U.S. Marines Have Landed in Syria

Well, you know what they say: Send in the Marines!

And they have.

At the Washington Post, "Marines have arrived in Syria to fire artillery in the fight for Raqqa":

Marines from an amphibious task force have left their ships in the Middle East and deployed to Syria, establishing an outpost from which they can fire artillery guns in support of the fight to oust the Islamic State from the northern Syrian city of Raqqa, defense officials said.

The deployment marks a new escalation in the U.S. war in Syria, and puts more conventional U.S. troops in the battle. Several hundred Special Operations troops have advised local forces there for months, but the Pentagon has mostly shied away from using conventional forces in Syria. The new mission comes as the Trump administration weighs a plan to help Syrian rebels take back Raqqa, the de facto capital of the Islamic State. The plan also includes more Special Operations troops and attack helicopters.

The force is part of the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit, which left San Diego on Navy ships in October. The Marines on the ground include part of an artillery battery that can fire powerful 155-millimeter shells from M-777 Howitzers, two officials said, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the deployment.

The expeditionary unit’s ground force, Battalion Landing Team 1st Battalion, 4th Marines, will man the guns and deliver fire support for U.S.-backed local forces who are preparing an assault on the city. Additional infantrymen from the unit will provide security, while resupplies will be handled by part of the expeditionary force’s combat logistics element. For this deployment, the Marines were flown from Djibouti to Kuwait and then into Syria, said another defense official with direct knowledge of the operation.

The official added that the Marines’ movement into Syria was not the byproduct of President Trump’s request for a new plan to take on the Islamic State...

Keep reading.

Sebastian Gorka Joins the Trump Administration

I like this guy so much it's ridiculous.

Here's his book, at Amazon, Defeating Jihad: The Winnable War.

And on Twitter:

Another Breitbarter to join WH https://t.co/J02X4IkI1x

— Hadas Gold (@Hadas_Gold) January 24, 2017

Well the radio silence is over.
Congrats to those who guessed!

Honored to be Deputy Assistant to the President of the United States.
MAGA pic.twitter.com/wgTy70E4jx

— Sebastian Gorka PhD (@SebGorka) January 31, 2017

Sensible Pause in U.S. Entry Policies

From Peter Brookes, at the Boston Herald, "Pause in U.S. entry policies sensible: Trump’s order targets countries with terror risks":

People will spin it anyway they like — and they will — but President Trump’s decision to take a pause and review travel to the United States from seven Middle Eastern and North African countries is sound national security policy.

It’s also completely defensible in these troubled times.

The presidential executive order will temporarily alter visa issuance, immigration and refugee flows to America from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen while U.S. entry programs are examined.

All of these countries have one thing in common: terrorism.

They may have a terrorist group operating within their borders or may have been slapped with the U.S. State Department’s State Sponsor of Terrorism designation as a country that uses terrorism or supports terrorist groups.

Of particular importance now is the Islamic State (aka ISIS) which, in my estimation, is in big trouble. The “caliphate” is under significant pressure in Syria and Iraq as forces close in on its key strongholds in Raqqa and Mosul.

For instance, Iraqi forces, with U.S. support, have made significant advances against ISIS since the battle for Mosul began last fall. The going is still tough, but Iraqi forces have reportedly taken back a good chunk of Iraq’s second largest city from ISIS fighters.

While Raqqa is still functioning as the Islamic State’s capital, tougher days are ahead for ISIS there. Syrian Kurdish and Arab forces, with U.S. help, are targeting the terrorist headquarters for a final assault.

But taking Raqqa won’t terminate ISIS...

More.

Open Dissent as State Department Staffers Sign Opposition Memo Against Trump

I tweeted earlier upon seeing WaPo's report:

Dissent memo circulating in the State Department over Trump's policy on refugees and immigrants https://t.co/WIGCPLVWZX

— Washington Post (@washingtonpost) January 30, 2017

State Department employees should resign if they don't support #PresidentTrump. #BreakingNews #MAGA #TRUMP https://t.co/BRKU8sURSt

— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) January 30, 2017

And at Axios, "Hundreds of State employees to oppose Trump travel ban":

Brookings' Lawfare Blog obtained a copy of a draft memo created by "numerous Foreign Service officers and other diplomats" to express dissent to President Trump's executive order restricting immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries. Hundreds of foreign service officers are expected to be party to the memo, which will be submitted through the State Department's Dissent Channel.

Here's the piece at Lawfare, "BREAKING NEWS: Full Text of Draft Dissent Channel Memo on Trump Refugee and Visa Order."

