Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson, who had sued successfully to block President Donald Trump’s first travel ban, said Thursday that he will ask a federal judge to affirm that the suspension of the initial ban applies to the new one.
Ferguson said Trump’s new executive order imposes many of the same harms as the first one in late January, even though it is different in important ways. And he said a federal judge, rather than the administration, should decide whether the original freeze should remain in place.
“The court decides that,” Ferguson said, “not the president.”
Ferguson said he will make his request to U.S. District Judge James L. Robart, the federal judge in Washington state who first suspended Trump’s ban nationwide. After Robart imposed that freeze, Trump lashed out on Twitter and seemed to target Robart personally.
“The opinion of this so-called judge, which essentially takes law-enforcement away from our country, is ridiculous and will be overturned!” Trump wrote.
The state of Hawaii already has asked a federal judge there to block Trump’s new executive order, which bars the issuance of new visas to citizens of six Muslim-majority countries for 90 days and suspends the refugee program for 120 days. A hearing in that case is set for March 15.
Robart could presumably act before that, and it is possible that other legal challenges could also emerge. Ferguson said the states of Oregon and New York would join his challenge. New York’s attorney general dropped out of a case in that state Thursday to be a part of the effort in Washington.
The first ban affected seven countries and the refugee program, and the administration implemented it by revoking tens of thousands of visas and detaining people as they landed at U.S. airports. The new ban specifically exempts current visa holders and spells out a robust list of people who might be granted waivers as they apply for new visas.
Justice Department lawyers have said that the administration plans to enforce the measure on March 16, unless a court tells them otherwise.
Ferguson and other state lawyers said they believe the burden is on the government to convince a judge that the freeze should not be in effect, rather than the other way around.
(c) 2017, The Washington Post ยท Matt Zapotosky
