US Supreme Court upholds Trump travel ban
5-4 ruling hands president ‘one of his biggest wins since taking office’

The US Supreme Court has upheld Donald Trump’s controversial travel ban targeting several Muslim-majority countries.
The court accepted 5-4 the government’s argument that the ban was within the president’s power to craft national security policy and his authority to “suspend entry of aliens into the United States”. The court rejected claims that it was discriminatory and motivated by religious hostility.
The ban targets travellers from Syria, Iran, Libya, Yemen and Somalia, and also includes limited sanctions against North Korean and Venezuelan citizens.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
The vote, which brings to an end more than a year of legal back-and-forth, is “a significant victory for the administration and a blow to anti-discrimination advocates” reports The Guardian. The Independent said the court had handed the president “one of his biggest wins since taking office”.
The administration has strongly denied this is a Muslim ban, but Omar Jadwat, director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Immigrant Rights Project, said that the ruling was one of the Court's “great failures”, and likened the decision to the ruling which upheld Japanese-American internment during World War Two.
CNBC says the case has been “central” to the Trump administration's immigration policy, “presenting a key test of the president's campaign promise to restrict immigration and secure America's borders”.
The administration has faced stinging criticism over its policy of separating immigrant families crossing the US-Mexican border, but the BBC’s Anthony Zurcher says this ruling marks a “significant victory for Mr Trump - and for presidential power to set immigration policy in general - albeit by the narrowest of margins”.
The decision once again highlights the Republican slant on the Supreme Court and follows a number of highly contentious rulings this week which have split along party lines.
On Monday the court voted 5-4 to uphold gerrymandered election maps in Texas, ignoring evidence that the maps were drawn to minimise the power of minority voters, also declining to take up a North Carolina gerrymandering case.
Both of decisions “damage voting rights” says David Leonhardt in the New York Times, and were only made possible “because of the unprecedented actions of Republican senators” who blocked Barack Obama’s choice to fill the vacant Supreme Court seat in the run up to the 2016 presidential election, ensuring the 5-4 Republican majority.
This has prompted University of Texas law professor Steve Vladeck to write that the court’s current term, “is shaping up to be one of its most ideologically one-sided (and consistently conservative) sessions in a long time.”
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
-
5 heavy-handed cartoons about ICE and deportation
Cartoons Artists take on international students, the Supreme Court, and more
By The Week US
-
Exploring the three great gardens of Japan
The Week Recommends Beautiful gardens are 'the stuff of Japanese landscape legends'
By The Week UK
-
Is Prince Harry owed protection?
Talking Point The Duke of Sussex claims he has been singled out for 'unjustified and inferior treatment' over decision to withdraw round-the-clock security
By The Week UK
-
El Salvador's CECOT prison becomes Washington's go-to destination
IN THE SPOTLIGHT Republicans and Democrats alike are clamoring for access to the Trump administration's extrajudicial deportation camp — for very different reasons
By Rafi Schwartz, The Week US
-
Supreme Court takes up Trump birthright appeal
Speed Read The New Jersey Attorney General said a constitutional right like birthright citizenship 'cannot be turned on or off at the whims of a single man'
By Rafi Schwartz, The Week US
-
Court slams Trump, senator visits Ábrego García
Speed Read The case 'should be shocking not only to judges' but all Americans with an 'intuitive sense of liberty'
By Peter Weber, The Week US
-
The anger fueling the Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez barnstorming tour
Talking Points The duo is drawing big anti-Trump crowds in red states
By Joel Mathis, The Week US
-
Judge threatens Trump team with criminal contempt
Speed Read James Boasberg attempts to hold the White House accountable for disregarding court orders over El Salvador deportation flights
By Rafi Schwartz, The Week US
-
Why the GOP is nervous about Ken Paxton's Senate run
Today's Big Question A MAGA-establishment battle with John Cornyn will be costly
By Joel Mathis, The Week US
-
UK-US trade deal: can Keir Starmer trust Donald Trump?
Today's Big Question White House insiders say an agreement is 'two weeks' away but can Britain believe it?
By Sorcha Bradley, The Week UK
-
A running list of Trump's second-term national security controversies
In Depth Several scandals surrounding national security have rocked the Trump administration
By Justin Klawans, The Week US