen its vetting procedures for people coming from terror-prone countries.

"Throughout the history of this country, courts have given, for obvious reasons, the executive extraordinary latitude in making determinations associated with national security," said Dan Stein, president of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, a group that advocates for lower levels of legal and illegal immigration. "And this is a national security judgement, something that courts would never want to interfere with."
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MSN News: Judge Halts Deportations As Refugee Ban Causes Worldwide Furor

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A federal judge in New York blocked deportations nationwide late Saturday of those detained on entry to the United States after an executive order from President Trump targeted citizens from seven predominantly Muslim countries.

Judge Ann Donnelly of the U.S. District Court in Brooklyn granted a request from the American Civil Liberties Union to stop the deportations after determining that the risk of injury to those detained by being returned to their home countries necessitated the decision.

Minutes after the judge’s ruling in New York, another came in Virginia when U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema issued a temporary restraining order to block for seven days the removal of any green-card holders being detained at Dulles International Airport. Brinkema’s action also ordered that lawyers have access to those held there because of the ban.

Trump’s order reverberated across the world Saturday, making it increasingly clear that the measure he had promised during his presidential campaign was casting a wider net than even his opponents had feared.

Confusion and concern among immigrant advocates mounted throughout the day as travelers from the Middle East were detained at U.S. airports or sent home. A lawsuit filed on behalf of two Iraqi men challenged Trump’s executive action, which was signed Friday and initially cast as applying to refugees and migrants.

But as the day progressed, administration officials confirmed that the sweeping order also targeted U.S. legal residents from the named countries — green-card holders — who were abroad when it was signed. Also subject to being barred entry into the United States are dual nationals, or people born in one of the seven countries who hold passports even from U.S. allies, such as the United Kingdom.

The virtually unprecedented measures triggered harsh reactions from not only Democrats and others who typically advocate for immigrants but also key sectors of the U.S. business community. Leading technology companies recalled scores of overseas employees and sharply criticized the president. Legal experts forecast a wave of litigation over the order, calling it unconstitutional. Lawyers and advocates for immigrants are advising them to seek asylum in Canada.

Yet Trump, who centered his campaign in part on his vow to crack down on illegal immigrants and impose what became known as his “Muslim ban,’’ was unbowed. As White House officials insisted that the measure strengthens national security, the president stood squarely behind it.
-Read more: http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/judge-halts-deportations-as-refugee-ban-causes-worldwide-furor/ar-AAmlFFZ
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(The Guardian) Sir Mo Farah, one of the UK’s most successful athletes, has just issued a statement condemning Trump’s travel ban.

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I am a British citizen who has lived in America for the past six years – working hard, contributing to society, paying my taxes and bringing up our four children in the place they now call home.

Now, me and many others like me are being told that we may not be welcome. It’s deeply troubling that I will have to tell my children that daddy might not be able to come home – to explain why the president has introduced a policy that comes from a place of ignorance and prejudice.
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(The Guardian) No 10 has insisted that Trump’s state visit in the summer will go ahead despite growing calls for it to be cancelled in light of his travel ban for people from several Muslim-majority countries.

--NEW: No.10 insistent that plans for UK #StateVisit by @realDonaldTrump remain in place despite calls for it to be postponed or cancelled. Darren McCaffrey, Sky News - 29 Jan. 2017)

Jeremy Corbyn and Tim Farron have called for it to be cancelled and a petition supporting the move, which had a few hundred signatures this morning, has now topped 100,000.
-Read more: https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/171928
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(The Guardian) PA has issued a fuller statement from Sir Mo Farah in which he says Trump’s ban made him “an alien”. The Somalia-born four-time Olympic champion, who lives and trains in the US, said: On 1 January this year, Her Majesty the Queen made me a knight of the realm. On 27 January, President Donald Trump seems to have made me an alien.

I am a British citizen who has lived in America for the past six years – working hard, contributing to society, paying my taxes and bringing up our four children in the place they now call home.

Now, me and many others like me are being told that we may not be welcome.

It’s deeply troubling that I will have to tell my children that daddy might not be able to come home – to explain why the president has introduced a policy that comes from a place of ignorance and prejudice.

I was welcomed into Britain from Somalia at eight years old and given the chance to succeed and realise my dreams.

I have been proud to represent my country, win medals for the British people and receive the greatest honour of a knighthood.

My story is an example of what can happen when you follow polices of compassion and understanding, not hate and isolation.
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Webster
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(The Guardian) Trump is awake and tweeting a defence of his controversial travel ban.

--Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the world - a horrible mess! (Donald J. Trump, President of the United States - 29 Jan. 2017)
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(The Guardian) The London mayor, Sadiq Khan, has added his voice to the growing calls for Trump’s visit to UK in the summer to be cancelled.

He reiterated his condemnation of the US travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries and said the UK should not be rolling out the “red carpet” while it remains in place.

He also suggested he would boycott the event if it did go ahead.
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(The Guardian) The Muslim Council of Britain has issued a statement condemning the travel ban and calling for May to take a firmer stand against Trump:

Trump’s Muslim Ban: Time for our Government to Stand Up For British Values
29 January 2017

The Muslim Council of Britain condemns the executive order by US President Trump to initiate a ban on people from a select few Muslim majority countries.

It calls on our British government to speak out much more forcefully and stand up for the British values it supposedly seeks from others. For all intents and purposes this is a Muslim ban designed not to confront terrorism but to placate the most hateful sections of American society.

Those countries whose citizens were found to be involved in terrorism in the United States are not on Mr Trump’s list.

Harun Khan, secretary general of the Muslim Council of Britain, said: “This ban on Muslims is not only an inconvenience, it is downright dangerous to our values of equality and non-discrimination. We are told that British values include the rule of law and mutual respect for and tolerance of those with different faiths and beliefs and for those without faith.

