President Donald Trump stands in front of the media while talking about the situation at the U.S. embassy in Baghdad, from his Mar-a-Lago property, Tuesday, Dec. 31, 2019, in Palm Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci)
On Friday, The Associated Press reported the President is considering adding countries to the anti-terrorism travel ban list.
The AP said several in the Trump administration relayed that the expansion is “timed to coincide with the third anniversary of Trump’s January 2017 executive order.”
The new list may be up to seven entries longer.
To quote the Beverly Hillbillies theme song, that’s a heapin’ helpin’.
Here’s how the outlet put it:
The countries on the proposed expansion list include allies that fall short on certain security measures. The additional restrictions were proposed by Department of Homeland Security officials following a review of security protocols and “identity management” for about 200 countries, according to the person.
The White House’s official spokesman — Hogan Gidley — didn’t confirm any of that, but he did high-five the current collection of nations with strong ties to terror:
“The Travel Ban has been very successful in protecting our Country and raising the security baseline around the world. While there are no new announcements at this time, common-sense and national security both dictate that if a country wants to fully participate in U.S. immigration programs, they should also comply with all security and counter-terrorism measures – because we do not want to import terrorism or any other national security threat into the United States.”
Presently, it’s a veritable Who’s Who of ill will; including:
Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Yemen, and North Korea.
As pointed out by The Daily wire — and as stated previously by Yours Truly — the moratorium isn’t a “Muslim ban,” as it’s been wrongly and often portrayed. Consider North Korea, as well as Venezuela — not quite the bastion of Islam. Furthermore, of course, many nations with Muslim majorities didn’t make the cut.
Here’s TDW:
[T]here are 50 Muslim-majority countries in the world and only banning five Muslim-majority countries means that 90% of Muslim-majority countries are not banned.
Pretty clear.
But what’s also clear is that, whoever Trump adds, there’ll be an outcry as tall as this building:
https://twitter.com/xavierkatana/status/1216820630563233792
As it would seem, some don’t even want Trump attacking terrorists; they sure won’t be happy with him clamping down on flight commerce with your favorite totalitarian hotspots.
-ALEX
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