It's hard to remove career bureaucrats. They can't easily be fired. But top people can, especially political appointees. So let's see how it goes over a State this week in terms of Trump's political apparatchiks. They might be able to offer the career staffers deals that can't refuse. Frankly, these long-term Foreign Service hacks are supposed to serve without fear or favor. They're supposed to carry out the policies of the elected administration. They're functionaries. And by dissenting they're violating the will of the American people who voted in a duly constituted election. This is how it works in this country. There should be consequences if this leftist charade goes on too long. Big consequences.

Via Memeorandum.

Debunking the Left's Despicable Attacks on Trump's Immigration Orders

Daniel Horowitz is the author of Stolen Sovereignty: How to Stop Unelected Judges from Transforming America.

He's got an awesome piece up at Conservative Review, "Separating Fact from Sickening Media Fiction on Trump's Immigration Executive Order."

This is bang-up phenomenal:

A potus acting through congress has the right to do this and its the most settled area of law https://t.co/uLrGBBeeC9 pic.twitter.com/4wvGaDXS0m

— Daniel Horowitz (@RMConservative) January 29, 2017

Settled law on the right of a nation to exclude or to place any conditions on LPRs https://t.co/ruTPSp0sNY pic.twitter.com/cmvvgCejZO

— Daniel Horowitz (@RMConservative) January 29, 2017

This is what American sovereignty looks like. https://t.co/xCMJfapqJT

— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) January 29, 2017

We are rapidly approaching a time when anything short of mass migration from the middle east will be ruled unconstitutional by the courts.

— Daniel Horowitz (@RMConservative) January 29, 2017

“Any alien coming to this country must or ought to know, that this being an independent nation, it has all the rights concerning the removal of aliens which belong by the law of nations to any other; that while he remains in the country in the character of an alien, he can claim no other privilege than such as an alien is entitled to, and consequently, whatever risque he may incur in that capacity is incurred voluntarily, with the hope that in due time by his unexceptionable conduct, he may become a citizen of the United States.” ~ Justice James Iredell, 1799.

There is a lot of confusion swirling around the events that transpired this weekend as a result of Trump’s executive order on immigration. Make no mistake: every word of Trump’s executive order is in accordance with statute. It’s important not to conflate political arguments with legal arguments, as many liberals and far too many “conservatives” on social media are doing. While the timing and coordination of implementing this order might have been poorly planned, we shouldn’t allow that to undermine the broader need to defend our sovereignty. For courts to violate years’ worth of precedent and steal our sovereignty should concern everyone.

What the order actually does

Among other things, the key provisions at the center of the existing controversy are as follows:

It shuts off the issuance of all new immigrant and non-immigrant visas for 90 days from the following seven volatile countries: Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen. Any non-citizen from those seven countries (not “all” Muslim countries) is excluded from entering the country during this time-period (which usually means they won’t be able to board a direct flight to America). After 30 days, the secretary of state and secretary of homeland security must submit a report to completely revamp the vetting process going forward.

Within 60 days, countries will have to submit any information that the administration determines necessary, pursuant to the findings of this report, in order to adjudicate a visa application and ensure they are properly vetted. Any country that fails to submit this information will not be able to send foreign nationals to our country. All the while, the ban can be extended and expanded at any time.

In addition, the entire refugee resettlement program is suspended for four months pending a complete investigation of the program and a plan to restructure it and prioritize those who are truly in danger of religious persecution. After 120 days, the program may resume, but only for those countries Secretaries Kelly and Tillerson determine do not pose a threat. The program from Syria is completely suspended until the president personally gives the green light.

With regards to refugees and those who seek to enter from the seven countries temporarily excluded, the order gave discretion to the State Department and DHS to admit individuals on a case-by-case basis for important reasons, even during the temporary moratorium.

Statement of principles on the right of a country to exclude non-citizens

Those who want to immigrate: There is no affirmative right, constitutional or otherwise, to visit or settle in the United States. Period. Based on the social contract, social compact, sovereignty, long-standing law of nation-states, governance by the consent of the governed, the plenary power of Congress over immigration, and 200 years of case law, our political branches of government have the power to exclude or invite any individual or classes people for any reason on a temporary or even permanent basis – without any involvement from the courts.[1] Congress has already delegated its authority to the president to shut off any form of immigration at will at any time.

Immigrants already here: Those already admitted to this country with the consent of the citizenry have unalienable rights. They cannot be indefinitely detained. However, they can be deported for any reason if they are not citizens. In Fong Yue Ting v. United States (1893), which is still settled law, the court ruled that Congress has the same plenary power to deport aliens for any reason as it does to exclude them and that the statutory procedures and conditions for doing so are due process.[2] Congress has established the process for deportation of those already here. However, as long as a legal permanent resident leaves the country he has no affirmative right to re-enter.[3] Either way, they have absolutely no right to judicial review other than to ensure that statutes are properly followed.

