US judge blocks Trump’s new travel ban — hours before taking effect

A federal judge has blocked Donald Trump’s move to prevent citizens from six Muslim-majority countries from entering the US.

Derrick Watson, a US district judge in Hawaii, ordered the temporary stay on Wednesday, hours before Trump’s action was due to take effect.

Watson’s ruling applies nationwide, which means the order cannot be enforced.

Hawaii’s attorney general, Doug Chin, had filed the suit challenging the US president’s new travel ban, stating that it “takes us back half a century”.

The ruling states that, “Defendants and all their respective officers, agents, servants, employees, and attorneys, and persons in active concert or participation with them, are hereby enjoined from enforcing or implementing Sections 2 and 6 of the Executive Order across the Nation.

“Enforcement of these provisions in all places, including the United States, at all United States borders and ports of entry, and in the issuance of visas is prohibited, pending further orders from this Court.”

Reacting during a rally in Nashville later in the day, Trump described the ruling as an “unprecedented judicial overreach.”

The US President made known his intention to take the case to the Supreme Court.

“A judge has just blocked our executive order on travel and refugees coming into our country from certain countries”, Trump said.

“This ruling makes us look weak, which we no longer are, by the way.

“The order he blocked was a watered-down version of the first order that was also blocked by another judge and that should never have been blocked to start with.

“This is, in the opinion of many, an unprecedented judicial overreach.”

Trump’s first travel ban, shortly after he became President, was similarly suspended by a federal judge.