LGBTQ organizations raised the alarm over the Trump immigration ban last Friday against a number of predominantly Muslim nations, as well as blocking Syrian refugees from seeking asylum in the US.
President Donald Trump had signed the executive order last week suspending travel from Syria, Iraq, Libya, Yemen, Iran, Sudan, and Somalia so as to keep out “radical Islamic terrorists.”
In a report by The New York Times, Trump said: “We want to ensure that we are not admitting into our country the very threats our soldiers are fighting overseas.”
Trump immigration ban is un-American
In response to this, national groups fighting for LGBTQ rights said this goes against the grain of what the US stands for. In particular, Rachel B. Tiven, CEO of Lambda Legal, said the orders were “un-American.”
“America is a beacon for LGBT people around the world, and restricting rather than expanding access to our shores harms us all”,” Tiven said.
“President Trump’s attacks on immigrants and refugees are a direct assault on America’s most fundamental values,” said Chad Griffin, president of the Human Rights Campaign.
“Donald Trump’s unjust and unconscionable executive orders make life more dangerous for countless LGBTQ people, and could equal a death sentence for those trying to escape violence and persecution from places such as Syria,” Griffin added.
“We in the LGBTQ community stand in solidarity with all immigrants, asylum seekers, and refugees, LGBTQ and non-LGBTQ, at this dark moment. The executive orders are not only un-American, they are ineffectual if they are meant to make America ‘strong,'” said Janson Wu, executive director of GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders.
“Targeting immigrants, Muslims, and refugees inverts what we know to be America at its best: a country that is made stronger by diversity and a country with freedom– including freedom of religion — as a core value,” Wu said.
“To single out Muslim persons for stigma and suspicion undermines our commitment to inclusion, religious freedom, and our common humanity,” said Kate Kendell, executive director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights.
LGBTQs affected by Trump immigration ban
A number of reports have come out that have affected LGBTQ people from these countries.
One was chemical engineer Maysam Sodagari, a former Iranian citizen who was now a green card holder from San Francisco. Sodagari was on an Atlantis cruise on Royal Caribbean’s Allure of the Seas when Trump signed the order.
“I left the port with a legal status for a gay cruise. Now, I may not be able to enter the US tomorrow. My future is all unclear just by a sudden change in law,” Sodagari wrote on a Facebook post.
“If I get detained and sent back to Iran, at least I lived life to the fullest as a gay man in the US, And I want to thank you all for being part of this experience,” he added.
Fortunately, Sodagari was able to return. OUT Miami Foundation director Jamie Alejandro tweeted that: “I am happy to report that I’m here with Maysam. He is doing well and is in good spirits– obviously concerned and shaken up, but doing well.”
Meanwhile, another one affected is Ramin Ahmari, a computer science major at Stanford University. Though an Iranian passport holder, he has never lived in Iran and grew up in Germany.
As he has a student visa, Ahmari is currently debating whether to be with his ill parents or stay and finish his degree in the US.
“I also identify as LGBT and was initially attracted by America’s openness that has now also changed,”” Ahmari said.