Final summary
Donald Trump’s executive order to close America’s borders to refugees and immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries has been swiftly enforced. The order blocks to the US from citizens from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya for 90 days and as well as indefinitely suspending admission of Syrian refugees.
The 45th president of the US also had a big day as he took phone calls from major world leaders including the Russian president, Vladimir Putin. Meanwhile Theresa May has met with the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and a joint press conference was held.
Here’s a roundup of the key events of the day:
- Criticism of his “muslim ban” came in from all quarters including Madeline Albright, the former US secretary of state, Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani campaigner for girls’ education and Facebook’s chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg.
- We received the first reports of arrivals blocked at US airports.
- The National Iranian American Council (NIAC) described the executive order as worse than a draft form that had been leaked earlier in the week.
- Twelve nobel laureates are among thousands of signatories to a petition calling on Trump to renounce the order.
- A legal challenge has been filed against Donald Trump’s executive order by lawyers representing two Iraqi refugees.
- Theresa May and the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, have signed a £100m commitment to build new fighter jets.
- May refused to condemn Trump’s refugee ban when pressed on the issue by journalists at a joint press conference.
- People holding so-called green cards, making them legal permanent US residents, are included in the executive action.
- Iran vowed to take reciprocal action.
- Trump spoke to Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, and the Russian president, Vladimir Putin.
- We spoke to travellers who had been turned away from flights and those who don’t know when they will see their families again
Thank you so much for staying with us throughout the day and contributing your stories via our callout. We’re closing the live blog now, but will of course be publishing further stories on today’s events.
Updated
Hamaseh Tayari, a UK resident who holds an Iranian passport, has been on holiday in Costa Rica with her boyfriend for the last week. She was due to fly back to Glasgow, where she works as a vet, this morning but was denied entry onto the flight because her flight went via New York and she would need a transit visa, which was revoked.
Tayari, who grew up in Italy, has never experienced anything like this. She says: “This has really shocked me. We just discovered [what Trump did] at the airport when we went to check in. I want people to know that this is not just happening to refugees. I am a graduate and I have a PhD. It has happened to a person who is working and who pays tax.”
Tayari and her boyfriend are trying to find an alternative route home. A flight to Madrid on the 30 January will cost them £2,000 and they’ll still have to find a way from there to Glasgow. “We had been saving for months for this holiday and it will cost me a month’s salary just to get home,” she said.
“I am destroyed. I did not know that I could cry for so long. It feels like the beginning of the end. How this is possible? I am really afraid about what is going on.”
Updated
Trump’s conversation with Putin, which began about noon eastern standard time (EST), took place as the president faces pressure to maintain sanctions against Moscow. Trump has previously spoken about the need to repair the US-Russian relationship, which has been particularly tense in recent years.
Trump spoke with Putin from the Oval Office and was flanked by vice-president Pence, national security adviser Michael Flynn, White House chief-of-staff Reince Priebus, chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon and Sean Spicer, his press secretary.
We’ll update you when we receive official statements about the content of the call from the Kremlin and the White House.
Updated
More travellers turned away from flights
Dutch airline KLM says it has had to turn away seven would-be passengers because they would no longer have been accepted into the US under Trump’s ban on immigration from seven Muslim-majority nations.
Manel Vrijenhoek, at KLM’s press office, said: “We would love to bring them there. That’s not the problem. It’s just that this is what the US sprang on the rest of the world that these people are no longer welcome.”
She said the seven were due to fly with KLM from different airports around the world. Vrijenhoek said she had no specifics on their nationalities. She confirmed they were from countries affected by the three-month immigration ban: Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen.
Meanwhile, Air Canada is reportedly blocking any travellers with passports from the seven countries from boarding flights to the US:
News: Air Canada says anyone with passport from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Yemen CANNOT take flight to US, green card or not.
— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) January 28, 2017
Air Canada: "This would affect only a small handful of our passengers," but they are "not permitted to enter the US."
— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) January 28, 2017
Murtadha Al-Tameemi, 24 is a software engineer for Facebook from Iraq who lives and works in Seattle. He was in Canada when he got a “frantic call” from his immigration attorney telling him to immediately cross the border back into the US.
Tameemi’s family lives just three hours away in Vancouver but he doesn’t know when he’ll see them again. “I have been traveling back and forth between the US and Canada on almost weekly basis for a few years,” he says. “I was in Vancouver to attend the opening night of my little brother’s first play when I got the call but there was no way I was going to miss that.
