When President Trump's travel executive order first went into effect in January, airports across the country erupted into chaos as legal travelers arriving from Trump's seven "banned" majority-Muslim countries were detained after landing. While temporarily being in custody at an airport is obviously slightly different than the plot of the 2004 Tom Hanks' film The Terminal, the situation still prompted a U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals judge to wonder about the similarities.
"We don't think that system would make a lot of sense," Wall added.
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.
"It would be like Tom Hanks at the airport, right?" clarified Judge Michael Daly Hawkins, a moderate-to-liberal judge who was appointed under President Clinton.
Wall agreed: "I think that's right."
It's not the first time the comparison has been made — when brothers Tareq Aqel Mohammed Aziz and Ammar Aziz learned their immigrant visas had been canceled upon landing in the United States just hours after the travel ban was enacted in January, their lawyer described the confusing situation as "Tom Hanks limbo."
Watch Monday's exchange via CSPAN here.
-
September 14 editorial cartoonsCartoons Sunday’s political cartoons include RFK Jr on the hook, the destruction of discourse, and more
-
Air strikes in the Caribbean: Trump’s murky narco-warTalking Point Drug cartels ‘don’t follow Marquess of Queensberry Rules’, but US military air strikes on speedboats rely on strained interpretation of ‘invasion’
-
A tour of Sri Lanka’s beautiful northThe Week Recommends ‘Less frenetic’ than the south, this region is full of beautiful wildlife, historical sites and resorts
-
Florida erases rainbow crosswalk at Pulse nightclubSpeed Read The colorful crosswalk was outside the former LGBTQ nightclub where 49 people were killed in a 2016 shooting
-
Trump says Smithsonian too focused on slavery's illsSpeed Read The president would prefer the museum to highlight 'success,' 'brightness' and 'the future'
-
Trump to host Kennedy Honors for Kiss, StalloneSpeed Read Actor Sylvester Stallone and the glam-rock band Kiss were among those named as this year's inductees
-
White House seeks to bend Smithsonian to Trump's viewSpeed Read The Smithsonian Institution's 21 museums are under review to ensure their content aligns with the president's interpretation of American history
-
Charlamagne Tha God irks Trump with Epstein talkSpeed Read The radio host said the Jeffrey Epstein scandal could help 'traditional conservatives' take back the Republican Party
-
CBS cancels Colbert's 'Late Show'Speed Read 'The Late Show with Stephen Colbert' is ending next year
-
Shakespeare not an absent spouse, study proposesspeed read A letter fragment suggests that the Shakespeares lived together all along, says scholar Matthew Steggle
-
New Mexico to investigate death of Gene Hackman, wifespeed read The Oscar-winning actor and his wife Betsy Arakawa were found dead in their home with no signs of foul play
