Source: http://blogs.law.columbia.edu/publicrightsprivateconscience/2018/06/
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 20:35:31+00:00

Document:
June 21, 2018: Today, five prominent professors of law and religion filed an amicus brief in support of Dr. Scott Warren, a humanitarian aid worker who faces up to twenty years in prison for providing food and shelter to migrants crossing the Arizona desert. The amicus was filed in an Arizona federal court, and contends that Dr. Warren is entitled to an accommodation from being criminally prosecuted for acting on his sincerely held religious beliefs. Dr. Warren, is a member of No More Deaths/No Mas Muertes, a humanitarian aid organization that works to reduce deaths and suffering along the US-Mexico border by providing water, food and clothing to migrants crossing the Arizona desert. When doing this work, humanitarian workers routinely discover the bodies of migrants who have died due to lack of water, food or shelter in the rugged and remote desert terrain.
Katherine Franke, Sulzbacher Professor of Law at Columbia Law School, authored the brief on behalf of herself and Caroline Mala Corbin, Professor of Law at the University of Miami School of Law, Micah J. Schwartzman, Joseph W. @PRPCP_Columbia facebook.com/PRPCP @PRPCP_Columbia Dorn Research Professor of Law at the University of Virginia School of Law, Elizabeth Sepper, Professor of Law at Washington University School of Law, and Nelson Tebbe, Professor of Law at Cornell Law School.
The focus of the case is the constitutionality of the third and most recent iteration of President Trump’s Ban on Travel and Immigration, informally known as the “Travel Ban 3.0”. The first travel ban, issued as an Executive Order on January 27th, 2017, just one week after Trump took office, was blocked by Federal District Court Judge James Robart of Seattle, in a nationwide restraining order on February 3rd, 2017. The second iteration was issued on March 6th, 2017, and subsequently blocked by the District Court of Hawaii on March 15th, 2017. The third iteration was issued on September 24th, 2017, and subsequently blocked by the U.S. District Court of Hawaii on October 17th, 2017.
A core concern regarding the multiple iterations of the travel ban has been the ways in which countries that would face greater travel restrictions were selected – the initial ban focused on restrictions on the number of Syrian refugees the United States would accept, rescinded a number of visas, and imposed restrictions on travel to persons from Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, Sudan, and Libya. The title of the initial executive order, (Executive Order 13769), “Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States,” plays upon Islamophobic fears, which right-wing politicians have used to leverage support for anti-immigration policies. All 7 of the countries listed in Executive Order 13769 have populations a Muslim majority, and President Donald Trump’s history of xenophobic comments both during his campaign and through his time in office served as strong indicators to many that the “travel ban” would cause disproportionate harm to Muslim individuals.
The Public Rights/Private Conscience Project has followed the progress of President Trump’s Executive Orders regarding travel and immigration, and our team members have written detailed analyses of President Trump’s policies, the Travel bans, and their implications – with particular regard towards the balance of religious liberty and other fundamental rights.
As we await the Supreme Court’s ruling in Trump v. Hawaii, we collect here our work on these issues over the past 17 months. Most recently, following the Supreme Court’s ruling in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, Elizabeth Reiner Platt analyzed how the language and arguments engaged in the Supreme Court’s ruling and in the Justices’ opinions may bear on the outcome of Trump v. Hawaii.
The Public Rights/Private Conscience Project issued a press release analyzing how Trump’s Executive Order was unconstitutional, as the order expresses a religious preference that violates the establishment clause of the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment.
Following the first week of the presidency of Donald J. Trump, scholars from the Public Rights/Private Conscience Project issued a document outlining the ways we anticipated the Trump administration would seek to advance particular conservative Christian tenets, restrict the rights of religious minorities, and break down the barrier between church and state. Enactment of the administration’s policy priorities (which we have seen in the ensuing months since the initial publication of this memo) call into question the careful balance between the First Amendment and other fundamental rights guaranteed under the Constitution.
