Refugees Stopped at Airports After Trump’s Order
CreditJustin Lane/European Pressphoto Agency
WASHINGTON
— A federal judge in Brooklyn came to the aid of scores of refugees and
others who were trapped at airports across the United States on
Saturday after an executive order signed by President Trump, which
sought to keep many foreigners from entering the country, led to chaotic
scenes across the globe.
The
judge’s ruling blocked part of the president’s actions, preventing the
government from deporting some arrivals who found themselves ensnared by
the presidential order. But it stopped short of letting them into the
country or issuing a broader ruling on the constitutionality of Mr.
Trump’s actions.
The
high-stakes legal case played out on Saturday amid global turmoil, as
the executive order signed by the president slammed shut the borders of
the United States for an Iranian scientist headed to a lab in
Massachusetts, a Syrian refugee family headed to a new life in Ohio and
countless others across the world.
The
president’s order, enacted with the stroke of a pen at 4:42 p.m.
Friday, suspended entry of all refugees to the United States for 120
days, barred Syrian refugees indefinitely, and blocked entry into the
United States for 90 days for citizens of seven predominantly Muslim
countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.
The
Department of Homeland Security said that the order also barred green
card holders from those countries from re-entering the United States. In
a briefing for reporters, White House officials said that green card
holders from the seven affected countries who are outside the United
States would need a case-by-case waiver to return.
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Mr.
Trump — in office just a week — found himself accused of constitutional
and legal overreach by two Iraqi immigrants, defended by the American
Civil Liberties Union. Meanwhile, large crowds of protesters turned out
at airports around the country to denounce Mr. Trump’s ban on the entry
of refugees and people from seven predominantly Muslim countries.
Document
Darweesh v Trump Order
A federal judge blocked part of President Trump’s
executive order on immigration, ordering that refugees and others
trapped at airports across the United States should not be sent back to
their home countries.
Lawyers
who sued the government to block the White House order said the judge’s
decision could affect an estimated 100 to 200 people who were detained
upon arrival at American airports.
Judge
Ann M. Donnelly of Federal District Court in Brooklyn, who was
nominated by former President Barack Obama, ruled just before 9 p.m.
that implementing Mr. Trump’s order by sending the travelers home could
cause them “irreparable harm.” She said the government was “enjoined and
restrained from, in any manner and by any means, removing individuals”
who had arrived in the United States with valid visas or refugee status.
The
ruling does not appear to force the administration to let in people
otherwise blocked by Mr. Trump’s order who have not yet traveled to the
United States.
The
judge’s one-page ruling came swiftly after lawyers for the A.C.L.U.
testified in her courtroom that one of the people detained at an airport
was being put on a plane to be deported back to Syria at that very
moment. A government lawyer, Gisela A. Westwater, who spoke to the court
by phone from Washington, said she simply did not know.
Hundreds
of people waited outside of the courthouse chanting, “Set them free!”
as lawyers made their case. When the crowd learned that Judge Donnelly
had ruled in favor of the plaintiffs, a rousing cheer went up in the
crowd.
Minutes
after the judge’s ruling in New York City, another judge, Leonie M.
Brinkema of Federal District Court in Virginia, issued a temporary
restraining order for a week to block the removal of any green card
holders being detained at Dulles International Airport.
Protests at J.F.K. Against Immigration Ban
Peaceful demonstrations began
Saturday afternoon at Kennedy International Airport in Queens, where
nearly a dozen travelers had been detained, an airport official said.
By DAPHNE RUSTOW and AINARA TIEFENTHÄLER on Publish Date January 28, 2017.
Photo by Victor J. Blue for The New York Times.
Watch in Times Video »
Around
the nation, security personnel at major international airports had new
rules to follow, though the application of the order appeared chaotic
and uneven. Humanitarian organizations delivered the bad news to
overseas families that had overcome the bureaucratic hurdles previously
in place and were set to travel. And refugees already on flights when
the order was signed on Friday found themselves detained upon arrival.
“We’ve
gotten reports of people being detained all over the country,” said
Becca Heller, the director of the International Refugee Assistance
Project. “They’re literally pouring in by the minute.”
Earlier
in the day, at the White House, Mr. Trump shrugged off the sense of
anxiety and disarray, suggesting that there had been an orderly rollout.
“It’s not a Muslim ban, but we were totally prepared,” he said. “It’s
working out very nicely. You see it at the airports, you see it all
over.”
But to many, the government hardly seemed prepared for the upheaval that Mr. Trump’s actions put into motion.
There
were numerous reports of students attending American universities who
were blocked from returning to the United States from visits abroad. One
student said in a Twitter post that he would be unable to study at
Yale. Another who attends the Massachusetts Institute of Technology was
refused permission to board a plane. A Sudanese graduate student at
Stanford University was blocked for hours from entering the country.
Human
rights groups reported that legal permanent residents of the United
States who hold green cards were being stopped in foreign airports as
they sought to return from funerals, vacations or study abroad. There
was widespread condemnation of the order, from religious leaders,
business executives, academics, political leaders and others. Mr.
Trump’s supporters offered praise, calling it a necessary step on behalf
of the nation’s security.
Homeland
Security officials said on Saturday night that 109 people who were
already in transit to the United States when the order was signed were
denied access; 173 were stopped before boarding planes heading to
America.
Eighty-one people who were stopped were eventually given
waivers to enter the United States, officials said.
