Tuesday, March 28, 2017

Another Suit Challenges Trump's Latest Travel Ban Executive Order

Last week, another suit was filed challenging President Trump's latest travel ban Executive Order on, among others, Establishment Clause and equal protection grounds.  The suit was brought by the largest organization of Shi’a Muslims in the United States,as well as by a Yemeni couple living in the United States. The complaint (full text) in Universal Muslim Association of America, Inc. v. Trump, (D DC, filed 3/23/2017), seeks a nationwide injunction barring the government from enforcing the sections of the Executive Order that temporarily bar or make more difficult travel into the U.S. by nationals of certain majority-Muslim nations.  As explained by a press release from Americans United:
There are two sets of plaintiffs in the case. They include the Universal Muslim Association of America (UMAA), the country’s largest organization of Shi’a Muslims, whose members are being deprived of religious learning, worship and services because their religious scholars almost exclusively hail from Iran, Iraq and Syria.  One of their scholars has already been denied entry under the first Muslim ban executive order, and he and other scholars are likely to be denied entry again.  The second set of plaintiffs are John and Jane Doe -- parents blocked from bringing their children home from Yemen.