“I didn’t want to make a big deal because it was a happy night for our family but I told my mum the situation and that I didn’t know when I would see her again. She told me everything is going to be all right and that it would all work out.”
After the play he rushed to the airport. “I showed up five hours before my flight this morning to race against any executive order and get through immigration before the potential ban could take effect,” he said.
Tameemi, who first came to the US as an exchange student, also had to cancel a planned business trip to Africa. “It certainly doesn’t feel like the America that welcomed me 10 years ago with open arms and hearts.”
Updated
Trump calls Putin
Donald Trump is now on the phone to Russian president Vladamir Putin, the White House press secretary has confirmed.
The US president had been scheduled to speak to several world leaders today, including Francois Hollande of France and Angela Merkel of Germany.
After speaking with Chancellor Merkel for 45 minutes @POTUS is now onto his 3rd of 5 head of government calls, speaking w Russian Pres Putin pic.twitter.com/RPAWIgcO2C
— Sean Spicer (@PressSec) January 28, 2017
President Trump speaking on the phone with Russian President Vladimir Putin pic.twitter.com/EuPnvBTxRg
— shannon A (@shogustus) January 28, 2017
President Trump is flanked by Pence, Flynn, Bannon, Priebus and Spicer in the Oval Office as he talks with President Putin.
— Philip Rucker (@PhilipRucker) January 28, 2017
.@potus now speaking with Putin
— Zeke Miller (@ZekeJMiller) January 28, 2017
Updated
Washington is responsible for its policy on refugees, Theresa May told reporters, when asked about Trump’s ban on people from certain countries seeking refuge in the US.
May made the comment at a joint news conference with Turkish prime minister, Binali Yildirim, in Ankara, the Turkish capital. May had previously said that the special relationship between the United States and Britain meant that the two countries could speak frankly when they disagreed.
Trump’s executive order has prompted fury from Arab travellers in the Middle East and north Africa who said it was humiliating and discriminatory. It drew widespread criticism from western allies including France and Germany, Arab-American advocacy groups and human rights organisations.
Updated
Iran vows reciprocal action to refugee ban
Iran has condemned its inclusion alongside six other predominantly Muslim countries in the US visa ban as an “open affront against the Muslim world and the Iranian nation” and vowed to retaliate.
A foreign ministry statement carried by state media said Iran “would take appropriate consular, legal and political measures” against the ban, which was announced by Trump on Friday.
“The decision by the United States to impose travel restrictions on Muslims – even if it is limited to three months – is an explicit insult to the Muslim world, particularly the great people of Iran,” the statement read, according to the semi-official Tasnim news agency.
“Instead of countering terrorism and protecting American people, these measures will be written in history as a gift to extremists and their supporters.”
Tehran said it was watching developments on the visa bans closely. “We respect people of America and we differentiate between them and their government but because of supporting the rights of our citizens and until these insulting restrictions have been lifted, we [will] reciprocate.”
Also on Saturday, Iran’s president, Hassan Rouhani, said: “Today is not the time of wall-raising between nations. Have they forgotten that the Berlin Wall collapsed years ago?”
According to Press TV, Rouhani added: “Today’s world is not a world where one can create distances between the nations and peoples of different territories. Today is a day of neighbourhood. We have become neighbours in cultural, scientific and civilisational terms, and also the world of communications and communications technology have shrunk distances … No one can fight globalisation today.”
Updated
I’m handing the live blog over to my colleague Nicola Slawson, thanks for reading.
Iraqi soldiers - who have been backed by US-led air support, training and other assistance - have decried Trump’s travel restrictions, AFP reports.
In Mosul, where Iraqi forces are at the forefront of the war against jihadists, soldiers told reporters the move would prevent them from visiting their families.
“It’s not fair, it’s not right. I should have the right to visit my family,” said Assem Ayad, a 23-year-old soldier deployed in Mosul who has three cousins living in Texas.
“This decision was made because there are terrorist groups in Iraq. But there are also innocent people” including those who are fighting against jihadists, said Ayad, who carried an American-made assault rifle.
Haider Hassan, 45, another soldier in Mosul, said his cousin lives in the United States and that he had wanted to visit.
Referring to US military personnel deployed in Iraq, Hassan asked: “Why would they ban us from coming to America when they are in my country and have bases here?”
Isis overran large areas north and west of Baghdad in 2014, sweeping aside military and police units that were ill-prepared to combat the offensive.