But can Trump prevent those with green cards from re-entering the country?

The statute is clear as day. The Immigration and Nationality Act (§ 212(f)) gives the president plenary power to “by proclamation, and for such period as he shall deem necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants.” Clearly, the president has the authority to block any non-citizen – including refugees, green card holders, and foreign students – from entering the country. Also, for purposes of deportation, there is no difference between a green card holder or a holder of a non-immigrant visa. No foreign national who has not yet obtained citizenship has an affirmative right to re-enter the country...

Still more.

Outrage! Pandemonium! Leftist Islamists Block Traffic at LAX (VIDEO)

Following-up, "Donald Trump's Refugee Ban Sparks Global Leftist Crisis."

At the Los Angeles Times, "Protesters block traffic at LAX as thousands rally against Trump travel ban."

More at CBS News 2 Los Angeles:

Trump Voters Shrug at Global Leftist Outrage Over Adminstration's Refugee Crackdown

Following-up, "Shock. Outrage. Resistance. Repeat."

Remember, it's leftists who're outraged. Everybody else is going about their lives. Normal Americans have jobs, for example.

At Instapundit, "SHOCKER: Trump Voters Shrug Off Global Uproar Over Immigration Ban."

#PresidentTrump's Alien Exclusion Order is Constitutional

At the Weekly Standard, "Alien Exclusion Order is Constitutional":

Over at National Review, Andrew McCarthy writes that President Trump's executive order instituting a temporary ban on entry into the United States for foreign nationals from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen is statutorily and constitutionally sound:

Under the Constitution, as Thomas Jefferson wrote shortly after its adoption, "the transaction of business with foreign nations is Executive altogether. It belongs then to the head of that department, except as to such portions of it as are specifically submitted to the Senate. Exceptions are to be construed strictly."

The rare exceptions Jefferson had in mind, obviously, were such matters as the approval of treaties, which Article II expressly vests in the Senate. There are also other textual bases for a congressional role in foreign affairs, such as Congress's power over international commerce, to declare war, and to establish the qualifications for the naturalization of citizens. That said, when Congress legislates in this realm, it must do so mindful of what the Supreme Court, in United States v. Curtiss-Wright (1936), famously described as "the very delicate, plenary and exclusive power of the President as the sole organ of the federal government in the field of international relations – a power which does not require as a basis for its exercise an act of Congress."

McCarthy, a former U.S. Attorney who prosecuted the 1993 World Trade Center bombing case argues that the 1965 immigration act prohibiting discrimination against immigrants on the basis of national origin does not make Trump's order illegal:

With that as background, let's consider the claimed conflict between the president's executive order and Congress's statute. Mr. Bier asserts that Trump may not suspend the issuance of visas to nationals of specific countries because the 1965 immigration act "banned all discrimination against immigrants on the basis of national origin." And, indeed, a section of that act, now codified in Section 1152(a) of Title 8, U.S. Code, states that (with exceptions not here relevant) "no person shall receive any preference or priority or be discriminated against in the issuance of an immigrant visa because of the person's race, sex, nationality, place of birth, or place of residence" (emphasis added).

Even on its face, this provision is not as clearly in conflict with Trump's executive order as Bier suggests. As he correctly points out, the purpose of the anti-discrimination provision (signed by President Lyndon Johnson in 1965) was to end the racially and ethnically discriminatory "national origins" immigration practice that was skewed in favor of Western Europe. Trump's executive order, to the contrary, is in no way an effort to affect the racial or ethnic composition of the nation or its incoming immigrants. The directive is an effort to protect national security from a terrorist threat, which, as we shall see, Congress itself has found to have roots in specified Muslim-majority countries. Because of the national-security distinction between Trump's 2017 order and Congress's 1965 objective, it is not necessary to construe them as contradictory, and principles of constitutional interpretation counsel against doing so.

McCarthy also cites specific language in federal immigration law that specifically authorizes this kind of temporary restriction for national security purposes...

Keep reading.

Also at RCP.

Shock. Outrage. Resistance. Repeat.

Yep. That about sums things up.

It's going to be daily outrage and protests for the next four years.

What a time to be a leftist. Democrats will be hailing Trump for revitalizing their base, lol.

Via Katrina vanden Heuval, from the Washington Post, "Shock. Outrage. Resistance. Repeat. Is this the new normal in Trump’s America?":

Resistance & Reconstruction-- Shock. Outrage. Resistance. Repeat. Is this the new normal in Trump’s America? https://t.co/qOi9KBkyyv

— Katrina vandenHeuvel (@KatrinaNation) January 30, 2017

In Donald Trump’s America, there may be no more weekends — just an incessant cycle of shocks, of actions and reactions. For the second weekend in a row, Friday to Sunday was wall to wall with resistance and outrage.