Legal
residents who have a green card and are currently in the United States
should meet with a consular officer before leaving the country, a White
House official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, told reporters.
Officials did not clarify the criteria that would qualify someone for a
waiver, other than that it would be granted “in the national interest.”
But
the week-old administration appeared to be implementing the order
chaotically, with agencies and officials around the globe interpreting
it in different ways.
The Stanford student, Nisrin Omer, a legal permanent resident, said she was held at Kennedy International Airport
in New York for about five hours but was eventually allowed to leave
the airport. Others who were detained appeared to be still in custody or
sent back to their home countries.
White
House aides claimed on Saturday that there had been consultations with
State Department and homeland security officials about carrying out the
order. “Everyone who needed to know was informed,” one aide said.
But
that assertion was denied by multiple officials with knowledge of the
interactions, including two officials at the State Department. Leaders
of Customs and Border Protection
and of Citizenship and Immigration Services — the two agencies most
directly affected by the order — were on a telephone briefing on the new
policy even as Mr. Trump signed it on Friday, two officials said.
Document: A.C.L.U. Complaint on Trump Immigration Order
The
A.C.L.U.’s legal case began with two Iraqis detained at Kennedy
Airport, the named plaintiffs in the case. One was en route to reunite
with his wife and son in Texas. The other had served alongside Americans
in Iraq for a decade.
Shortly
after noon on Saturday, Hameed Khalid Darweesh, an interpreter who
worked for more than a decade on behalf of the United States government
in Iraq, was released. After nearly 19 hours of detention, Mr. Darweesh
began to cry as he spoke to reporters, putting his hands behind his back
and miming handcuffs.
“What I do for this country? They put the cuffs on,” Mr. Darweesh said. “You know how many soldiers I touch by this hand?”
The
other man the lawyers are representing, Haider Sameer Abdulkhaleq
Alshawi, who was en route to Houston, was released Saturday night.
Before
the two men were released, one of the lawyers, Mark Doss, a supervising
attorney at the International Refugee Assistance Project, asked an
official, “Who is the person we need to talk to?”
“Call Mr. Trump,” said the official, who declined to identify himself.
While
the judge’s ruling means that none of the detainees will be sent back
immediately, lawyers for the plaintiffs in the case expressed concern
that all those at the airports would now be put in detention, pending a
resolution of the case.
The
White House said the restrictions would protect “the United States from
foreign nationals entering from countries compromised by terrorism” and
allow the administration time to put in place “a more rigorous vetting
process.” But critics condemned Mr. Trump over the collateral damage on
people who had no sinister intentions in trying to come to the United
States.
Peaceful
protests began forming Saturday afternoon at Kennedy Airport, where
nine travelers had been detained upon arrival at Terminal 7 and two
others at Terminal 4, an airport official said. Similar scenes were
playing out at other airports across the nation.
An
official message to all American diplomatic posts around the world
provided instructions about how to treat people from the countries
affected: “Effective immediately, halt interviewing and cease issuance
and printing” of visas to the United States.
Internationally,
confusion turned to panic as travelers found themselves unable to board
flights bound for the United States. In Dubai and Istanbul, airport and
immigration officials turned passengers away at boarding gates and, in
at least one case, ejected a family from a flight it had boarded.
Seyed
Soheil Saeedi Saravi, a promising young Iranian scientist, had been
scheduled to travel in the coming days to Boston, where he had been
awarded a fellowship to study cardiovascular medicine at Harvard,
according to Thomas Michel, the professor who was to supervise the
research fellowship.
But Professor Michel said the visas for the student and his wife had been indefinitely suspended.
“This
outstanding young scientist has enormous potential to make
contributions that will improve our understanding of heart disease, and
he has already been thoroughly vetted,” Professor Michel wrote to The
New York Times.
Document: Virginia Ruling on Trump Order
A Syrian family of six who have been living in a Turkish refugee camp since fleeing their home in 2014 had been scheduled to arrive on Tuesday in Cleveland. Instead, the family’s trip has been called off.
“Everyone
is just so heartbroken, so angry, so sad,” said Danielle Drake, the
community manager for US Together, an agency that resettles refugees.
A
Christian family of six from Syria said in an email to Representative
Charlie Dent, Republican of Pennsylvania, that they were being detained
on Saturday morning at Philadelphia International Airport despite having
legal paperwork, green cards and visas that had been approved.
In
the case of the two Iraqis held at Kennedy Airport, the legal filings
by his lawyers say that Mr. Darweesh was granted a special immigrant
visa on Jan. 20, the same day Mr. Trump was sworn in as president.
A
husband and father of three, Mr. Darweesh arrived at Kennedy Airport
with his family. Mr. Darweesh’s wife and children made it through
passport control and customs, but agents of Customs and Border
Protection detained him.
In
Istanbul, during a stopover on Saturday, passengers reported that
security officers had entered a plane after everyone had boarded and
ordered a young Iranian woman and her family to leave the aircraft.
Iranian
green card holders who live in the United States were blindsided by the
decree while on vacation in Iran, finding themselves in a legal limbo
and unsure whether they would be able to return to America.
“How
do I get back home now?” said Daria Zeynalia, a green card holder who
was visiting family in Iran. He had rented a house and leased a car, and
would be eligible for citizenship in November. “What about my job? If I
can’t go back soon, I’ll lose everything.”
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