Theresa May refuses to condemn Trump refugee ban
Theresa May has ducked a series of questions on Donald Trump’s migrant and refugee ban, according to reporters at the scene of a joint press conference with the Turkish PM.
The prime minister had travelled to Turkey to meet with the country’s leaders just 24 hours after holding a joint press conference with the new US president in a bid to cement the UK-US special relationship.
She was asked on more than one occasion what she thought of Trump’s executive order temporarily banning refugees from seven predominantly Muslim countries.
After first ducking the question, she said: “The United States is responsible for the United State policy on refugees.”
Here’s the Guardian’s political editor Heather Stewart:
May ducked question about Trump's refugee ban. Asked again, she tetchily replies: "The US is responsible for the US policy on refugees."
— Heather Stewart (@GuardianHeather) January 28, 2017
Buzzfeed’s Jim Waterson:
Theresa May completely fails to engage on whether she's comfortable with Trump's refugee policy. Does not answer question.
— Jim Waterson (@jimwaterson) January 28, 2017
The Mirror’s Jack Blanchard:
Theresa May refuses to criticise her new pal Donald Trump for his refugee ban. Ducks question from @faisalislam completely here in Turkey
— Jack Blanchard (@Jack_Blanchard_) January 28, 2017
BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg:
May swerves Q on Trump ban, doesnt answer @faisalislam 's Q
— Laura Kuenssberg (@bbclaurak) January 28, 2017
Sunday Times’ Tim Shipman:
May flatly refuses to condemn Trump for banning refugees. Totally ignores that part of the question. Won't criticise her new bestie
— Tim Shipman (@ShippersUnbound) January 28, 2017
The Sun’s Tom Newton Dunn:
Theresa May asked to condemn Trump's refugees ban. Ducks the Q to talk about UK. Heckle from press: "And the US?". PM gives death stare.
— Tom Newton Dunn (@tnewtondunn) January 28, 2017
Paul Waugh:
It took four goes but we got there in the end. May refused three times to answer the Trump refugee Q. Then said it's a matter for the US.
— Paul Waugh (@paulwaugh) January 28, 2017
Updated
Abas Aslani at Iranian news agency, Tasnim, says the Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) has said it will apply a reciprocal measure against US visas - via my colleague Saeed Kamali Dehghan.
#Iran MFA: Iran, while respecting American ppl & distinguishing them from govmnt's hostile policies, will apply reciprocal measure.#VisaBan
— Abas Aslani (@AbasAslani) January 28, 2017
Ali Abdi, an Iranian with permanent residency of the US, is in limbo in Dubai.
He can not go to Iran because he has been outspoken about human rights violations there, he can not return to the US because of the visa bans and he can not stay longer in Dubai as his visa will run out. He said on his Facebook page:
I am an Iranian PhD student of anthropology in the US. Doing fieldwork is the defining method of our discipline. I left New York on January 22nd, two days after he was sworn in. Now in Dubai, waiting for the issuance of my visa to enter Afghanistan to carry out the ethnographic research. The language of the racist executive order he just signed is ambiguous, but it is likely to prevent permanent residents like me from returning to the country where I am a student, where I have to defend my thesis.
Meanwhile, it’s not yet clear whether the consulate of Afghanistan in Dubai would issue the visa I need in order to stay in Kabul for a year, and I cannot stay in Dubai for long or my UAE visa would expire. It’s not wise to go to Iran either.
This is just one story among thousands.
Trump has started his round of phonecalls to world leaders with a conversation with Shinzo Abe, prime minister of Japan.
Abe has been invited to a meeting at the White House on 10 February, a White House spokesman told Reuters.
Abe was scheduled to be Trump’s first phone call and is expected to next call German Chancellor Angela Markel before speaking to the Russian President Vladimir Putin.
His call with Putin will be heavily scrutinised following allegations that Russia attempted to interfere in the US election to assist Trump’s victory. Trump has complimented Putin in the past but on Friday said there were no guarantees about relations between the two countries. Trump’s team have hinted at the possibility of a relaxation of US sanctions against Russia.
Later in the afternoon, Trump is scheduled to speak with the French President Francis Hollande and the Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull.
The calls with France and Germany will come after a joint news conference in Paris with German foreign minster Sigmar Gabriel and French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault, where the two men expressed concern over the new immigration restrictions and reaffirmed a hardline stance on Russia sanctions.
Trump’s order banning migrants and refugees from entering the US is illegal, argues an immigration policy expert.
