WASHINGTON — Virginia has joined a legal fight to block President Donald Trump’s revised temporary travel ban.
Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring has joined 13 other attorneys general, including those from D.C. and Maryland, in filing an amicus brief in U.S. District Court for the District of Hawaii.
The brief, filed late Monday, supports Hawaii’s request for a temporary restraining order to stop enforcement of the ban.
“We’re going to continue to fight this ban alongside our fellow states because — even after all the concessions President Trump made from the first ban to the second — it still remains a harmful, deeply un-American and unconstitutional attempt to enact the Muslim ban he promised as a candidate,” Herring said.
An executive order issued by the president on March 6 — scheduled to take effect Thursday — bans new visas for travelers from Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. It also means no refugees will be admitted to the U.S. for 120 days.
The temporary ban is necessary, Trump said, so that screening and vetting procedures can be improved to better prevent terrorists from entering the country.
A separate attempt to block the travel ban will get a court hearing Wednesday in Greenbelt. Those who filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, including the ACLU of Maryland, are also seeking a temporary restraining order.
