Trump’s New Muslim Ban versus Vermont’s New Syrian Refugee Program: Time For Nullification?

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Vermont attorney general T.J. Donovan announces task force to study impact of Trump executive order.

Kudos to VtDigger for covering the impact of Mr. Trump’s new ban on Muslim refugees entering the United States here in our Green Mountains of Vermont. Let’s begin by acknowledging that Trump’s “if we bomb you, we ban you” executive order is an astonishingly grotesque policy move, given the U.S. military’s central role in the systematic destruction of Syria over the past several years (the Obama administration dropped more than 12,000 bombs on Syrians last year, and reportedly ran out of bombs a few months ago.) Vermont has long provided a sanctuary for refugees fleeing from violence and instability from all parts of the world – Africa, eastern Europe, Asia and the Middle East.

Here in Vermont, we have options.  The one word solution to Mr. Trump’s grotesque federal/imperial overreach? NULLIFICATION. The Vermont legislature can declare the Trump administration’s executive order to be “null and void” within the borders of our Green Mountains, and bring the Syrian refugees here as we have been planning to do for months. Both constitutional and historical precedent are on our side – see Vermont’s 1858 nullification of the Fugitive Slave Act, for example.

Will our elected legislators have the foresight and courage to consider this option? Time will tell.

Free Vermont, and long live the UNtied States!

VtDigger’s story, written by Rutland County beat reporter Adam Federman, below.

One week after the first Syrian refugee families arrived in Rutland, President Donald Trump plans to issue an executive order Thursday that indefinitely suspends the program.

The eight-page document, obtained by VTDigger, puts a 120-day hold on the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program and greatly reduces the overall number of refugees to be admitted to the United States for fiscal year 2017.

Syrian refugee resettlement will be resumed only when it has been determined “that sufficient changes have been made to the USRAP to ensure its alignment with the national interest,” according to the president’s executive order.

Rutland Mayor Chris Louras said the executive order “means that our community’s first two Syrian neighbors will be our last. And from a human perspective, history will prove this to be a monumental mistake for both the country and for our community.”

After the three-month period, refugees from other countries will be admitted on a case-by-case basis. The secretary of state will resume the refugee admissions program “only for nationals of countries for whom the Secretary of Homeland Security, the Secretary of State, and the Director of National Intelligence have jointly determined that sufficient safeguards are in place to ensure the security and welfare of the United States,” the order says.

The executive order, titled “Protecting the Nation from Terrorist Attacks by Foreign Nationals,” puts in place sweeping new limitations on immigration from certain countries including Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. It also calls for the establishment of safe zones in Syria and the surrounding region and the prioritization of refugees fleeing religious persecution, “provided that the religion of the individual is a minority religion in the individual’s country of nationality.”

The executive order comes just one week after the first two refugee families from Syria arrived in Rutland. In September, after months of debate, Rutland was selected as a new resettlement site for up to 100 Syrian and Iraqi refugees. Chittenden County is also expected to take in around 350 refugees this year primarily from Somalia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Bhutan.

According to State Department data, Vermont has resettled 142 refugees since the beginning of fiscal year 2017.

The Vermont Refugee Resettlement Program’s office in Rutland only recently opened, and the program has received a three-year grant to hire staff and provide services. Some of that funding has already been allocated, according to state refugee coordinator Denise Lamoureux. The grant application must be resubmitted every year.

For members of Rutland Welcomes — a group that has organized to support Syrian refugee resettlement — the news of the president’s order was devastating.

“We’re really disappointed,” said Hunter Berryhill, a spokesperson for the group. Berryhill described the suspension of the program as “unjust, inhumane, shortsighted and heartless.”

Trump derives his power to unilaterally freeze immigration for broad blocs of people from section 212(f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952. That law allows the president to curtail immigration of certain groups on various grounds, including national security and terrorism concerns.

After the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama issued executive orders halting immigration of specific people who belonged to terrorist groups. Obama, for example, issued an executive order in July 2011 banning immigration for anyone who was already disqualified under a United Nations Security Council travel ban, which included individuals who are members of terrorist groups.

Earlier Wednesday, Trump signed orders initiating construction of a border wall with Mexico, cutting federal funding for so-called sanctuary cities, and increasing the number of border patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.

“I think this is a complete betrayal of everything our country is about,” said Melanie Nezer, vice president of policy and advocacy at the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, based in New York City.

“We knew it was coming — this was something that was promised during the campaign,” Nezer said. “To see it happen, to see it on paper, it’s just unconscionable.”

Stacie Blake, director of government and community relations for the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, said the order “seems counter to our values.”

“It is a significant pivot from America’s traditional leadership on these issues,” Blake said.

Former ambassador to Syria Robert Ford said blocking refugees, especially those from predominantly Muslim countries, from entering the United States would send the wrong message and serve as a recruiting tool for Islamic terrorists. Though Ford said there were reasonable concerns about security and that it made sense for any new administration to learn about the vetting process, he said it would be counterproductive to suspend or indefinitely halt the program.

“Halting refugee resettlement over the long term is demonstrating to people in the Middle East that Americans don’t like Muslims, and it plays exactly into the hands of the Islamic State and other jihadi recruiters,” Ford said.

“The administration risks strategic incoherence, on the one hand sending American bombers to fight jihadi terrorists, and on the other adopting policies which promote further recruitment into those groups,” he said. Ford was ambassador to Syria from 2011 to 2014 and before that served as deputy ambassador in Iraq.

Nezer said the executive order was unprecedented, especially given that it was not a response to an act of war or national emergency. After 9/11 the program was temporarily suspended but restarted in three months.

U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., has long advocated for the rights of refugees and immigrants. And while a spokesman said Leahy would not comment on the refugee order until it was issued Thursday, the Vermont senator railed against Trump’s proposal shortly after it was announced, calling it a “reprehensible proposition” that runs “contrary to the fundamental principles on which this nation was founded.”

Last year, Leahy reintroduced the Refugee Protection Act, which would have expanded protections for asylum seekers from across the world.

The bill — which has not drawn a single Republican co-sponsor — would, among other things, extend Social Security benefits for refugees coming to America, provide more oversight of immigration detention facilities, and eliminate time limits for asylum applications. It would also add standards aimed at protecting victims of terrorism from being defined as terrorists when they apply for asylum.

A Leahy aide said Vermont’s senior senator would work diligently to push back against Trump’s immigration orders, pointing out that he was recently assigned to the immigration subcommittee of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Trump’s crackdown on refugees follows an unprecedented year of immigration of Muslim refugees. According to the Pew Research Center, 38,901 Muslim refugees entered the U.S. in 2016 — nearly half of the total 85,000 refugees who came to America seeking asylum last year.

Under Trump’s proposed executive order the total number of refugees admitted to the United States will be slashed from 110,000 to 50,000 in the current fiscal year.

Published in VTDigger – Thursday, January 26, 2017.