Ban could chill isles’ tourism, state attorney general says

Students, visiting professors and others from six predominantly Muslim countries with legitimate ties to the United States will be allowed to travel to Hawaii but face an uncertain future once they arrive, state Attorney General Doug Chin said Monday following a decision by the U.S. Supreme Court on President Donald Trump’s travel ban.

The court agreed to hear arguments in October over two lawsuits challenging the ban, including one filed by Chin’s office. But no one knows when a decision will be reached, leaving visitors with legitimate U.S. connections from Libya, Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen in limbo once they arrive.

“If I were to put myself in the shoes of those people — or, really, anybody outside of the United States who’s watching everything that’s happened — there’s no question that what has happened has created a chilling effect,” Chin told reporters Monday following the Supreme Court’s ruling. “It’s created uncertainty in the United States as far as who’s going to be allowed to come into the country.”

And that uncertainty could spill over into countries beyond the six listed under Trump’s ban, Chin said.

The Attorney General’s Office argued “that the problem with having these sort of temporary bans is that it makes people who are even not from these countries wonder whether or not it’s going to be OK for them to come into the United States,” Chin said.

While the court’s decision temporarily allows entry to students and others with legitimate U.S. ties, it’ll make it more difficult for tourists from the six countries with no U.S. connections to visit Hawaii and other U.S. destinations, Chin said.

He cited Hawaii tourism data from two years ago in which 6,200 island visitors came from the Middle East and 2,000 more from Africa.

Trump tweeted Monday that the Supreme Court’s decision was a “clear victory.”

But Chin said, “I would say it’s a victory for President Trump in the sense that people for the next six months who have no ties to the United States who are from the six Muslim majority nations aren’t going to be able to come into the United States. But by the flip side, I could say it’s a victory for our position in the sense that people who do have a connection to the United States who are from those six Muslim majority nations … are not covered by the travel ban.”

The court’s decision is a victory for Ismail Elshikh, the imam of the Muslim Association of Hawaii, who is a plaintiff in the Hawaii case because his mother-in-law is a Syrian national living in Syria.

While Elshikh, his wife and their five children are U.S. citizens, his mother-in-law wants to visit the family in Hawaii that represents her U.S. connection.

“He’s grateful for this decision,” Chin said. “I think he is pleased that this executive order is not going to apply to him.”

But, Chin said, “The bottom line is his mother-in-law still isn’t here, which is very unfortunate.”