Writing for the New York Times, David J Bier, an analyst at the Cato Institute’s Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity, says that more than 50 years ago, Congress outlawed such discrimination against immigrants based on national origin.
The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 banned all discrimination against immigrants on the basis of national origin, Bier writes.
The act was drawn up in response to laws creating a so-called Asiatic Barred Zone, banning immigration from China, Japan and other Asian countries.
Trump points to a 1952 law allowing the president the ability to “suspend the entry” of “any class of aliens”, says Bier, but this ignores restrictions placed by Congress in 1965, stating no person could 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”.
While presidents have used their power dozens of times to keep out certain groups of foreigners under the 1952 law, no president has ever barred an entire nationality of immigrants, says Bier.
While courts rarely interfere in immigration matters, they have affirmed the discrimination ban, he adds.
Mike Pence sent this tweet on 8 December 2015, 32 weeks before he formally won the vice presidential nomination.
Calls to ban Muslims from entering the U.S. are offensive and unconstitutional.
— Governor Mike Pence (@GovPenceIN) December 8, 2015
Green-card holders will be hit by Trump ban - Homeland Security
People holding so-called green cards, making them legal permanent US residents, are included in President Donald Trump’s executive action temporarily banning people from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States, the Department of Homeland security has confirmed to Reuters
“It will bar green card holders,” Gillian Christensen, acting spokeswoman for the department, reportedly said in an email.
The order places a 90-day block on entry to the US from citizens from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya. In addition, it indefinitely suspends admission of Syrian refugees. It also caps total refugees entering the US in 2017 to 50,000, less than half the previous year’s 117,000.
Almost 500,000 people from the seven countries have received green cards in the past decade, according to news site ProPublica allowing them to live and work in the US indefinitely.
Updated
The Campaign Against Arms Trade has criticised May for signing a deal with Turkey. Andrew Smith, spokesman for the group, said:
The human rights situation in Turkey has only got worse since Erdogan came to power, particularly following the coup attempt. The crackdown has intensified, and so has the war on journalism, yet Theresa May has shown she is willing to turn a blind eye to these abuses in order to secure arms company profits.
May signs £100m fighter jet deal with Erdoğan
Theresa May and Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan have signed a £100m commitment to build new fighter jets, in a deal Downing Street hopes will see Britain become Turkey’s leading defence partner.
Despite concerns about Erdoğan’s human rights record and the increasingly authoritarian tone of his government, which has locked up thousands of political dissidents and protestors, a Downing Street spokeswoman said the two issues – human rights and trade – were distinct. She said:
I think those are separate issues; Turkey is an important Nato partner, so our cooperation on both security and defence is in line with that.
The PM’s approach is quite clear: she thinks it is important and in the UK’s interests to engage with Turkey.
Afternoon summary
Donald Trump’s executive order banning refugees from entering the US has already taken effect.
The order places a 90-day block on entry to the US from citizens from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya and as well as indefinitely suspending admission of Syrian refugees. It also caps total refugees entering the US in 2017 to 50,000, less than half the previous year’s 117,000.
The Department of Homeland Security issued a directive at 4:30pm EST ordering the Customs and Border Protection to enforce the executive order.
Here is what we know about the order’s impact so far:
- A legal challenge has been filed against the order by lawyers representing two Iraqi refugees detained at JFK airport.
- The complaints are said to have been filed in conjunction with the American Civil Liberties Union, the International Refugee Assistance Project at the Urban Justice Centre, the National Immigration Law Centre, the Jerome N. Frank Legal Services Organisation and the law firm Kilpatrick, Townsend and Stockton.
- Cairo airport officials reportedly confirmed seven US-bound migrants, six from Iraq and one from Yemen, were prevented from boarding an EgyptAir flight to New York’s JFK airport.
- The National Iranian American Council (NIAC) urged Iranian green-card holders [those granted permanent residence] not leave the country until further clarity is achieved.
- Google has reportedly recalled around 100 staff back to the US, although they would not confirm or deny the reports.
- The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) said it had received reports that green-card and other visa holders had been denied boarding and admission into the US at various airports, as has the Council on American-Islamic Relations.
- US immigration attorneys with clients from the affected countries are advising them to cancel any plans to travel abroad if they are currently in the US.
Updated
The International Refugee Assistance Project, one of the organisations involved in a legal challenge against Trump’s executive order banning refugees from certain countries, has said the policy is “irresponsible and dangerous”.
The organisation said in a statement: “Denying thousands of the most persecuted refugees the chance to reach safety is an irresponsible and dangerous move that undermines American values and imperils our foreign relations and national security.
