This means access to the United States for nationals from Iran, Libya, North Korea, Somalia, Syria, Venezuela and Yemen will be restricted.
Protests over the decision broke out across the country with some demonstrators even rallying outside the Supreme Court itself. Protestors in Manhattan gathered in Foley Square and chanted “shame.”
In Queens and across the city, leaders were quick to blast the ruling — all five conservative justices ruled to uphold the ban while the bench’s four liberals dissented.
“This ban is institutionalized Islamophobia, promoted under the guise of national security,” Mayor de Blasio said in a statement. “Banning people from our country on the basis of religion is an affront to our founding ideals. With this decision, the highest court in the land has sent a message of exclusion and division across the globe.
“As our president tries to build walls, New York City will continue to welcome people from all over the world to our shores, from all faith traditions.”
During the 2017 fiscal year, the federal government issued about 87,000 “non-immigrant” visas from the seven nations affected by the travel ban, CNN reported.
Those include people ranging from tourists to students to those doing business in the United States.
Gov. Cuomo said he believes New York’s diversity is its greatest strength, something the Trump administration doesn’t truly understand.
“The Trump travel ban is a gross violation of our American values, and the Supreme Court’s ruling along partisan lines does nothing to change that,” Cuomo said. “This shameful and bigoted policy is nothing but a thinly veiled attempt to govern by hate and division and continue the federal government’s assault on immigrants.”
The Supreme Court first ruled in December that the president’s third attempt at a travel ban could go into effect while the nine justices deliberated the merits of multiple legal challenges against it.
Councilman Daneek Miller (D-St. Albans) — the City Council’s only Muslim member — called the Supreme Court’s decision “shameful.”
“Regardless of any so-called constitutional rigor employed by this White House in drafting its third iteration of the ‘Muslim Ban,” Miller said, “today’s shameful ruling by the Court’s conservative majority, particularly the opinion of Justice Clarence Thomas, validates government sanctioned Islamophobia and sets a terrible precedent by which the federal government can arbitrarily restrict individuals of a particular faith or nationality under the guise of national security.
“This is a dreadful moment in the history of our country, particularly at a time when criminal acts of prejudice against its more than three million Muslims has reached a level not seen in more than 15 years,” he added, “and one that should prompt every voter of conscience to register their disapproval at the ballot box this fall and again in 2020.”
