News from the Week of February 6:

Here’s another round-up of what we’ve been reading and watching this week, from the news and around the web:

The week began with continued challenges to President Trump’s Executive Order “Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States.” It reached the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals this week,  who on Thursday decided to uphold a lower court’s decision to suspend the order.

In a press release, Human Rights First’s Eleanor Acer celebrated the ruling, saying, “religious discrimination cloaked in the language of national security concerns does not merit a pass from the court.”

In The New Yorker, former USAID worker Kirk Johnson explains how the executive order affects Iraqi-refugees aligned with the United States. “Most of the refugees the Trump Administration has put at risk have only suitcases, visas, and a dream of forging something new in America, in peace,” he offers.

Under the court’s ruling, the Department of Homeland Security began issuing Special Immigrant Visas again. Many holders of Special Immigrant Visas (SIV), however, were caught in the chaos of the ban and “sold all their belongings in anticipation of traveling to the United States, only to be rebuffed by an unexpected anti-refugee presidential order.”

Despite Thursday’s victory, the decision is expected to be appealed. Veterans for American Ideals has issued a statement condemning the Executive Order, stating in part: “[The] Order is a devastating symptom of rising Islamophobia, a pattern in our policies and behavior increasingly driven by fear and lack of understanding rather than the compassion that is at the core of this nation’s identity.”

Scott Cooper, founder of VFAI, spoke about the strategic mistake of the order and how it amounted to a “gift to ISIS.” He added that the executive order “feeds into their narrative that the United States is building walls and is at war with all of the Muslim world.”

Veterans from around the country are also showing their support for those affected by the new execuive order. Here, VFAI leader Colonel Cal Hickey writes about how the oath he took in the Air Force led him to protest the executive order at Dulles International Airport. Hickey tells of the spirt behind his service and the service of an Iraqi Muslim who he served with in the U.S. military: “We took an oath to a document, not to a political party, not to an institution, and certainly not to a person—especially a person with so little evident knowledge of and regard for the Constitution.”

In Chicago, Arti Peddakotla, an Army veteran and first generation American, spoke on the establishment of her neighborhood, Oak Park, as a sanctuary city, stating that “what Oak Park is doing is what all cities should do because the immigrant ban and that Muslim ban that Trump has put in place is un-American.”

Have reactions to share, or want to learn how you can be involved in our efforts to raise veteran voices in support of refugees? Find us on Facebook or Twitter, or contact us at vfai@humanrightsfirst.