On Friday, President Trump signed an executive order banning people from seven nations in the Middle East and Africa from entering the United States.

On Saturday, protesters began heading to the airports to welcome international travelers, some of whom were detained for hours without access to lawyers.

On Sunday, thousands pushed peacefully against the fences around the White House in protest of Trump’s order. The signs spelled out embarrassment and resolve — and a cheeky self-awareness that only Washington can muster.

“SHAME ON AMERICA.”

“DEATH TO FASCISM.”

“PROTEST IS THE NEW BRUNCH.”

Is this what we’re in for, even on weekends? Will every news alert force us to ask ourselves who we are or send us out into the streets in a spontaneous counterattack?

Yes. The left is all about perpetual outrage. Meanwhile, the rest of us go about our lives while the White House restores are sovereignty.

Sheesh.

(Still more.)

Donald Trump's Refugee Ban Sparks Global Leftist Crisis

Look, I'm not having a crisis. My wife and kids aren't having a crisis. If you're a regular taxpaying American citizen you're not having a crisis. You can come and go. It's leftists who're having a crisis. The cosmopolitan globetrotting left is in crisis as the Trump administration takes back control of our borders.

So, yeah, Charles Schumer, cry me a river, you freakin' dweeb.

I mean, c'mon, just look at the jihadist taking over LAX. We're about to knock off Mecca as the jihad capital, sheesh.

At LAT, "Confusion reigns at U.S. airports as protests of Trump executive order enter second day":

Yeah, confusion reigns: Can America remain a Christian nation, or will leftist Islamic supremacy take over? pic.twitter.com/A6LesjY0Ae

— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) January 30, 2017

With protesters’ chants echoing through arrival halls and beyond, confusion prevailed Sunday at airports across the United States amid seemingly contradictory signals from the Trump administration over a hotly contested executive order blocking U.S. entry to refugees and nationals of seven Muslim-majority nations.

Even as the White House defended the directive’s rollout as a success, advocacy groups and administration officials remained locked on an apparent collision course. Since its signing on Friday, the measure has led to the detention of more than 100 people landing at airports across the country with valid entry documents.

About twice as many others were denied permission to board flights to the United States, according to lawyers representing a consortium of groups that won a temporary nationwide stay Saturday night against the deportation of anyone who had arrived with a valid visa.

On the ground, backlash to the ban grew. While major international airports were the locus of protests, thousands rallied in cities including Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., Philadelphia and Boston.

Despite the air of gravity surrounding debate over the ban, the atmosphere at many airport rallies was raucous and cheerful. Whenever anyone was released from detention, he or she was greeted with cheers and applause from well-wishers.

At Los Angeles International Airport, thousands of protesters filled the lobby at the Tom Bradley International Terminal and spilled into the street outside, chanting, "Let them in!" and "Love, not hate, makes America great."

Jacob Kemper, a 35-year-old Army veteran who served two tours in Iraq, said he was infuriated to think soldiers he fought alongside might be denied entry to the country.

"I really don't care about religion, but I really hate oppression," he said, holding a sign that read, "I Fought Next To Muslims."

Shay Soltani, a network engineer, fled the Iranian revolution 40 years ago and still has family members in Iran. She joined Sunday’s protest in Los Angeles, she said, because she doesn't know if she will be able to see them again, thanks to Trump’s order.

"I am so hurt by this," she said. "He is against freedom of speech and the Constitution and everything I believe in as an American."

Groups including the American Civil Liberties Union said they would ultimately press to have Trump’s order overturned as unconstitutional.

In the meantime, the emergency stay issued by a federal judge in Brooklyn on Saturday represented an “absolute baseline” prohibiting the removal of any of those who were halted upon arrival, said Lee Gelernt, the deputy director of the ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project.

But it remained essentially the luck of the draw in terms of who was halted upon arrival, who was released after questioning, and who had access to legal counsel if detained, the lawyers said.

Daily Beast Editor Christopher Dickey: 'We've Been Spared Fascism, Up Until Now...' (VIDEO)

They still don't get it.

Leftist elites don't get it, and they're going to flail themselves right into a second Trump administration until they do.

From Mark Finklestein, at Legal Insurrection, "Daily Beast editor: Non-Cosmopolitan Rural Voters For Trump are the ‘Real Problem’."

Dickey used to be at Newsweek, which oughta tell you something, lol.