“IRAP works with hundreds of the most vulnerable refugees – children with medical emergencies, survivors of gender-based violence and torture, and Afghan and Iraqi allies to U.S. forces, to name a few – who will be left in immediate life-threatening danger.
“For many of them, resettlement in the United States is their only option to live safely and with dignity.”
Yousif Al-Timimi, a Case Worker at IRAP and former IRAP client who had to flee Iraq in 2013 because of his service to the US government, said: “Those who helped the U.S. mission in Iraq are thankful to be here in the United States as refugees or through the Special Immigrant Visa program; however, for them, the fear is not over.
“Their families are still in Iraq where they might get hurt or killed just because they have ties to a person with a U.S. affiliation and are looked at as traitors. Many of them, like me, try to help their parents and siblings to get out of the country for safety.”
Legal challenge launched against refugee ban
A legal challenge has been filed against Donald Trump’s executive order, which imposes a three-month ban on refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries and from Syria permanently.
The New York Times reports that lawyers representing two Iraqi refugees detained at JFK airport filed a challenge against the measure on Saturday, demanding their clients be released and proposing a class action in a bid to represent all refugees and migrants affected.
One of the refugees detained was named as Hameed Khalid Darweesh, who is said to have worked on behalf of the US government in Iraq for 10 years. The second detained refugee, Haider Sameer Abdulkhaleq Alshawi, was reportedly travelling to New York to join his wife and young son. They had both arrived in the US on Friday night, travelling on seperate flights.
The complaints are said to have been filed in conjunction with the American Civil Liberties Union, the International Refugee Assistance Project at the Urban Justice Centre, the National Immigration Law Centre, the Jerome N. Frank Legal Services Organisation and the law firm Kilpatrick, Townsend and Stockton.
Mark Doss, one of the lawyers representing the pair, told the paper: “These are people with valid visas and legitimate refugee claims who have already been determined by the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security to be admissible and to be allowed to enter the US and now are being unlawfully detained.”
Updated
Iraqi and Yemeni migrants barred from entry
Cairo airport officials reportedly told Reuters seven US-bound migrants, six from Iraq and one from Yemen, were prevented from boarding an EgyptAir flight to New York’s JFK airport.
The officials said the action Saturday by the airport was the first since President Donald Trump imposed a three-month ban on refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen.
The officials said the seven migrants, escorted by officials from the UN refugee agency, were stopped from boarding the plane after authorities at Cairo airport contacted their counterparts in JFK airport.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to brief the media.
Google would not confirm or deny reports that it has recalled staff travelling overseas back to the US.
Google chief executive Sundar Pichai, in a memo to staff seen by Bloomberg News, said more than 100 company staff are affected by the order.
The company has reportedly told these staff to get back to the US.
The employees in question normally work in the US but happened to be abroad when the order was made. The concern is that even if staff have valid visas, they may still be at risk if they are from one of the seven countries targeted by the order and they are outside the US when the order kicks in.
Google would not comment on whether staff had been recalled. It issued this statement:
We’re concerned about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that could create barriers to bringing great talent to the US. We’ll continue to make our views on these issues known to leaders in Washington and elsewhere.
The Liberal democrat leader, Tim Farron, has drawn parallels between May’s visit with Trump and her meeting with Erdogan. calling the pair “unsavoury leaders”. In a statement he said:
As Theresa May seeks trade deals with ever more unsavoury leaders, she ignores the simple point that the most successful countries around the world respect human rights - economies flourish in free societies.
There are tens of thousands of people in Turkish jails without fair trial who in many cases have committed no crime, other than daring to disagree with President Erdogan. Theresa May should address this as a priority in her meeting today.
Yes, the Prime Minister should seek to promote British trade, but at this time her priority should be to secure a long-term trade deal with our European neighbours by fighting to stay in the single market.
Twelve nobel laureates are among thousands of signatories to a petition calling on Trump to renounce the ban on refugees and to reconsider the executive order, my colleague Saeed Kamali Dehghan says.
The petition says the executive order is discriminatory, detrimental to the national interests of the US and will tear families apart.
It has been backed by academics from the US’s most prestigious universities including several Nobel Laureates, fields medalists, National Academy members, and John Bates Clark medalists.
The petition is found here: https://notoimmigrationban.com/
Updated
Iranian-British Cyrus Abbasian, who works as an NHS consultant psychiatrist, said he felt discriminated against given that he has lived in the UK since aged 10. “A total ban of Iranian citizens entering US, just because they are Iranian, is not only highly prejudicial and illogical but will defeat its purpose,” he said.
