A federal judge invalidated Donald Trump’s ban on 39 countries.

A US federal judge ruled Friday that an immigration ban imposed by the Donald Trump administration on 39 countries following last November’s DC shootings was unlawful. Chief US District Judge John McConnell in Providence, Rhode Island ruled that US Citizenship and Immigration Services had adopted a number of unlawful policies targeting people from 39 African, Asian, Latin American and Middle Eastern countries.The Obama-appointed judge said those policies have put the lives of countless immigrants living in the United States in uncertain legal jeopardy. He wrote, “USCIS’s hold on the decisions cannot be attributed to anything that these individuals have done wrong; rather, it arises entirely from the phenomenon of their birth.” “But the rule of law must apply equally to everyone, and as is clear here, USCIS neither ‘followed the law’ nor ‘did things the right way,'” McConnell wrote in the 135-page decision. “In fact, the agency has violated the same immigration laws that Congress has charged it to enforce, as well as the administrative laws that govern the agency’s actions.”The Department of Homeland Security did not immediately comment on the decision. The administration can appeal the decision and if they do not want the ban to be lifted, they can appeal for an immediate stay of the decision.The policies barring immigrants from any of the list of countries from receiving any immigration benefits, visas, green cards, travel visas were announced after two National Guard members were shot in Washington by an Afghan national, Rahmanullah Lakanwal. Lakanwal pleaded not guilty.The judge wrote, “The Court is reminded of an oft-repeated line in discussions of immigration policy: If people want to immigrate to the United States, they must ‘obey the law’ and ‘do things the right way.'” “This case is a perfect example of immigrants doing just that.”

list of 39 countries

full suspension: Afghanistan, Burkina Faso, Burma, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Laos, Libya, Mali, Niger, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, YemenPartial suspension: Angola, Antigua and Barbuda, Benin, Burundi, Côte d’Ivoire, Cuba, Dominica, Gabon, Gambia, Malawi, Mauritania, Nigeria, Senegal, Tanzania, Togo, Tonga, Turkmenistan, Venezuela, Zambia, Zimbabwe