President Donald Trump insisted on Sunday that his travel ban on certain Muslim-majority nations would protect the United States from terrorists.
For a second consecutive day, protesters rallied across the country on Sunday.
In an afternoon statement, after the weekend of outrage and confusion over his move, Trump wrote that the country would continue showing “compassion to those fleeing oppression.”
He rejected criticism that his executive order amounts to the “Muslim ban” he proposed as a candidate.
“To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting,” he wrote. “This is not about religion — this is about terror and keeping our country safe.”
Republican Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham broke the GOP silence on Capitol Hill on Sunday to issue a scathing condemnation of the executive order.
Trump’s move set off confusion at airports and even the agencies in charge of implementing it. One key question is how the order affects US green-card holders and people who hold dual citizenship that includes one of the seven banned nations.
Adding to the confusion, officials at times seemed to contradict themselves. In an interview with NBC, White House chief of staff Reince Priebus said the order “doesn’t affect” green-card holders, then later said “of course” it affects green-card holders from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia.
The executive order temporarily banning more than 218 million people from the United States was met with swift legal challenges. (An earlier email update incorrectly included a lower number of people affected.)