A Clarifying Moment in American History

From Professor Eliot Cohen, at the Atlantic, "There should be nothing surprising about what the Donald Trump has done in his first week—but he had underestimated the resilience of Americans and their institutions":

I am not surprised by President Donald Trump’s antics this week. Not by the big splashy pronouncements such as announcing a wall that he would force Mexico to pay for, even as the Mexican foreign minister held talks with American officials in Washington. Not by the quiet, but no less dangerous bureaucratic orders, such as kicking the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff out of meetings of the Principals’ Committee, the senior foreign-policy decision-making group below the president, while inserting his chief ideologist, Steve Bannon, into them. Many conservative foreign-policy and national-security experts saw the dangers last spring and summer, which is why we signed letters denouncing not Trump’s policies but his temperament; not his program but his character.

We were right. And friends who urged us to tone it down, to make our peace with him, to stop saying as loudly as we could “this is abnormal,” to accommodate him, to show loyalty to the Republican Party, to think that he and his advisers could be tamed, were wrong. In an epic week beginning with a dark and divisive inaugural speech, extraordinary attacks on a free press, a visit to the CIA that dishonored a monument to anonymous heroes who paid the ultimate price, and now an attempt to ban selected groups of Muslims (including interpreters who served with our forces in Iraq and those with green cards, though not those from countries with Trump hotels, or from really indispensable states like Saudi Arabia), he has lived down to expectations.

Precisely because the problem is one of temperament and character, it will not get better. It will get worse, as power intoxicates Trump and those around him. It will probably end in calamity—substantial domestic protest and violence, a breakdown of international economic relationships, the collapse of major alliances, or perhaps one or more new wars (even with China) on top of the ones we already have. It will not be surprising in the slightest if his term ends not in four or in eight years, but sooner, with impeachment or removal under the 25th Amendment. The sooner Americans get used to these likelihoods, the better...

Interesting, and not all that disagreeable. And I find the talk of impeachment and exercising the 25th Amendment rather humorous.

Frankly, it's mostly humor that's the antidote to all the leftist hair-raising hysteria. Repeat after me: It's gonna be fine. It's all good. Take the day off from politics and you'll see that your life hasn't changed much at all.

Still more, at Memeorandum.

And don't forget Cohen's book, The Big Stick: The Limits of Soft Power and the Necessity of Military Force.

'It's going to be a long and terrible four years...'

Ah, the nectar of leftist tears. I've gotta get me one of those cups!

On Twitter:

@littlekique, I'm just so angry. If the last ten days are any indication, it's going to be a long and terrible four years.

— Nick Kulmala (@NNNICKKK) January 28, 2017

These two are responding to a Facebook post from Clemson Professor Nazanin Zinouri, whining about being "deported" by the Trump administration. I mean, how stupid can you get? You fly to Iran to visit your mom when President Trump is in the midst of issuing a raft of executive orders. I guess leftists aren't used to a president that keeps his word.

Federal Judge Halts Part of President Trump's Immigration Order; Stops Deportation of Refugees (VIDEO)

Trump's going to win. Some of his executive order may be struck down, especially the ban on return entry for green card holders, but he's going to win. It's the executive's authority to implement immigration laws. We're in for big changes, and for all the hand-wringing, they will be far-reaching.

At the Los Angeles Times, "Federal judge blocks deportations under Trump's 'extreme vetting' order for refugees and others with valid visas":

After a day of chaos at airports around the world, a federal judge in Brooklyn on Saturday night stayed deportations under President Trump’s executive order barring citizens of some Muslim countries from entering the United States.

U.S. District Judge Ann M. Donnelly ordered a halt to any removal of refugees or others who hold valid visas to enter the United States — meaning those who have arrived at U.S. airports from the seven predominantly Muslim countries named under the president’s executive order can remain, for now.

The judge did not rule on the legality of the executive order, nor did she say that others who have not yet arrived in the U.S. can be allowed to proceed.

The ruling came in response to a petition filed by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of two Iraqis detained at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York: Hameed Khalid Darweesh, who was an interpreter for the U.S. military, and Haider Alshawi, who was on his way to join his wife, who had worked for a U.S. contractor in Iraq.

ACLU attorneys argued that returning either petitioner could cause “irreparable harm” by exposing them and their families to retaliation from extremists.

The two lead plaintiffs were held by authorities and threatened with deportation, even though both “assert a fear of returning to their countries, and if they are not admitted pursuant to their valid entry documents, [they] seek an opportunity to pursue asylum,” the lawyers argued in the emergency petition.

“This ruling preserves the status quo and ensures that people who have been granted permission to be in this country are not illegally removed off U.S. soil," said Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project, who argued the case.