“It will likely only lead to mistrust, division and alienation. It also resonates of the bad old days I thought was well behind us, when minorities were systematically blamed or scapegoated usually with tragic consequences.”
Pooya Ghoddousi, an Iranian PhD student, said “the beginning of the end even started while Obama was still in power when the discriminatory HR158 bill [about dual nationals] was passed by the congress and signed by Obama.” He was referring to measures that targeted dual nationals from Iran, as well as Iraq, Syria and Sudan. Under the 2015 measures, Iranians with dual citizenship from European countries who could previously visit the US for 90 days without a visa must since obtain one.
He said: “I want Americans to know that I do not judge them based on the actions of their government. I want them not to judge me based on the actions of mine.”
Bozorgmehr Sharafedin, Reuters’ Iran reporter, tweeted earlier this week: “I can’t visit my mum in Tehran due to #Iran’s political restrictions & now my mum can’t see my brother in US after #Trump’s executive order!”
Visa bans drawn condemnation from Iranians
Visa bans on Iranians have drawn huge condemnations, with one Iranian actor, whose film is nominated for an Oscar, saying on Thursday that she would boycott the awards over the decision.
Sheyda Monshizadeh-Azar said she was horrified. “These blanket bans on all Iranians are discriminatory and will rip families apart. I am an optimistic person but today I feel defeated,” she said.
Meysam, an Iranian civil engineer, said new restrictions would mostly affect Iranian students. “Hundreds of Iranian engineers who would like to apply for various universities in the USA may have to think about other options like Canada or Australia. This rule mainly affects university graduates not so-called terrorists or black-listed politicians.”
Iranian-Americans say they are among the US’s most successful immigrant groups, with many Iranians having held senior positions at various organisations from Nasa to Apple, eBay (whose founder is Iranian), Dropbox and Facebook.
Updated
The ban has already made some people reconsider their plans.
Mohammad Saghafi, an undergraduate electric engineering student in Tehran Azad University, told the Khaleej Times that he was thinking twice about trying to pursue further education in the US because of the ban.
“I may continue my education in Canada or Germany,” he said. “Their leaders do not react like teenagers, at least.”
In the days before the order was issued, the Director of CAIR, Nihad Awad, tweeted: “These EOs (executive orders) will not make our nation safer, rather they will make it more fearful and less welcoming.”
The council said that it would hold a news conference on Monday to announce the filing of a federal lawsuit on behalf of more than 20 individuals challenging what it called the “Muslim ban”.
Hooper said it appeared that border officials had been anticipating the order for several days.
We had been getting reports of people being turned away after landing days before the order (was issued). We don’t know what’s going on it’s just a great state of confusion and apprehension. It’s going to be the Wild West out there. People are taking it upon themselves to carry out the indiscrimination that’s in this order.
There were reports that some border officials were confused about their new instructions and unhappy about what was being asked of them.
Ibrahim Hooper, communications director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) told the Guardian:
I got a report of somebody who had just returned and had been pulled aside at the airport and was being detained and they were saying the agents don’t know what to do with them. We’re mainly starting to get questions from people, who have green cards and who are overseas and are returning now, about whether they are going to be allowed back into the country. We’re getting questions from young people who are going to go on ummas -lesser pilgrimages- in a group. They’re American citizens and they’re wondering should they go, should they postpone? I personally got a call from someone who has a green card and is overseas and had just booked the first flight they could get. They were actually on their way back trying to make it back home to their American citizen husband and children, not knowing when they land whether they will be allowed into the country. That’s what we’re getting right now.
One notable casualty of the new order appeared to be the Iranian film director Asghar Farhadi who is nominated for an Oscar in the best foreign language film. Farhadi said he was concerned that he would no longer be able to enter the US for the ceremony as a result of the order.
Trita Parsi, president of NIAC, tweeted:
Confirmed: Iran's Asghar Farhadi won't be let into the US to attend Oscar's. He's nominated for best foreign language film...#MuslimBan
— Trita Parsi (@tparsi) January 28, 2017
NIAC said it had learned that a daughter of a greencard holding Iranian family living in the US had been removed from her plane bound for the US from Dubai.
After five hours of questioning she was allowed by Dubai officials to board another flight to the US.
Later, Parsi reported on Twitter that he had learned of “another Iranian student with multiple entry visa who was denied entry as she returned to the US from from Europe.”