Ashe McGovern, Legislative and Policy Director with the Public Rights/Private Conscience Project, wrote at Rewire.News on how the January 27th Executive Order engaged insidious rhetoric such as pink-washing, and ‘divide-and-conquer’ tactics historically used to isolate oppressed groups from joining in solidarity with one another.
In this thoughtful piece at Religion Dispatches, Elizabeth Reiner Platt, Director of the Public Rights/Private Conscience Project, discusses the rhetoric engaged by Trump supporters in discussing President Trump’s Executive Order on Travel and Immigration, with particular regard to the rights of religious minorities. The piece also discusses the language and rhetoric engaged in the Executive order in relation to information leaked at the time of publication regarding President Trump’s Executive Order on religious liberty.
Elizabeth Reiner Platt analyzed the second iteration of President Trump’s ban on travel and immigration, discussing the ways in which the language of the second iteration was shifted to ostensibly avoid violating the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause. Platt analyzes this rhetoric and the language of the second travel ban in the context of other cases, highlighting elements that arguably violate the U.S. Constitution.
“Trump’s second attempt at banning travel from certain Muslim-majority countries is clearly written to avoid being struck down under the Establishment Clause. Most notably, it no longer contains provisions that preference entry for religious minorities—language the President himself admitted was intended to prioritize entry for Christian rather than Muslim refugees.
Elizabeth Reiner Platt analyzes the rhetoric and language engaged by the Supreme Court of the United States in the ruling in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission (issued on June 4th, 2018), in regards to the Court’s pending decision in the case of Trump v. Hawaii.
What Implication does the Supreme Court’s Decision in #MasterpieceCakeshop have for the #MuslimBan?
The blog post highlights PRPCP Scholar Elizabeth Reiner Platt’s article with Religion Dispatches regarding the Muslim Ban Case, and the ways in which the Supreme Court’s ruling in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission may influence or ultimately be divergent from their ruling in their forthcoming ruling in Trump v. Hawaii.
“The article specifically discusses the language engaged by the Justices with particular regard to the concepts of ‘neutrality’ and ‘religious neutrality.’ The case, of Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, brought to the fore issues regarding religious liberty, individual freedom, civil rights, and debates about the interpretation of Constitutional Law.
The Public Rights/Private Conscience Project team is available for comment regarding these pieces and issues directly related to this case and our other work – to contact Professor Katherine Franke, Elizabeth Reiner Platt, or Kira Shepherd, please reach out to Elizabeth Boylan, Associate Director for the Center for Gender & Sexuality Law at 212.854.0167 or eboyla@law.columbia.edu.
Elizabeth Reiner Platt, Director of PRPCP, has written an article with Religion Dispatches (an outlet of Rewire.News) providing analysis and reflection on the Supreme Court’s ruling on June 4th in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, “Will SCOTUS’ New Zeal for “Neutrality” Affect its Decision on the “Muslim Ban”?
The article specifically discusses the language engaged by the Justices with particular regard to the concepts of “neutrality” and “religious neutrality.” The case, of Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, brought to the fore issues regarding religious liberty, individual freedom, civil rights, and debates about the interpretation of Constitutional Law.
As the Supreme Court is expected to provide a decision in the next few weeks in regards to the case of Trump v. Hawaii, the court’s engagement of language related to these issues is of key interest. At stake in Trump v. Hawaii is the constitutionality of President Donald Trump’s travel ban, more commonly referred to as the “Muslim Ban” for the ways in which it’s language has been interpreted as being indicative of bias against Muslim persons and countries with large populations of Muslim citizens.
The full article from Elizabeth Reiner Platt may be accessed via Rewire.News’ Religion Dispatches page, here.
Elizabeth Reiner Platt is the Director of the Public Rights/Private Conscience Project, and a thought leader on core issues related to the balance of law, rights, and religion in contemporary discourse and practice. She is available for interview and comment regarding this piece, the Public Rights/Private Conscience Project, and the Supreme Court’s decisions in these and other related cases. We encourage you to reach out should you have any further questions.

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