U.S. President Joe Biden is poised to lift the infamous Muslim ban signed into law by his predecessor Donald Trump as soon as he takes office, according to his incoming Chief of Staff Ron Klain.
On Jan. 27, 2017, only one week after his inauguration, President Donald Trump issued an executive order titled “Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States,” which was immediately labeled a “Muslim ban” and denounced by huge swathes of people in the U.S. and across the world.
Trump’s executive order limited travel from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Yemen, North Korea and Venezuela.
The idea was mentioned by Trump for the first time during an election campaign in December 2015, where he promised a ban on Muslim entry to the U.S., citing a poll commissioned by a notoriously anti-Muslim organization.
Myanmar, Eritrea, Kyrgyzstan, Sudan, and Nigeria were later added to the list of blacklisted countries.
On June 26, 2018, the Supreme Court ruled that the Muslim ban did not violate the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, giving the president authority to "impose on the entry of" or "suspend the entry of" a "class" of people to the U.S.
More than 6 million Muslim-Americans, the second-largest faith in the country, who pay taxes, serve in the army and contribute to the U.S. economy in various ways, were left extremely disappointed by the discriminatory policies of the U.S. administration and the Supreme Court.
Biden to rejoin Paris Climate Accord
Klain also stated that Biden will rejoin the Paris Climate Accord after Trump withdrew the world’s biggest economy from the pact that aims to rein in climate change and reduce carbon emissions soon after taking office.
