Attorneys who sued the Trump administration over the president’s executive order on refugees and immigrants didn’t wait for a ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit to make their next move.
Challenges to the order are moving forward in courts around the country, with American Civil Liberties Union attorneys aiming to force the government to turn over the names of any individuals who have been detained or turned away from the United States.
The 9th Circuit on Thursday upheld an order barring the Trump administration from enforcing the ruling.
But in the days leading up to the decision, Virginia’s Democratic attorney general has prepared for a preliminary injunction hearing on Friday that could provide the most substantive examination of the merits behind the executive order.
“The hearings in other states have been slightly more truncated examinations of the merits for purposes of a temporary restraining order, which is a short-term injunction,” said Michael Kelly, spokesman for Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring. “If the Commonwealth is successful in securing a preliminary injunction, it would indicate that Virginia is likely to prevail on the merits of its challenge to President Trump’s ban, and it will be a more durable injunction that will last all the way through trial — so potentially weeks or months.”
Mr. Trump’s executive order indefinitely halted the resettlement of Syrian refugees in the U.S., blocked other refugees for 120 days and temporarily barred nearly all citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries — Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen — from traveling to the U.S. The administration has said the delays are meant to give the government a chance to improve its screening of travelers from those countries.
Chaos and protests broke out at airports across the country as foreign nationals from the affected countries, who were already on flights bound to the United States when the order was signed Jan. 27, were detained and in some cases turned away and put back on planes headed out of the country.
A mounting number of lawsuits has challenged the constitutionality of Mr. Trump’s order, and a federal judge in Seattle halted enforcement of the order nationwide with the issuance of a temporary restraining order on Feb. 3.
A three-judge panel from the 9th Circuit heard arguments in that case Tuesday, and ruled late Thursday to uphold the temporary retraining order that paused enforcement of Mr. Trump’s executive action.
In the intervening days, attorneys involved in other cases have sought to force the administration to disclose additional details about the order’s enforcement.
A judge in Brooklyn, New York, ordered the Justice Department on Jan. 28 to disclose the names of all individuals who were detained at airports across the country after Mr. Trump’s order took effect.
But nearly two weeks since the ruling, the ACLU alleges that the Justice Department has failed to comply with the order and has sought intervention from the judge to force the government to turn over a list of names.
“Despite repeated written requests for this list, respondents have yet to provide petitioners’ counsel with even one name of any person held at any U.S. airport or returned to a foreign port,” ACLU attorneys wrote in a motion filed Tuesday in the federal court in Brooklyn.
A Justice Department spokeswoman declined to comment on the motion.
In documents filed in the case, Steven Platt, a DOJ attorney working on the case, wrote to the plaintiffs on Jan. 31 that authorities “are not aware of CBP [or ICE] detaining any individual anywhere in the country under the Executive Order. By ’detained,’ I do not mean individuals who are being processed at a port of entry.”
Lee Gelernt, an ACLU attorney involved in the Brooklyn case, said the difference between what the government and the plaintiffs regard as “detained” seems to be “a semantic evasion.”
“Because if someone is being held back there in the airport for 30 hours, no matter what the government wants to call it, it’s detention,” Mr. Gelernt said.
He said attorneys are seeking a list of the individuals who were detained or removed to get a full accounting of those affected by the order so they can reach out and offer legal aid to those removed.
The federal judge overseeing the Virginia challenge has also ordered that the government turn over a list of individuals with Virginia ties who were denied entry or removed as a result of the order. The government is required to respond by the close of business Thursday, but had not done so late Thursday evening.
• Andrea Noble can be reached at anoble@washingtontimes.com.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.