Washington:
President Donald Trump on Thursday said he will announce a new executive order on immigration next week that will “comprehensively” protect the US, days after his previous controversial travel ban against seven Muslim-majority countries was hit by a legal roadblock.
In a news conference at the White House, Trump said the new order would comprehensively protect the country, and hinted that it might contain new vetting measures for travellers.“We’re issuing a new executive action next week that will comprehensively protect our country,” Trump said.
“We’ll be going along the one path and hopefully winning that, at the same time we will be issuing a new and very comprehensive order to protect our people. That will be done sometime next week, toward the beginning or middle at the latest part,” Trump said.
His previous executive order temporarily suspending entry of Syrian refugees and people from seven Muslim-majority countries has been put on hold by the court, which he said is not correct.
Trump said his administration had a very smooth rollout of the travel ban. “But we had a bad court. Got a bad decision. We had a court that’s been overturned. Again, may be wrong. But I think it’s 80 per cent of the time, a lot,” he said.
“We had a bad decision (by the court). We’re going to keep going with that decision. We’re going to put in a new executive order next week some time. But we had a bad decision,” he said, alleging that such a court ruling is very bad for the safety and security of the country.
The rollout of the executive order was “perfect”, he said.Trump said he is going ahead with extreme vetting.
“Now in the meantime, we’re vetting very, very strongly. Very, very strongly. But we need help. And we need help by getting that executive order passed,” he said in response to a question.
“Extreme vetting will be put in place and it already is in place in many places. In fact, we had to go quicker than we thought because of the bad decision we received from a circuit that has been overturned at a record number,” he said.
“I have heard 80 per cent, I find that hard to believe, that is just a number I heard, that they are overturned 80 percent of the time. I think that circuit is in chaos and that circuit is frankly in turmoil. But we are appealing that, and we are going further,” Trump said.
Soon after Trump’s announcement, late Thursday afternoon, the US Justice Department told a federal appeals court in San Francisco that there was no reason to reconsider a case on the executive order on immigration and refugees.
A three judge bench last week had refused to remove the stay on the executive order by another federal court in Seattle.
