The states of Hawaii and Oregon joined Washington and Minnesota on Thursday in their legal challenge against President Donald Trump’s revised travel ban, which goes into effect March 16, and the states of New York and Massachusetts have said they will join the challenge, too.
The Washington Post reports that Hawaii filed a lawsuit against the revised ban Wednesday, saying that the order would harm its Muslim population, tourism and foreign students.
The new executive order, which was announced Monday, bars new visas for people from six Muslim-majority countries and temporarily shuts down the U.S. refugee program. The order does not apply to travelers who already have visas, unlike the initial order.
On Feb. 22, Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum asked to join Washington and Minnesota in their lawsuit opposing the travel ban, arguing that it harmed Oregon in the same way it harmed Washington and forced Oregon to violate its own laws against discrimination. U.S. District Judge James Robart granted Oregon’s request Thursday.
Washington, which was the first state to sue over the original ban, has asked a federal judge to affirm that the order blocking the first travel ban will apply to the revised ban as well.
Washington state Attorney General Bob Ferguson said Thursday that he would ask the judge to extend his temporary restraining order against the first ban to Trump’s revised order.
The revised ban bars visas for people from Somalia, Iran, Syria, Sudan, Libya and Yemen.
Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey announced Thursday that her state would be joining Washington’s lawsuit and said that Trump’s travel ban “remains a discriminatory and unconstitutional attempt to make good on his campaign promise to implement a Muslim ban.”
According to the Post, Healey’s office dropped its case in Massachusetts against the first travel ban voluntarily and will consolidate legal efforts to challenge what Healey called the Trump administration’s “unlawful immigration policies.”
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman called the revised executive order “a Muslim ban by another name,” and said in a statement Thursday that his office is also joining the lawsuit.
The Post reports that White House press secretary Sean Spicer says the administration is confident that the revised ban will stand up to legal scrutiny.
During a White House briefing Thursday, Spicer said that administration officials “feel very confident with how that was crafted and the input that was given.”
The administration is confident, and so am I. I am confident that even more states will join this lawsuit, and we will get rid of Trump’s ridiculous, xenophobic and Islamophobic ban for good.
Read more at the Washington Post.