Thanks to a revised Executive Order signed on March 6, a new travel ban targeting majority Muslim nations will take effect this Thursday — or it might not. Attorneys from Michigan to Hawaii and beyond, as they work tirelessly in the name of civil rights and justice, have filed lawsuits demanding immediate censure of “an illegal and discriminatory attempt to ban Muslims,” so says Arab American Civil Rights League Director Rula Aoun.
“In America, we don’t target and prohibit people because of how they pray — and we don’t impose religious litmus tests on immigrants,” Aoun said. An attorney for the ACLU, Lee Gelernt, agrees with Aoun: The new order “discriminates on the basis of religion” and “will bring significant hardship to many people inside and outside the country.”
Where the original order banned citizens of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen for 90 days, all refugees for 120 days and Syrian citizens indefinitely, the new version removes Iraq and lifts the indefinite ban on Syrians. Opponents including the Arab-American Civil Rights League, the ACLU, and Nessel & Kessel Law hold that the ban will render harm not just to people but to tourism, morale, and the economy as well.
A federal judge could strike down the ban tonight.
The largest legal assault is a lawsuit filed by Washington state and joined by California, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York and Oregon. They argue that the ban will hurt their economies by limiting students and professors who can work and study at state universities, reducing tourism from the Middle East and curbing employment from those countries.
U.S. District Judge James Robart in Seattle, who halted Trump’s first ban, is hearing this lawsuit, too. He gave government lawyers until Tuesday night to file a response. Robart could issue an order immediately after that, or schedule a hearing later this week.
Source: USA Today