Vermont Republican Gov. Phil Scott appears willing to go head-to-head with the Trump administration over immigration.
Vermont’s new Republican governor is fighting President Donald Trump’s temporary immigration ban, saying the executive orders “crossed ethical lines.”
“This is push back. I don’t think it’s right, and it’s not who we are as Americans,” Gov. Phil Scott said Monday while addressing businesspeople and elected officials at a Rutland Chamber of Commerce luncheon.
On Sunday night, Scott called a special cabinet meeting to discuss what state government could do to oppose the orders.
Scott says he will not comply with increased border security and immigration enforcement orders as Trump mandated. He will also seek legislation to stop Vermont law enforcement officials from carrying out those actions.
However, he stopped short of saying he intended to make Vermont a sanctuary state.
“We need to better define ‘sanctuary state.’ We need to make sure that we are not giving people a false sense of security,” Scott said, noting that such a designation does not deny the power of the federal government to enforce U.S. immigration policy.
Such a designation could risk Vermont’s federal funding, such as funding for state infrastructure. In 2010, the federal government spent 7.4 billion dollars for Vermont. The state also receives the most grant funds per dollar of federal taxes paid than any state.
Scott also convened a Civil Rights and Criminal Justice Cabinet composed of high ranking elected and appointed officials and law enforcement officers. The purpose of the cabinet is to see whether current Vermont state law conflicts with the executive orders.
The attorney general will begin investigating the legality of Trump’s executive orders, which Scott believes may violate the Fourth and Tenth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution. The intent of the investigation is to challenge the orders.
Sifting through the hysteria
Protests in Burlington and Rutland have formed to opposed Trump, while misinformation continues to spread regarding the actual language of Trump’s executive order, which is not as drastic as the media is portraying.
The halt on incoming refugees is for only 120 days. The temporary halt is designed to give immigration officials time to reevaluate the security screening process for incoming refugees, as Trump also promised during his campaign.
Trump also has set the refugee cap at 50,000 per year, lower than former President Barack Obama’s 110,000 refugee ceiling, but higher than the one set by former President George W. Bush.
The order also places a 90 day ban on travelers from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia. While critics claim this ban is a ban on Muslims, the executive order applies only to countries the Obama administration identified as jihadist hotspots.
The ban does not apply to people from these countries who hold green cards. These people have already been extensively vetted and have legal presence in the United States.
Trump has permanently stopped immigration from Syria, similar to Obama’s 2011 halt on Iraqi immigration for six months after a terrorist plot was discovered in Kentucky and linked to Iraq.
Obama started accepting large numbers of Syrian refugees in his last year in office, despite being president during the height of the country’s bloody civil war. Between 2011-2015, the Obama administration admitted only 1883 Syrian refugees to the United States. In 2016, about 13,210 were admitted.
Trump’s executive order also leaves room for exceptions, allowing immigration officials to approve cases in the “national interest.”