Due to President Donald Trump’s executive order banning immigrants from seven predominantly Muslim nations from entering the United States, a 12-year-old girl is currently stuck in East Africa.
Trying To Come Home
The girl is the daughter of Ahmed Mohammad Ahmed Ali. He had his wife had been attempting to get her a green card to enter the U.S. since 2011. Both parents are U.S. citizens, along with their two other daughters. However, the 12-year-old was not automatically born into citizenship. This is because her mother had not been living in the U.S. for the required five years prior to the child’s birth.
The family was finally able to get the girl a visa to enter the United States after years of work. Her visa was issued earlier this week in Djibouti, a country in the Horn of Africa. She had taken a 16-hour bus ride from Yemen in order to get to Djibouti, a trip that took her through extremely dangerous territory.
Trapped In Dangerous Territory
Yemen is currently in the midst of a civil and proxy war. This conflict has resulted in the deaths of an estimated 10,000 citizens over the last two years. Because of this, the American embassy in Yemen was closed, forcing the girl to make this dangerous trek to Djibouti in order to get her visa.
But just hours after Trump signed this radical executive order, the girl and her father were pulled out of line by airport personnel. They were then barred from boarding their Ethiopian Airlines flight. Now Ali and his daughter are trapped in East Africa, where they have no family or friends to help them out.
Looking For An Exception
Katy Lewis, the family’s immigration attorney, is adamant that Trump’s executive order is unconstitutional. She has been working to get an exception to the order, as it says:
“Secretaries of State and Homeland Security may, on a case-by-case basis, and when in the national interest, issue visas or other immigration benefits to nationals of countries for which visas and benefits are otherwise blocked.”
While Ali and his 12-year-old are trapped in Africa, his family is struggling to support themselves in the U.S. without him. If they do not receive an exception to the executive order soon, he may be faced with the decision of having to leave his daughter behind. This awful situation leaves Ali with little hope:
“Everybody was happy. We were almost done after six years.”
Their long, difficult journey had almost been completed. That was until a wigged, orange buffoon signed possibly the worst executive order in recent memory. This story is just one of many injustices caused by Trump’s overt racism. It is now up to us to tell their stories and resist the racism of this presidency.
Watch the video below to see immigrants being detained and huge protests at American airports
Featured image credit: screenshot from CNN Twitter
