A US federal judge in Virginia ruled on Friday that President Donald Trump's travel ban was justified, increasing the likelihood the measure will go before the Supreme Court as the decision took an opposing view to courts in Maryland and Hawaii that have halted the order.
US District Court Judge Anthony Trenga rejected arguments by Muslim plaintiffs who claimed Trump's March 6 executive order temporarily banning the entry of all refugees and travellers from six Muslim-majority countries was discriminatory.
The decision went against two previous court rulings that put an emergency halt to the order before it was set to take effect on March 16. The order remains halted.
Trump has said he plans to appeal those unfavourable rulings to the US Supreme Court if needed, and differing opinions by lower courts give more grounds for the highest court to take up the case.
Trenga, an appointee of Republican President George W. Bush, said the complaint backed by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a Muslim civil rights group, found that more than 20 individuals who brought the suit had been able to show they were harmed by the travel ban since they might be unable to reunite with their relatives.
Crucially he also ruled that Trump's revised order, which replaced a more sweeping version signed on January 27 and rejected by courts, fell within the president's authority to make decisions about immigration.
He said that since the order did not mention religion, the court could not look behind it at Trump's statements about a "Muslim ban" to determine what was in the "drafter's heart of hearts."
Trump has said the ban is necessary to protect the country from terrorist attacks, but his first order was halted by a federal judge in Seattle and a US appeals court in San Francisco due to concerns it violated the US Constitution's prohibition against religious bias.
A ruling by US District Judge Derrick Watson in Hawaii - an appointee of Democratic President Barack Obama - put a stop to the two central sections of the revised ban that blocked travellers from six countries and refugees, while leaving other parts of the order in place.
US District Judge Theodore Chuang in Maryland, also an Obama appointee, only put a halt to the section on travelers.
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