The amicus brief includes Attorneys General from Illinois, Massachusetts, and Pennsylvania, and also signed by the Attorneys General from California, Connecticut, the District of Columbia, Delaware, Iowa, Maryland, Maine, North Carolina, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington. In the amici curiae brief filed today in the Virginia suit, the Attorneys General stated: “The excluded individuals include those with valid U.S. visas that enable them to work, study, and travel within the amici States. The Executive Order thus inhibits the free exchange of information, ideas, and talent between the seven designated countries and the amici States, negatively affecting the financial stability and intellectual vitality of educational and research institutions, and disrupting large and small businesses throughout the States.”
The full amicus brief is available here.
State Attorneys General have been at the forefront of the opposition to President Trump’s order. In addition to the amicus briefs filed this week, New York Attorney General Schneiderman filed to join the lawsuit in the Eastern District of New York last week.
“As Attorneys General, our primary job is to protect the people we represent,” said New York Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman. “President Trump’s immigration ban represents an all-out assault on the rights of New Yorkers, on our economy and businesses, and on our educational and healthcare institutions. My fellow Attorneys General and I will continue to do everything in our power to strike down this unconstitutional, discriminatory, and chaotic order, and prevent further harm to the people we serve.”
The amicus brief highlights the irreparable harm already caused to the amici states, including disruptions to staffing and intellectual exchange at colleges, universities, and medical institutions; enduring harm to the states’ economies and tax revenues; and the irreparable injury caused by the executive order’s egregious violations of the U.S. Constitution.
In particular, the brief cites the hundreds of employees and thousands of students affected by the order at state educational institutions, as well as disruptions to medical staffing and research. Additionally, the brief highlights the large number of entrepreneurs, developers, and other professionals who are foreign-born, and on which businesses and the states’ economies rely. The order has also caused the amici states to lose both direct and indirect tax revenue; for example, the approximately 1,000 nationals from the designated countries studying in New York on temporary visas have contributed nearly $30.4 million to the State’s economy.
The brief goes on to detail how the executive order violates the Establishment, Due Process, and Equal Protection clauses of the constitution, and how the order’s chaotic implementation has gravely harmed people in the states. As the brief states, “Without judicial action staying the implementation of the Executive Order across the country, our States will see a return of the chaos experienced in our airports beginning on the weekend of January 28 and 29, and continued serious harms to the individuals who live, work, and study in our States; the institutions that employ and educate such persons; and the communities in which they reside.”
The amicus brief calls for the Court to enter a preliminary injunction enjoining the operation of the executive order on a nationwide basis.
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