WASHINGTON
A United States federal appeals court early Sunday rejected a request by the Department of Justice to immediately reinstate President Donald Trump’s travel ban.
Trump’s administration had lodged the request with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals as part of an appeal against a lower court order temporarily suspending the travel ban on citizens from seven mainly Muslim countries.
For now, the travel ban suspension remains in place.
Both the State and Homeland Security Departments said Saturday they were resuming normal practices concerning travellers from the affected countries.
Judge William Canby Jr in Phoenix and Judge Michelle Friedland in San Francisco did not give a reason for their denial in a two-paragraph ruling.
However, they told the states of Washington and Minnesota, which had filed the original suit against Trump’s travel ban, to provide documents detailing their opposition to the government’s appeal by 11:59pm Sunday.
The Department of Justice was given a deadline of 3pm Monday to supply more documents supporting its position.
Judge Robart probed a Justice Department lawyer on what he called the “litany of harms” suffered by Washington state’s universities, and also questioned the administration’s use of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States as a justification for the ban.
Robart said no attacks had been carried out on U.S. soil by individuals from the seven countries affected by the travel ban since that assault. For Trump’s order to be constitutional, Robart said, it had to be “based in fact, as opposed to fiction.”
Gulf carrier Qatar Airways will allow passengers barred by an executive order last week to board flights to the United States, after Robart’s order, a spokeswoman told Reuters.
But for some who had changed their travel plans following the ban, the order was not enough reassurance.
In Dubai, Tariq Laham, 32, and his fiancee Natalia had scrapped plans to travel to the U.S. after their July wedding in Poland, where Natalia is from.
Laham said the couple would not reverse their decision.
“It is just too risky,” said Laham, a Syrian who works as a director of commercial operations at a multinational technology company. “Everyday you wake up and there is a new decision.”
The White House said it would file an appeal as soon as possible.
“At the earliest possible time, the Department of Justice intends to file an emergency stay of this outrageous order and defend the executive order of the president, which we believe is lawful and appropriate,” the White House said in a statement.
“The president’s order is intended to protect the homeland and he has the constitutional authority and responsibility to protect the American people.”
Washingon Governor Jay Inslee celebrated the decision as a victory for the state, adding: “No person – not even the president – is above the law.”
The judge’s decision was welcomed by groups protesting the ban.
“This order demonstrates that federal judges throughout the country are seeing the serious constitutional problems with this order,” said Nicholas Espiritu, a staff attorney at the National Immigration Law Center.
Eric Ferrero, Amnesty International USA spokesman, lauded the short-term relief provided by the order but added: “Congress must step in and block this unlawful ban for good.”
But the fluid legal situation was illustrated by the fact that Robart’s ruling came just hours after a federal judge in Boston declined to extend a temporary restraining order allowing some immigrants into the United States from countries affected by Trump’s three-month ban.
A Reuters poll earlier this week indicated that the immigration ban has popular support, with 49 percent of Americans agreeing with the order and 41 percent disagreeing. Some 53 percent of Democrats said they “strongly disagree” with Trump’s action while 51 percent of Republicans said they “strongly agree.”
At least one company, the ride-hailing giant Uber, was moving quickly Friday night to take advantage of the ruling.
CEO Travis Kalanick, who quit Trump’s business advisory council this week in the face of a fierce backlash from Uber customers and the company’s many immigrant drivers, said on Twitter: “We have a team of in-house attorneys who’ve been working night & day to get U.S. resident drivers & stranded families back into country.
“I just chatted with our head of litigation Angela, who’s buying a whole bunch of airline tickets ASAP!! #homecoming #fingerscrossed”
The decision in Washington state came at the end of a day of furious legal activity around the country over the immigration ban. The Trump administration has justified its actions on national security grounds, but opponents have labeled it an unconstitutional order targeting people based on religious beliefs.
In Boston, U.S. District Judge Nathan Gorton expressed skepticism during oral arguments about a civil rights group’s claim that Trump’s order represented religious discrimination, before declining to extend the restraining order.
U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema in Alexandria, Virginia, ordered the federal government to give the state a list by Thursday of “all persons who have been denied entry to or removed from the United States.”
The state of Hawaii on Friday also filed a lawsuit alleging that the order is unconstitutional and asking the court to block the order across the country.
He lists several examples of Syrian friends from around the world, whose work and personal life had been thrown into disarray by Trump’s orders.
One has been unable to visit family residing in the U.S., while another was unsure whether they would be able to take up a job offer in California after their U.S. visa appointment was canceled in the wake of the ban.
