04 February 2017•Update: 04 February 2017
NEW YORK
The White House late Friday expressed outrage and pledged to fight back after a federal judge in Seattle, Washington halted President Donald Trump's controversial travel ban.
"At the earliest possible time, the Department of Justice intends to file an emergency stay of this outrageous order and defend the executive order of the President, which we believe is lawful and appropriate," White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said in a statement.
"The President's order is intended to protect the homeland and he has the constitutional authority and responsibility to protect the American people," Spicer added.
The executive order Trump signed a week ago bars nationals of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S. for 90 days, freezes the U.S. refugee program for 120 days and bans Syrian refugees indefinitely.
It has caused tens of thousands of visas to be revoked and led to dozens of detentions nationwide, triggering mass protests across the country.
Federal Judge James Robart halted the order late Friday, leading border agents to declare that canceled visas would be reinstated and refugees with valid visas would be admitted into the U.S.
After obtaining the restraining order from Judge Robart, Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson wrote on Twitter: “No one is above the law — not even the President.”
Hours earlier, the White House won a smaller-scale legal victory when a judge in Boston unblocked the executive action in the state of Massachusetts, used as a transit route over the last week by people from the blacklisted nations who wanted to avoid detention as many of them sought to be reunited with family and friends.
Prompted by a knife attack in Paris treated as an act of terror, President Trump took to Twitter earlier in the day to defend his ban, declaring to his 23.6 million followers: "We must keep 'evil' out of our country!"