The executive order Trump signed Friday suspends all refugee entries for 120 days, blocks Syrian refugees indefinitely and bars for 90 days the entry of citizens from Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya and Somalia.

While the court did not take on the legal merits of that action, the judge’s order said the Trump administration and its employees are  “enjoined and restrained from the commission of further acts of and misconduct in violation of the Constitution.”

“The petitioners have a strong likelihood of success in establishing that the removal of the petitioner and others similarly situated violates their rights to Due Process and Equal Protection guaranteed under the United States Constitution,” the court ruled.

Surrounded by a throng of cheering demonstrators, who had rushed from Kennedy airport to the Brooklyn courthouse, an exultant Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the ACLU, said, ``This was a remarkable day. What we’ve shown today is that the courts can work. They are a bulwark in our democracy when President Trump enacts laws or executive order that are unconstitutional and illegal.’’

Keep reading.

Do You Want More Trump?

Here's Glenn Reynolds with a roundup on the leftist reaction to President Trump's executive order on refugees, at Instapundit, "Do you want more Trump? Because explosive anger mixed with sanctimony is how you get more Trump":

OBAMA DID A 6-MONTH IMMIGRATION PAUSE ON IRAQ, NOBODY CARED. TRUMP DOES A 3-MONTH PAUSE ON A LIST OF COUNTRIES THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION PUT TOGETHER AND HE’S LITERALLY HITLER. The Green Card thing is genuinely horrible, but that’s not even what people are going apeshit about.

And Trump’s fine with that, because it will play badly, and he knows it.

Click through for the tweet roundup.

Refugees Detained at U.S. Airports, Prompting Legal Challenges to Trump's Immigration Order

I'm surprised green card holders are being detained, since they have a legal right to be here. (See Glenn Reynolds on that, "WELL, THIS IS STUPID: DHS Spox: Trump Muslim Ban Includes Green Card Holders.")

Honestly, though, I'm not all shaken up by this. See the long stream of articles at Memeorandum, including the New York Times.

And from Matt Pearce, via Twitter, linking the L.A. Times, "Confusion and consternation as new 'extreme vetting' policy blocks travel from several Muslim-majority countries":

Read this. What a massive story, with wide-ranging consequences that cross industries and touch thousands of lives. https://t.co/lPmhevijjr

— Matt Pearce (@mattdpearce) January 29, 2017

President Trump’s executive order suspending refugee arrivals and banning travel to the United States from several Muslim-majority countries spawned chaos and consternation across the globe Saturday, igniting legal challenges, trapping unwitting airline passengers and galvanizing anguished questions about core American values.

The abrupt ban ensnared people from all walks of life who were caught in transit or expecting to soon return to the U.S. — not only refugees but students on a break from studies, business travelers, tourists, concert musicians, even the bereaved who had gone home for funerals.

A group of advocacy organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union, filed a legal action against the policy on Saturday in New York, acting on behalf of two Iraqis who were stopped at John F. Kennedy Airport hours after the order was signed. The writ seeks the release of the two Iraqis, who held valid U.S. visas, unless the government can show lawful grounds for their detention.

One of the two detained Iraqis, Hameed Khalid Darwish, was an interpreter who had worked on behalf of the American government. Freed after 19 hours in custody, he wept as he spoke to reporters, thanking supporters and calling America “the land of freedom, the land of rights.”

The groups bringing the legal action, who also included the International Refugee Assistance Project and the National Immigration Law Center, said a separate motion sets the stage for a larger action involving other would-be refugees, visitors and immigrants stopped at other ports of entry.

“We’ll see you in court, Mr. Trump,” tweeted the ACLU’s national legal director, David Cole, after the writ was filed.

Arab American advocacy groups also were reacting to the new order, warning that it was disrupting travel all over the world.

“We see complete chaos in the way this has been implemented. … Individuals overseas have not been able to board airplanes and fly back into the United States,” Abed A. Ayoub, legal and policy director for the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, said in a conference call with reporters Saturday morning.

This is tearing apart families. We have students overseas stuck there who can’t get back. We have students abroad who cannot return here at all,” he said.

Another legal challenge was in the works as well. The Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR, said it would file a federal lawsuit on behalf of more than 20 individuals challenging the order. The suit, to be filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Virginia, argues that the executive order is unconstitutional because of its apparent aim of singling out Muslims.

“There is no evidence that refugees — the most thoroughly vetted of all people entering our nation — are a threat to national security,” the group’s national litigation director, Lena F. Masri, said in a statement. “This is an order that is based on bigotry, not reality.”

The order, signed Friday by the president during a visit to the Pentagon, suspends all refugee entries for 120 days. In addition, it indefinitely blocks Syrian refugees, and bars entry to the U.S. for 90 days for those traveling from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.