Parsi said it appeared that US border officials were deciding on whether green card holders could re-enter the US on a “case by case” basis which involved asking individuals about their political views.
Within hours of Trump signing the executive order banning nationals from seven countries from entering the US, human rights groups and NGOs reported that they had been inundated with calls from people concerned that they will not be able to get back into the country.
The National Iranian American Council (NIAC) described it as worse than a draft form that had been leaked earlier in the week. In a statement, the council said:
As a result, we strongly recommend Iranian green card holders not leave the country until further clarity is achieved.
Social media was alive with claims that people being denied entry to the US -even, in some cases, if they were green card holders.
The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) said it had received reports that green card holders and other visa holders have been denied boarding and admission into the United States at airports.
Abed A. Ayoub, the ADC’s legal director, said on Twitter that he had received many questions from concerned members.
I have received many questions from concerned community members. I am doing my best to answer each and every one. Thnx 4 patience #MuslimBan
— Abed A. Ayoub (@aayoub) January 28, 2017
Ayoub tweeted that visas were being denied immediately and that there was “chaos at airports and in the air.”
“Additional reports of green card holder being stopped,” he added. “This is not a drill. It is happening.”
Guardian political editor, Heather Stewart, is in Ankara where the UK prime minister, has just been asked what she thinks about Trump’s refugee ban.
Asked what May thinks about Trump's executive order banning refugees, Downing St refers me to remarks in her Philadelphia speech (1/2)
— Heather Stewart (@GuardianHeather) January 28, 2017
"There may be occasions on which we disagree. But the common values and interests that bring us together are hugely powerful." May on US-UK.
— Heather Stewart (@GuardianHeather) January 28, 2017
Former UK foreign secretary David Miliband has called Trump’s refugee ban a “harmful and hasty” decision.
The ex-Labour MP, who is now the president of humanitarian aid body the International Rescue Committee (IRC), said:
America must remain true to its core values. America must remain a beacon of hope.
The IRC said that the US vetting process for prospective refugees is already robust involving biometric screening and up to 36 months of vetting by “12 to 15 government agencies”.
Miliband praised America’s previous record as a resettlement destination, and added:
This is no time for America to turn its back on people ready to become patriotic Americans.
A report from Reuters, citing congressional sources and Republicans close to the White House, says Trump and his advisers are considering rescinding a signature policy of the Obama administration that shields young immigrants from deportation.
Reuters reports:
Even though Trump campaigned on a promise to roll back Obama’s executive orders on immigration, the Republican has so far left intact an order safeguarding 750,000 people who were brought to the United States illegally as children, known as the “dreamers.”
The issue has become a flashpoint for White House advisers divided between a more moderate faction such as chief of staff Reince Priebus and immigration hardliners Stephen Miller and Steve Bannon, said a former congressional aide who has been involved with immigration issues in Washington.
Priebus has said publicly that Trump will work with Congress to get a “long-term solution” on the issue.
Meanwhile, Miller and Bannon, former head of right-wing website Breitbart News, have pushed Trump to take a harder approach and rescind the protections.
Reports of arrivals blocked at US airports
There are already claims that Trump’s executive order banning immigration from some Muslim countries is preventing refugees and professionals from travelling into the US.
The Department of Homeland Security issued a directive at 4:30pm ordering the Customs and Border Protection to enforce the executive order.
The Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee said people who had landed after that had been blocked and told they had to return to their point of origin.
“We’re hearing from a lot of people concerned about family members, friends, classmates. We’re hearing about a lot of folks asking ‘should I cancel my plans,’ and from folks who had to cancel events because of this,” Abed Ayoub of the ADC told the New York Daily News.
“If they are already on the plane, they will not be able to enter.”
Among those reportedly blocked is Iranian film director Asghar Farhadi, who will not be able to travel to the US for the Oscars, for which he is nominated for best foreign language film.
Confirmed: Iran's Asghar Farhadi won't be let into the US to attend Oscar's. He's nominated for best foreign language film...#MuslimBan
— Trita Parsi (@tparsi) January 28, 2017
Visas being denied immediately. Chaos at airports and in the air. #MuslimBan will apply to green card holders attempting to return tonight.
