Nigel Evans, MP for the Ribble Valley, addressed US President Donald Trump’s latest action on travel restrictions. Done through an executive order, the travel restrictions include a temporarily halt to refugee admissions for 120 days, in order to “improve the vetting process”, then caps refugee admissions at 50,000 per year. The order also imposes a temporary, 90-day ban on people entering the US from seven countries: Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen. Finally, the executive order also puts an indefinite hold on admission of Syrian refugees to the United States.
Nigel released the following statement on the matter:
“Donald Trump has been democratically elected as the President of the United States of America. He’s a man who was elected as he spoke the language of Middle America which had felt ignored and dispossessed. He entertained Theresa May for talks as the first world leader to the White House following the inauguration. He reintroduced Winston Churchill’s bust back into the Oval Office after Barack Obama had removed it; he is pro-British and was pro-Brexit, and he wants to see a quick trade deal with the UK.
Theresa May and Boris Johnson were able to get the position of British nationals clarified by the US government, along with Green Card holders and people with dual-citizenship. The policy of a country-wide ban on citizens entering the US is not one I support, but we are assured it is temporary while the new vetting measures are introduced. President Barack Obama introduced a country-wide ban upon Iraq in 2011, and 16 countries have bans against Israelis entering their countries. Many countries have human rights violations against their citizens and some are simply not democratic. The best action is dialogue, not bans.
We are in a unique position in our special relationship with the US, which has already shown its effectiveness as I have talked about above. I will welcome President Trump to the UK when he visits. I want to tell him of our close working relationship with BAC and the US over the Joint Strike Fighter project – and that the US is one of our most treasured trading partners.
A policy of banning the President of one of our closest trading partners, and a country with which we have shared history over the centuries, would backfire big time, hurt the UK economically and deny us any influence in the future. This policy of bans, if spread, would soon find the UK isolated and without friends. This is not in the best interests of Britain or the world.”