Professors Join Amicus Brief Challenging Trump Travel Ban

Columbia Law Professors Vincent Blasi, Katherine Franke, and Jeremy Kessler yesterday joined an amicus brief in IRAP v. Trump, the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals case challenging the Trump administration's travel (“Muslim”) ban. Along with more than 40 other leading constitutional scholars from across the country and the political spectrum, the professors argue that the First Amendment and the Equal Protection Clause speak with one voice in barring the U.S. government from taking action that is, in whole or in part, motivated by “animus toward a particular religious group.”

The Constitutional Law Scholars Amicus Brief offers a doctrinal case for invalidating the travel ban that is simpler than the one used by the court below, avoiding controversial Establishment Clause precedents and rendering moot the Government’s after-the-fact appeals to national security.

A companion brief will soon be filed in State of Washington v. Trump in the Ninth Circuit.

A full accounting of the issues raised in the brief is available at the legal blog, Take Care.

# # #

Posted April 20, 2017