— Abed A. Ayoub (@aayoub) January 28, 2017
were ready to come over here after the most intense vetting process in US history. And now they can't. They're doubly stuck. /2
— Jessica Goudeau (@jessica_goudeau) January 28, 2017
I feel physically sick. REFUGEES ARE THE VICTIMS! They are the victims. #WeWelcomeRefugees We are sorry, refugees. But it's not enough. /4
— Jessica Goudeau (@jessica_goudeau) January 28, 2017
@jimsciutto Canadian Iranian with U.S. Green Card and living in the United States. Scared if I go to Canada, I won't be allowed back in U.S.
— Yasmineh Mirabedini (@yasminehm) January 28, 2017
@jimsciutto my father is a univ professor @WVUTech and travelled to Iran for his fathers funeral, he holds a GC and we are concerned.
— ☤Amir Eslami OMS-IV (@MrAmirEslami) January 28, 2017
Updated
Here’s a few more pictures of May’s meeting with Erdogan in Ankara:
May arrives for talks with Turkey's president
Theresa May has arrived in Ankara for talks with Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan to find her own image dominating television screens in the presidential palace, which were showing footage of her meeting with Trump at the White House on Friday.
As the PM arrived Downing Street announced that the UK and Turkey have agreed to set up a new joint working group to carry out the groundwork for a post-Brexit trade deal.
May is under pressure to confront Erdogan over human rights, following his crackdown on dissent in the wake of the coup, which has seen a wave of arrests, the closure of numerous media outlets and the removal of thousands of public officials - including judges, academics and teachers - from their jobs.
Congressman Seth Moulton, an Iraq war veteran, said he was “ashamed” Trump is president. In a statement, he said:
We are a nation of immigrants, and America is stronger when we welcome the refugees of our enemies. These policies do not put America first. I am ashamed that he is our president.
Democratic senator Chris Murphy urged his colleagues to speak out against Trump’s refugee ban.
Murphy posted the following tweet alongside the photo of Alan Kurdi, the three-year-old Syrian boy who drowned while fleeing with his family.
To my colleagues: don't ever again lecture me on American moral leadership if you chose to be silent today. pic.twitter.com/XW7sjmCcXh
— Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) January 28, 2017
Madeline Albright, the former US secretary of state, reacting to Trump’s executive order, said:
There is no fine print on the Statue of Liberty. America must remain open to people of all faiths and backgrounds.
Facebook’s chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, said in a statement he was concerned about the impact of Trump’s executive orders.
Zuckerberg, who is Jewish, said his great-grandparents came to the US from Germany, Austria and Poland and his wife’s parents were refugees from China and Vietnam. He said:
The United States is a nation of immigrants, and we should be proud of that.
Expanding the focus of law enforcement beyond people who are real threats would make all Americans less safe by diverting resources, while millions of undocumented folks who don’t pose a threat will live in fear of deportation.
Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani campaigner for girls’ education who survived an attempted murder by the Taliban when she was 15, said she was “heartbroken” that America was “turning its back on a proud history of welcoming refugees and immigrants – the people who helped build your country, ready to work hard in exchange for a fair chance at a new life”. She added:
I am heartbroken that Syrian refugee children, who have suffered through six years of war by no fault of their own, are singled out for discrimination.
Trump is facing mounting criticism for his ban on all Syrian refugees entering the US and a halt on arrivals from a string of mostly Muslim countries, Guardian staff report.
The US president’s executive order, named Protection of the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States, places a 90-day block on entry to the US from citizens from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya and Somalia.
Chuck Schumer, Democratic leader in the Senate, said:
Tears are running down the cheeks of the Statue of Liberty tonight as a grand tradition of America, welcoming immigrants, that has existed since America was founded, has been stomped upon.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations announced it would be filing a federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the order “because its apparent purpose and underlying motive is to ban people of the Islamic faith from Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States”.
Morning summary
Welcome to the Guardian’s live coverage of global political developments.
As the world picks apart Donald Trump’s move to deny refugees and immigrants from certain Muslim-majority countries entry to the United States, the 45th president of the US will take phone calls from major world leaders including the Russian president Vladimir Putin.
The phone calls come after his first meeting as president with a major world leader – the UK prime minister, Theresa May. Much of the coverage of their meeting has been hung around one defining image, that of May and Trump awkwardly holding hands as they walk round the White House.
But May’s meeting with Trump is already behind her as she travels to the Turkish capital, Ankara, to meet with the country’s president, Recep Erdoğan. It is expected the two leaders will discuss a post-Brexit trade deal.
We’ll keep you up to date with reaction to Trump’s latest executive order, the continued analysis of the special relationship, May’s meeting with Erdoğan and other political developments to emerge.
Updated
