Trump's Muslim Ban is Constitutional But Stupid

In a 2013 interview with New York Magazine, the late Supreme Court Justice Anton Scalia said:

“I gave a talk once where I said they ought to pass out to all federal judges a stamp, and the stamp says—Whack! [Pounds his fist.]—STUPID BUT ­CONSTITUTIONAL. Whack! [Pounds again.] STUPID BUT ­CONSTITUTIONAL! Whack! ­STUPID BUT ­CONSTITUTIONAL … [Laughs.] And then somebody sent me one.”

Perhaps the current justices on the Supreme Court were using the STUPID BUT CONSTITUTIONAL stamp when they saw fit to restore a majority of President Trump's travel ban from six Muslim majority countries (Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen).

While the President of the United States has the authority to restrict the entry of foreign persons into this country, just because the President can do something, doesn't necessarily mean he should.

After all, the Muslim travel ban was initiated by President Trump as a counterterrorism measure.

So how many Americans have died at the hands of foreign nationals in terrorist attacks on U.S. soil from the six Muslim majority countries in question since 9/11?

None.

You read that correctly.

In fact, during this period, there have been exactly two terrorist incidents in the United States carried out by nationals from these countries. Both incidents were vehicular attacks which occurred at universities more than a decade part. In March 2006, an Iranian national named Mohammed Reza Taheri-azar injured 9 students when he rammed his SUV at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. Taheri-azar is currently serving a 33-year prison sentence (It should be noted that Taheri-azar came to the United States with his family when he was two years old.) Then in November 2016, only weeks after the presidential election, a Somali refugee named Abdul Razak Ali Artan rammed his vehicle at Ohio State University and then got out of his vehicle and began stabbing people before he was shot dead by a campus police officer. Thirteen people were injured.

Meanwhile, the attacks in Fort Hood, San Bernardino, Orlando, the Little Rock Army Recruitment Center and the Vaughan Foods beheading were carried out by American born Muslims or Muslim converts. No travel ban could have prevented these acts of terror.

The stupidity of the Muslim travel ban lies in the fact that radical Islam is an ideology without borders. One need never leave the comfort of one's bedroom to become radicalized and carry out a jihadist attack.

If President Trump truly wants to stop jihadist attacks he would be better served to stop Islamic radicalization among those born and raised in the United States.

He would also be well served to read the words of Justice Scalia.