“And yet, our prime minister has found it hard to express these values when representing us on the world stage. At the same time, the ban will affect us here in Britain, as those with dual nationality such as Sir Mo Farah and the Conservative MP Nadhim Zahawi will also be affected by this ban.

“Our government should express in no uncertain terms how daft this policy is to its US counterparts, and press home how counter-productive it is in its professed fight to confront terrorism.

“In front of Mr Trump, the prime minister said that the point of the “special relationship” was to have a frank dialogue. Well, this is one area where we need to be frank about where we stand. As an important ally of the United States, surely we have a duty to remind them of the values on which they were founded upon.”
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(The Guardian) The global reaction to Trump’s travel ban continues. Our correspondent in Iraq Martin Chulov has just sent this: Iraq’s government was being urged on Sunday to impose a reciprocal ban and said it was continuing to examine the ramifications of the visa decision. The foreign relations committee said it supported a similar ban on US citizens entering Iraq, while the Popular Mobilisation Units, an umbrella group of mainly Shia militias, called for the expulsion of US citizens currently in the country.

Iraqi refugees who have been accepted into the US in the past decade have all been subjected to extensive vetting, involving interviews and background checks. Many have worked for the US military or government.

There has been no official reaction to the announcement from Yemen, or Libya, which have each been ravaged by civil war and have no functioning central government.
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(The Guardian) According to this piece from CNN there was a sense of confusion and chaos when Trump announced his executive order, with homeland security officials being unaware of the detail of the plan.

When President Donald Trump declared at the Pentagon Friday he was enacting strict new measures to prevent domestic terror attacks, there were few within his government who knew exactly what he meant.

Administration officials weren’t immediately sure which countries’ citizens would be barred from entering the United States. The Department of Homeland Security was left making a legal analysis on the order after Trump signed it. A Border Patrol agent, confronted with arriving refugees, referred questions only to the president himself, according to court filings.

-Read more: http://edition.cnn.com/2017/01/28/politics/donald-trump-travel-ban/index.html
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(The Guardian) That sense of confusion – and fear – is clear in some of the conversations my colleague Alice Ross has been having with people caught up in the US travel ban.

A Palestinian woman living in New York: I’m an architect from the West Bank and I live in New York with my spouse, who holds American citizenship. I have my green card and planned to travel to Palestine this week to visit my family, who were very excited to see me. I also wanted to renew my passport, which is expiring soon.

After hearing about yesterday’s ban, we decided to cancel my flight until we have some clarity. It’s true that Palestine is not on the list of banned countries but the fact that the order is so random and vague makes the situation scary. I am afraid if I travel and they expand the order, I will be in limbo and I will be living apart from my spouse for an unknown period.

My family is so disappointed I’m not going home, and I don’t know what to do about my new passport. I’ve also lost money by cancelling the flight. Right now everything is so vague and unclear. If they go ahead with these orders it will make the US a big prison where so many people will hate living here. I’m just waiting and hoping for some clarity in the next few days, but I have no idea whether to just risk it and go to Palestine. It’s a mess.


And this from an employee at Dubai international airport gives a clear sense of the confusion among those trying to implement the ban: We’ve had no written instructions yet from the US, at least not on the frontline, and the instructions that we have received don’t mention dual nationality or green cards – it’s very unclear what to do.

So some people are stopped while others are being given the benefit of the doubt, so if, for example, a passenger is Syrian holding a US passport we’re turning a blind eye, we’re pretending we haven’t seen the Syrian passport.

One passenger stuck in the airport here is a Syrian green card holder who was denied boarding. Her family, her job, her whole life is in the US and when she asks us when we will allow her to go home, none of us know what to say. Unfortunately because she’s Syrian it’s difficult for her to get a visa for Dubai and it’s difficult for her to go elsewhere.

At the moment her chances of getting into the US depends on which airport she goes to. If she’s landing in New York they’ll send her back, if it’s Houston they might accept her – what we’ve found is it really depends on which shift is operating, it’s not even a standard airport policy.

Last I heard they were trying any airport as long as she gets to US soil, and then at least once she’s there she can create a legal challenge or manage her way in instead of being stuck in Dubai.
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(The Guardian) According to CNN, Trump’s travel ban on people from seven mainly Muslim countries may be just the start.

It has just published a report that suggests the administration is considering asking all foreign visitors “to disclose all websites and social media sites they visit, and to share the contacts in their cell phones”.
-Read more: http://edition.cnn.com/2017/01/29/politics/donald-trump-immigrant-policy-social-media-contacts/index.html
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(The Guardian) According to Reuters, the Republican Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, has just said “we need to be careful” while carrying out President Trump’s order.

A bit more from Reuters on those comments from Mitch McConnell, the Republican Senate majority leader.

The US Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, a Republican, said the United States needs to “be careful” while implementing President Donald Trump’s new executive order targeting immigration from seven predominantly Muslim countries.

McConnell said on ABC’s This Week program it was a good idea to tighten the vetting of immigrants, but “I also think it’s important to remember that some of our best sources in the war against radical Islamic terrorism, are Muslims, both in this country and overseas ... We need to be careful as we do this.”
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(The Guardian) Political reaction is starting to gather pace in the US. Reuters has this: White House chief of staff Reince Priebus defended its implementation of Trump’s executive action targeting immigration from seven predominantly Muslim countries and said only two dozen travellers remain detained.

“It wasn’t chaos,” Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” program, adding that 325,000 travelers entered the United States on Saturday and 109 of them were detained.

“Most of those people were moved out. We’ve got a couple dozen more that remain and I would suspect that as long as they’re not awful people that they will move through before another half a day today,” he said.
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