Prominent Muslim figures raised their voices in opposition to the temporary refugee ban, saying children would be among those suffering the most from it. Nobel peace laureate Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani schoolgirl who was shot by the Taliban, said in a statement that she was “heartbroken” that Trump was closing the door on “children, mothers and fathers fleeing violence and war.”

On Saturday, the Department of Homeland Security said the travel ban covered holders of green cards, who are authorized to live and work in the U.S. Some reports have put the number of such permanent residents from the affected countries as high as half a million.

An administration official eventually said that current green card holders from the affected countries would be allowed to remain in the U.S. — but that those caught outside the country at the time of the ban’s imposition would have be allowed back in on a case-by-case basis. Those with business overseas will have to meet beforehand with a consular official.

Trump advisor Kellyanne Conway took to Twitter on Saturday to praise the directive, calling the president “a man of action and impact.”

“Promises made, promises kept,” she tweeted. “Shock to the system. And he’s just getting started.”

Get used to it. @POTUS is a man of action and impact.
Promises made, promises kept.
Shock to the system.
And he's just getting started https://t.co/AoUsZWClXt

— Kellyanne Conway (@KellyannePolls) January 28, 2017

Extreme Vetting (VIDEO)

Following-up, "President Trump Issues Executive Order Calling for 120-Day Pause on Refugee Admissions."

Here's Margaret Brennan, for CBS Evening News:

President Trump Issues Executive Order Calling for 120-Day Pause on Refugee Admissions

Trump's doing what Americans elected to do, and terror-coddling open-borders leftists are up in arms.

I'm loving it.

Oh, and not to forget, the U.S. will now give preference to Christians in the refugee program, and that's what you call sticking up for American values.

At the Los Angeles Times, "Trump signs order to temporarily shut nation's door to most refugees and start 'extreme vetting'":

Trump temporarily shuts U.S.'s door to most of the world's refugees and start "extreme vetting" https://t.co/MMpo3a5xKe pic.twitter.com/gbGD9jGLlt

— Los Angeles Times (@latimes) January 27, 2017

Read the full text of Trump's executive order regarding visas, refugees and "extreme vetting": https://t.co/5B6PkVzYRw pic.twitter.com/GowoK2Xx9Z

— Los Angeles Times (@latimes) January 28, 2017

President Trump signed an executive order Friday that temporarily halts the nation’s refugee program and ushers in the most sweeping changes in more than 40 years to how the U.S. welcomes the world’s most vulnerable people.

The order blocks all refugees from entering the U.S. for 120 days and suspends the acceptance of refugees from war-torn Syria indefinitely.

“We want to ensure that we are not letting into our country the very threats that our soldiers are fighting overseas,” Trump said after swearing in new Defense Secretary James N. Mattis at the Pentagon.

Trump also blocked visa applicants entirely from a list of countries that the administration considers of major terrorism concern, including Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen, until a new “extreme vetting” procedure for visa applicants can be launched.

The action capped Trump’s frenetic first week in the White House, as well as a busy day that included his first meeting with a foreign leader, British Prime Minister Theresa May.

Trump also spoke by phone for about an hour with Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto, attempting to soothe what has already become a tense relationship. And he swore in Mattis and signed a second directive that instructs the Pentagon to draw up a list of plans to upgrade equipment and improve training.

The U.S. has admitted more than 3.3 million refugees since 1975, including more than 80,000 refugees in the last year. Under Trump’s plan, those numbers will plummet to a trickle for the next several months. For the full fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30, the order sets a cap of 50,000 refugees.

The order provides an exception for “religious minorities,” a category that could include Christians fleeing largely Muslim countries as well as other groups including Yazidis and Bahais that face persecution in the Mideast.

Trump said in an interview Friday with the Christian Broadcasting Network that the order will help Christians fleeing Syria enter the United States.

The order also expands the ability of local jurisdictions to block the settlement of refugees they object to. During the Obama administration, the federal government stopped efforts by some local officials to block refugee resettlements.

Trump’s action, seen as part of his campaign pledge to ban Muslims from entering the country, sparked an international outcry, given the historic role that the U.S. and other industrialized nations have long played in embracing victims of war and oppression. The last major change in U.S. refugee policy came during the Vietnamese resettlement programs of the mid-1970s.

In recent months, Trump has backed away from a blanket ban on Muslims and instead says he will focus on blocking people from countries linked to terrorism...

More.

