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Donald Trump's new Muslim ban released Monday aims to get past certain legal hurdles that hobbled his first effort, but the administration's intent hasn't changed one bit: it's still a duplicitous political effort to vilify Muslims and keep them from entering the U.S. while doing little to improve the safety of Americans. Here's a good summation of the changes from Daniel Benjamin:
The cosmetic surgery was clearly undertaken to strengthen the administration’s chances in the expected court fight. Gone, for example, are the clauses affecting Green Card holders and those in transit with valid visas—both classes who would easily have standing to sue. Iraqis, who happen to be doing most of the fighting and dying in the battle against ISIS, are exempt, thus assuaging the concerns of the Pentagon and others who worried the order would undermine our struggle against jihadist terrorism. Now, the blanket ban is focused on those about whom the courts are least concerned: Foreign nationals from Sudan, Libya, Somalia, Iran, Syria and Yemen who don’t live in the United States now and who don’t hold visas to travel here.
The New York Times editorial board notes that the ban also won’t go into effect for almost two weeks, thus eliminating some of the immediate chaos caused by the first original ban.
These changes are, no doubt, intended to address the due process concerns that led the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit to affirm a lower-court ruling that put a hold on part of the original order. But while these changes are important, they do not fix the core problem with the executive order: The administration is waging an all-out assault on Islam and Muslims. [...]
Left off are the predominately Christian countries that the State Department lists as “Terrorist Safe Havens” like Colombia, the Philippines and Venezuela.
In fact, tellingly, one of the biggest sections stricken from the original ban leveled a slew of unfounded claims that government lawyers failed to provide any basis for whatsoever during the Ninth Circuit court proceedings.
Numerous foreign-born individuals have been convicted or implicated in terrorism-related crimes since September 11, 2001, including foreign nationals who entered the United States after receiving visitor, student, or employment visas, or who entered through the United States refugee resettlement program. Deteriorating conditions in certain countries due to war, strife, disaster, and civil unrest increase the likelihood that terrorists will use any means possible to enter the United States.
Since the numbers do not bear out the accusations made in the original order, the new order relies mostly on why the “conditions in these countries present heightened threats.” But if the goal was really safety, Trump's henchmen would have trained their misguided sights on different countries than the order singles out. The only reason Iraq was left off the list is because Pentagon officials clearly let the White House know that preventing the entry of Iraqis who helped and protected U.S. soldiers would uniquely hamstring military efforts to fight ISIS abroad.
In short, any legitimate effort to protect Americans would have focused on improved methods of vetting individuals rather than weeding out groups of people by country.
The Department of Homeland Security concluded last month that “country of citizenship is unlikely to be a reliable indicator of potential terrorist activity.”
In the end, any document produced by the Trump officials will still carry the indelible liability of Trump's stated intent on the campaign trail: a ban on Muslims entering the country. During the Ninth Circuit proceedings government lawyers tried and failed to keep the judges focused on the "four corners" of the document, excluding entirely the context in which the document was created. It didn't work then and it's impossible to see how it will work now.