Refugee aid groups in the Syracuse area have sharply criticized President Donald Trump’s executive order suspending refugee admissions to the United States.

Trump signed the executive order on Jan. 27, preventing people from Syria, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen from entering the country for the next 90 days and halting all refugee admissions for 120 days. A federal judge in Seattle, however, suspended the order last Friday, and the appeals court started hearing arguments on lifting the ban Tuesday night.

Trump’s executive order had a direct consequence on the Syracuse area: more than 200 refugees are now stuck waiting to go to Syracuse, said Mike Melara, the executive director of Catholic Charities of Onondaga County on its website. The organization is a local nonprofit human services agency.

In a statement posted on the Catholic Charities website, Melara said the organization was saddened by the executive order on immigration and refugee resettlement policies.

“They have endured years of persecution and, in some cases, torture, only to find their hopes of freedom dashed by the stroke of a pen,” Melara said. “This is a human tragedy.”

Beth Broadway, CEO at Interfaith Works of Central New York, said in a statement that the agency is disappointed with Trump’s immigration order.

“The order halts the arrival of new refugees for at least four months, preventing mothers from joining their children, husbands from joining their wives and families and sisters from joining their brothers,” she said. “This is effectively an attack on one faith tradition, and history has shown us the danger of this kind of discrimination.”

Immigration lawyers have expressed skepticism about the executive order.

Niels Frenzen, an immigration and refugee law professor at the University of Southern California, said in an email that he doesn’t see the executive order having any benefits.

“The order is simply not rational,” said Frenzen, adding that overseas refugees are more closely scrutinized by U.S. officials compared to tourists, foreign students and even most other immigrants. “There is no evidence that vetted refugees coming to the U.S. will pose any more danger to the U.S. than do other classes of persons, such as European citizens.”

The ban, he said, was motivated by animosity toward Muslims. The ban also has a harsh impact on approved refugees who have gone through an extensive review process to get into the U.S., Frenzen said.

States and local governments have the authority to refuse to enforce federal laws, but Frenzen said it is still a complicated legal process.

The travel ban will have no impact on local refugees who have been resettled in the U.S with two major exceptions, Frenzen said.

When a refugee leaves the U.S., even for a short period of time, he or she may not be permitted to return back if the ban is reinstated and if the refugee is from one of the seven affected countries, Frenzen said. The second exception, he said, is for refugees who are staying in the U.S. and may have family members who were supposed to be traveling to the country as part of a family reunification process.

Susan Akram, a clinical professor of law at Boston University, said in an email that there will be an enormous impact on refugee resettlement not only in Syracuse, but around the country if the travel ban is ultimately upheld by the courts and implementation goes forward.

“Thousands of U.S. jobs in the refugee admission, resettlement, services and benefits and medical areas will be lost,” she said. “U.S. communities that receive federal funds for refugees to resettle there will lose that funding which will have detrimental impact on the economies of cities and states.”

Published on February 7, 2017 at 10:26 pm

Contact Chieh: chchen@syr.edu