On Thursday the US Court of Appeal for the Ninth Circuit ruled that the temporary restraining order on President Trump’s proclamation banning entry to immigrants without health insurance needs to be lifted. In a 2-1 decision, the court said the initial proclamation was within the authority of the president. As such, the Ninth Circuit lifted the temporary ban on the president’s proclamation.

The case started in October 2019 with a lawsuit by seven US citizens who claimed the proclamation unfairly prevented their family members from immigrating into the US. As a result, US District Judge Michael Simon in the District of Oregon ordered a nationwide preliminary injunction against Trump’s latest proclamation in November 2019.

Now, with the case in front of the Ninth Circuit and Trump appointee Judge Daniel Collins, the case went in favor of Trump. Collins and the majority relied on the Supreme Court case Trump v. Hawaii to support their holding. The court stated that “[n]othing in Trump v. Hawaii requires a bright-line trigger for terminating additional restrictions that have been imposed under § 212(f) [of the Immigration and Nationality Act].” 

The dissenting Judge A. Wallace Tashima, who was himself imprisoned as a child in a WWII-era Japanese internment camp, said he sided with the Oregon Court. He said that the proclamation should be banned for violating both the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and “the public charge rule of the Immigration and Nationality Act, which comprehensively addresses the circumstances under which individuals may be excluded from this country due to their limited financial means or the financial burdens they will place on others.”