Trump and His Travel Bans
From January 31, 2017
One week into his Presidency, Donald Trump has already demonstrated in spades his proclivity towards dramatic action. In this system of government, that means Executive Orders. His initial forays into government by fiat were primarily domestic in nature, and therefore beyond the purview of this site. However, at the tail end of Week One, he dropped what has become known as the Travel Bans.
First, let's clarify what they are and are not. They are not "Muslim Bans," although they are clearly -- if not explicitly -- meant to curb Islamist efforts at terror. I will give the Administration the benefit of the doubt and assume that the target of these bans are not the adolescent Syrian refugees that the media and protesters are apt to highlight, but those that would commit acts of violence. Is the opposition correct that this ban would not have prevented those acts of terrorism which we have experienced in the past 15 years? Is it not true, they say, that none of the 9-11 terrorists came from those countries subject to these orders? Yes, probably, in both cases. Supporters of the President would counter, or at least should counter, that those points are irrelevant. While no refugees from the seven countries at issue have conducted terrorist acts in the United States, they have done so in other Western nations that have been more lenient. Yes, none of the 9-11 hijackers entered the U.S. from these countries, but that was over 15 years ago. And there is evidence that such countries (Saudi Arabia, Egypt, etc) are actively assisting in preventing bad actors from entering the U.S.
Which leads to the point that one should make, if inclined to support these "bans." The issue is not to prohibit Muslims from entering the United States. If it were, these EO's are even worse than anyone has said. The largest Muslim countries in the world (Indonesia, India, Pakistan, Egypt) aren't subject to them. Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf States are exempted. Six of the seven subject states are all, to some extent, failed states. There are no domestic authorities to provide any assurances regarding the persons from their territory. During my time as a consular officer adjudicating non-immigrant applicants in the Middle East, we were instructed not to accept passports from some "countries" were there was no functioning government. Asking the simple question of "By whose authority is this passport issued?" provided the answer. Even then, Somalia was on that list. That still seems a valid approach, even without an Executive Order. That covers six of the seven, and the odd-man-out is, of course, Iran. Iran is always the exception, and should remain so, so long as they support state terror and are subject to the whims of a theocratic cabal.
American foreign policy can be influenced (but should never be guided) by humanitarianism. Using a generous definition of "humanitarianism," one can define the past 100 years of policy as influenced by humanitarian concerns, albeit those concerns were usually incidental to more pressing issues. However, immigration policy is not (at least not always) foreign policy. Our solution to ending the Holocaust was not to simply allow every Jewish citizen of Nazi occupied Europe to come to the U.S. We did not fight North Korea by the wholesale emigration of the South. Many, many Syrians do not WANT to leave Syria so much as they want one other(very specific) person to leave Syria instead. Working to fix the mess that we helped make in Syria -- and Iraq, for that matter -- would go a long way towards mooting this issue altogether.
But here is where I break from anything smacking of support for the Administration. If their goals were laudable, the methods of achieving them (as well as many of their domestic actions) are amateurish and ham-handed. They leave themselves up to attack, and thier opposition (both in the streets and in the media) have shown themselves only too ready to pounce. I will quote Sir Humphrey Appleby's admonition to Mr. Hacker: "If you're going to do this damn silly thing, don't do it in this damn silly way."