Elections have Consequences

January 28, 2017

Comments

Via AFP:

An Iraqi family was barred from flying from Cairo to New York on Saturday after US President Donald Trump signed an order restricting arrivals from seven Muslim-majority countries.

[…]

Fuad Sharef, 51, and his wife and three children were instead forced to board a flight back to Erbil in Iraq’s semi-autonomous region of Kurdistan, he told AFP.

Trump had on Friday signed a sweeping executive order to suspend refugee arrivals and impose tough controls on travelers from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.

“I had sold my house, my car, my furniture. I resigned from work and so did my wife. I took my children out of school,” said Sharef of the family’s preparations to resettle in Nashville, Tennessee under a special immigrant visa.

[…]

“Donald Trump destroyed my life. My family’s life. I used to think America was a state of institutions but it’s as though it’s a dictatorship,” he said.

“For a decision like this to come out and be implemented immediately, and against whom? Against a valid visa holder.”

“I put my life at risk, working with the Americans at a time that it could have gotten you killed,” he added.

6 responses to “Elections have Consequences”

Hal_10000

January 28, 2017 at 6:27 pm

The Republicans will never stop Trump on principle. The only way to get through is to keep showing how cruel and destructive his policies are until you have an overwhelming popular tide against them.
Just ‘nutha ig’rant cracker

January 28, 2017 at 6:36 pm

Stand by for bill or one of the other knotheads to enter this discussion proclaiming that he has no concern for what is happening to some towelhead and that this man’s situation is exactly why he voted for Trump in the first place.

(Did I mention that Mr. Sharef should just stop his whining and grow a pair?)
Gustopher

January 28, 2017 at 7:03 pm

From the text of the executive order:

the Secretaries of State and Homeland Security may jointly determine to admit individuals to the United States as refugees on a case-by-case basis, in their discretion, but only so long as they determine that the admission of such individuals as refugees is in the national interest — including when the person is a religious minority in his country of nationality facing religious persecution, when admitting the person would enable the United States to conform its conduct to a preexisting international agreement, or when the person is already in transit and denying admission would cause undue hardship — and it would not pose a risk to the security or welfare of the United States

It sounds like the order is being implemented incorrectly. The Sharef family hits nearly every single one of the exception cases, and should not have been sent back before they had a chance to get the two Secretaries to approve them.

The cruelty of the policy is only matched by the incompetence of the implementation.

Further, if we don’t stand by our allies (both countries and people), why would anyone ally themselves with us?
al-Ameda

January 28, 2017 at 9:01 pm

@Hal_10000:

The Republicans will never stop Trump on principle. The only way to get through is to keep showing how cruel and destructive his policies are until you have an overwhelming popular tide against them.

I have a hard time imagining any kind of Congressional Republican mutiny against Trump prior to the 2018 mid-term elections. And waiting on that bus is dicey at best.

I’m of the opinion that the only thing that might cause an early firestorm would be either, (1) disclosure that Trump actually had sleaze bag Russian connections and prior knowledge of the Russian effort to influence our election, and/or (2) his tax returns are leaked and contain evidence of potentially compromising ties to Russian financiers.

He’s an appalling grease ball but Congressional Republicans are looking to run the table with President Queeg at the helm. It’s Kool Aid Time in D.C.
DrDaveT

January 28, 2017 at 10:58 pm

@Gustopher:

It sounds like the order is being implemented incorrectly.

That can’t possibly have anything to do with the fact that exceptions require joint action by two woefully understaffed agencies (now also under hiring freezes) that have no administrative mechanism in place whereby they could reach a joint determination about anything. Right?
Just ‘nutha ig’rant cracker

January 29, 2017 at 11:02 am

@DrDaveT: Purely coincidental, I assure you.