Planned lawsuit could make Hawaii first state to challenge Trump’s revised travel ban

Hawaii today is expected to be the first state in the nation to challenge President Donald Trump’s revised travel ban.

In a motion filed in U.S. District Court in Honolulu on Tuesday, state attorneys said they would be asking a federal judge to issue a temporary restraining order blocking the president’s executive order.

According to the court documents, Ismail Elshikh, imam of the Muslim Association of Hawaii, will also be a plaintiff.

Trump’s revised order, issued Monday, continued to impose a 90-day ban on visitors from six Muslim-majority nations but removed Iraq from the list of countries of origin. It also exempts permanent residents and current visa holders, and removed language offering preferential status to persecuted religious minorities.

State Attorney General Doug Chin confirmed the suit in a news release late Tuesday. He said the state, along with the Department of Justice, is asking Judge Derrick K. Watson for an expedited schedule that would allow a hearing before the new travel ban goes into effect March 16.

Earlier in the day, Neal Katyal, a Washington, D.C., attorney who is also representing the state, published the following tweet Tuesday: “Here we go. Proud to stand w/State of Hawaii challenging Pres. Trump’s ‘new’ Executive Order issued yesterday.”

Katyal is a former acting solicitor general of the United States under former President Barack Obama.

Chin, meanwhile, appeared at a midday news conference Tuesday at the Muslim Association of Hawaii mosque in Manoa, but he did not mention the suit in his remarks. Elshikh, who was also there, didn’t bring it up either.

Chin and Elshikh joined Honolulu Mayor Kirk Caldwell and other community leaders in denouncing Trump’s new executive order.

Honolulu is no place for religious tests, Caldwell said, “whether it be Muslim or when you think about the executive order issued in 1942 — 9066 — against Japanese-Americans.”

“We’re all Americans. We’re all people of this community, and we are all treated equally,” the mayor declared. “Our message is there is no acceptance or allowing of racial, religious or sexual intolerance. It’s not acceptable here. Not here. Not now. Not ever.”

Chin was hailed by speakers for leading the charge in filing a lawsuit against the president’s first temporary travel ban. The order was ultimately blocked by a federal appeals court.

Hakim Ouansafi, president of the Muslim Association of Hawaii, praised Chin as a man with “the courage to stand and say, ‘No, no, no … not on my shift. It’s wrong, and I’m going to do something about it.’”

Several speakers said they remain just as repulsed by the newest version of Trump’s executive order as the first one.

“Trump has been clear to the whole world that he wants to ban Muslims,” said Mateo Caballero, legal director of the ACLU of Hawaii. “(Monday), with this new ban, he has recommitted himself to religious discrimination.”

In his remarks, Chin said Trump is selling the executive order as if it’s essential for national security and safety, but in reality it’s not.

“It’s about discrimination,” he said. “It’s discriminating against people based on their national origin or based on their religion. It’s disenfranchising people who are not of the majority race or majority religion. It puts them in a place that smears their culture or a religion that is not accepted by everyone else. And that’s wrong.”

Chin, who met with Trump along other state attorneys general last week, said the message coming from Washington is that crime is on the rise, it’s being committed by those who are unlawfully in this country, and the only way to deal with it is to remove those people.

“We just can’t accept that,” Chin said. “We can all appreciate public safety … but not when it violates the Constitution. Not when it violates our principles or values that are so important to our society.”

Former Republican state Sen. Sam Slom criticized Chin for veering off course.

“The state has enough problems right now. I wish the attorney general, the governor and the Legislature would focus on the problems right here at home,” Slom said, adding that they should be spending more time “on the problems they never seem to be able to solve.”

At the state Legislature a proposed resolution would declare Hawaii a sanctuary state that “keeps safe the men, women and children in our population who are from other countries, regardless of their citizenship or immigration status.”

According to the Migration Policy Institute, Hawaii’s unauthorized population numbers about 21,000 — 82 percent of whom are Asian.

Trump’s immigration policies so far have been aimed at the Middle East, as well as Mexico and Central America.

Slom argued that Trump’s temporary ban is not anti-Muslim. There are 41 Muslim countries not affected, he said, and the order is simply intended to elevate the country’s security level.

In largely blue Hawaii, he said, the big fuss is “more political than anything else,” a diversion from all the taxes being imposed.

In an interview after the news conference, Chin was asked why he is focusing so much time on something that appears to be a national matter.

“I see this issue as something that affects the state very deeply,” said Chin, the son of Chinese immigrants who left an oppressive communist government.

Not only does Hawaii have a long history of fighting racial discrimination, he said, but this executive order could end up affecting Hawaii’s economy and the people who want to travel here.

“The problem with the executive order is that it definitely leaves the door open for further restrictions,” he said. “It could be just 128 days, but it could be extended indefinitely. Or it could add in additional countries, even countries that are very close to or (have) a larger population base here in Hawaii.”

Chin added that his mail is running 80 percent positive and 20 percent against what he’s doing on the issue.