Representative Tulsi Gabbard Says She Met With Syrian Strongman Bashar Assad

At Hot Air, "Dem Rep. Tulsi Gabbard: Why, yes, I met with Assad on my freelance visit to Syria":

The people of Syria are crying for peace, asking the US to stop arming terrorist "rebels" who are destroying Syria. https://t.co/tu0O5ThBvc

— Tulsi Gabbard (@TulsiGabbard) January 25, 2017

I met these beautiful children at a shelter in Aleppo. The message I heard from the Syrian people there: Give peace a chance. #voicesofsyria pic.twitter.com/j9wjZ97ksU

— Tulsi Gabbard (@TulsiGabbard) January 25, 2017

My goodness. Logan Act violations are like Bigfoot sightings: Claims are made all the time but they’re never solid enough to convince anyone. In this case, we may have the equivalent of a real-life ‘Squatch in captivity. Quote:

Any citizen of the United States, wherever he may be, who, without authority of the United States, directly or indirectly commences or carries on any correspondence or intercourse with any foreign government or any officer or agent thereof, with intent to influence the measures or conduct of any foreign government or of any officer or agent thereof, in relation to any disputes or controversies with the United States, or to defeat the measures of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.

Gabbard went to Damascus not only without the endorsement of leaders in Congress, she went without their knowledge. Paul Ryan and Nancy Pelosi had no idea she was gone until after she’d arrived in Syria. It was the Ohio chapter of the Arab American Community Center for Economic and Social Services that footed the bill for her, apparently, which until today had been another mystery about Gabbard’s trip. Watch the clip below. It sounds like she went to Damascus to lend Assad moral support and to carry back talking points aimed at convincing Americans to take his side. Unless you want to argue that no “dispute” technically exists between the U.S. and Syria, which would be hard given the American aid provided to anti-Assad rebels, how is this not a Logan Act violation? Does being a member of Congress mean by definition that she enjoys the “authority of the United States” in carrying out freelance diplomacy?

A choice bit from her interview with Tapper below:

“When the opportunity arose to meet with [Assad], I did so because I felt it’s important that if we profess to truly care about the Syrian people, about their suffering, then we’ve got to be able to meet with anyone that we need to if there’s a possibility that we could achieve peace,” Gabbard said. “And that’s exactly what we’ve talked about.”

What do you mean “we”? The president speaks for Americans on foreign policy. Last week that was Obama, this week it’s Trump. Meeting with Assad is especially dubious since the U.S. broke off official diplomatic relations with his regime several years ago. It was the judgment of the White House that he’s a sufficiently monstrous human that the United States shouldn’t legitimize him by formally meeting with him. Gabbard, a member of Congress, had other ideas. By what authority does her judgment trump Trump’s?

Keep reading.

Syria Spotlights Impotence of the United Nations

This is great.

At Der Spiegel, "War and Peace: Disunity and Impotence at the United Nations":

The mandate of the United Nations is to preserve peace in the world, but when it comes to the Syrian crisis, the global body has failed badly. Will the UN's new secretary-general be able to finally introduce necessary reforms?

The UN was not created to take mankind to heaven, but to save humanity from hell.
- Dag Hammarskjöld, UN secretary-general, during a May 1954 speech.

The man who, by simply raising his hand, prevented all efforts to end the war in Syria is sitting in a bunker-like room on 67th Street in Manhattan. Chandeliers are hanging above his head, a pendulum clock is keeping the time behind him and the furniture recalls Soviet-era filmography. "We have had this problem with Syria, of course, and ...… I (have) thought a lot about it," says Vitaly Ivanovich Churkin, Russia's ambassador to the United Nations. An ironic expression on his face, the white-haired diplomat leans back in his leather chair.

Churkin is one of the men charged with saving the world. As absurd as it might sound, that is his job. The 15 members of the UN Security Council, in particular the five permanent members -- China, France, Great Britain, Russia and the United States -- bear "primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security," according to Article 24 of the Charter of the United Nations.

It is a heroic task, an idealistic notion that was born out of the ruins of World War II: The peoples of the Earth joining together to protect the only planet we have. Uniting their strength, the world's countries hoped to create a better world, a place where all people can live in dignity. And the prerequisite for doing so is peace.

In 2001, the United Nations and its then-secretary-general, Kofi Annan, received the Nobel Peace Prize "for their work for a better organized and more peaceful world." It is also thanks to the UN that nuclear war has thus far been prevented, that war criminals from former Yugoslavia were forced to stand trial and that we now have a Paris Climate Agreement, which is aimed at preventing the destruction of the world.

But what has been happening in Syria for the last five years is the opposite of peace: a proxy world war being fought on Syrian territory. It has called everything into question for which the UN stands. The images and the calls for help that innocent men, women and children have been sending out to the world via Facebook and Twitter are unbearable. And yet the world stands by, watching as though it were all merely part of a particularly long horror movie...

More.