Attorney General Kilmartin Joins New SCOTUS Brief in Travel Ban Case

Attorney General Peter F. Kilmartin, part of a coalition of 17 Attorneys General, filed a new amicus brief in the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) opposing President Trump’s third travel ban.

The brief was filed in Trump v. Hawaii (No. 17-965), ahead of arguments before the SCOTUS scheduled for April 25th. In this third challenge, the district court entered a nationwide preliminary injunction that prohibits enforcement of President Trump’s indefinite ban on the entry into the U.S. of nationals from six overwhelmingly Muslim countries. The Ninth Circuit affirmed the injunction, which protects foreign nationals with a bona fide relationship with a person or entity in the United States.

“We have been successful in our arguments to courts across the land that these travel bans are unconstitutional and would have a significant financial impact on our state should they be allowed to move forward,” said Attorney General Kilmartin. “I am pleased this case is finally before the Supreme Court and look forward to the Court upholding these important Constitutional principles.”

The brief was signed by Attorneys General from New York, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, and the District of Columbia.

“All of amici States benefit from immigration, tourism, and international travel by students, academics, skilled professionals, and business-people. The disputed provisions of the Proclamation—like the previous bans—significantly disrupt the ability of our public universities to recruit and retain students and faculty, impairing academic staffing and research, and causing the loss of tuition and tax revenues, among other costs. The Proclamation also disrupts the provision of medical care at our hospitals and harms our science, technology, finance, and tourism industries by inhibiting the free exchange of information, ideas, and talent between the designated countries and our States, causing long-term economic and reputational damage. In addition, the ban has made it more difficult for us to effectuate our own constitutional and statutory policies of religious tolerance and nondiscrimination,” the amicus brief explains.

The brief, like previous ones filed by the same coalition, details the numerous grave and irreparable harms the States have continued to face as a result of the Trump Administration’s travel bans, and which could very well now be permanent due to the indefinite nature of this third ban. The injunction thus provides critical protection against those injuries.

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