Hanover
But that hasn’t stopped the couple, who work at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center and the Geisel School of Medicine, from taking steps to secure their place in America.
“Well, it hastened our application for a U.S. passport,” Al-Nimr said in an email.
Both Amer, a gastroenterologist from Jordan, and Rima, a clinical instructor from Canada, hold green cards, which grant them permanent U.S. residency. Trump’s executive order, however, originally applied to green card holders before his administration this week appeared to scale it back, amid considerable confusion over the reach of the order and its legality.
Although the Al-Nimrs said they had been eligible for three months to apply for U.S. passports, they had held off because of more pressing issues. Amer, for instance, said he had just returned from a medical mission to care for Syrian refugees.
“I would never have assumed this blanket ban could affect legal, tax-paying U.S. residents,” Al-Nimr wrote. “While my country is not on the list, it just goes to show that I was possibly one whimsical decision away from being separated from my wife and our two American daughters after living here for 15 years.”
Meanwhile, high-ranking officials in the Twin States and educational institutions in the Upper Valley this weekend denounced Trump’s temporary ban on immigration from seven majority-Muslim countries, as international scholars and professionals expressed concern about their own residency status.
Vermont Gov. Phil Scott, a Republican who declined to support Trump during the campaign, on Sunday condemned the president’s decree to turn back refugees and immigrants from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen.
“I can’t imagine what Vermont, or our country, would look like today, had we refused to allow immigrants from all reaches of the world to experience this wonderful country the way most of us have, simply because they were not born here or didn’t share our exact religious view,” Scott said. “As I have said, I’m going to do everything I can to protect the rights of all Vermonters and the human rights of all people — that includes standing up to executive orders from Washington that cross legal, ethical and moral lines that have distinguished America from the rest of the world for generations.”
Scott also applauded a Brooklyn federal judge’s ruling on Saturday to block part of the executive order after the American Civil Liberties Union filed suit, citing constitutional overreach and potential harm to 100 to 200 people trapped at airports because of the action.
Trump, who during the campaign repeatedly called for a “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States,” this week said his action had not been religiously motivated and pointed out that many Muslim-majority countries are not on his list.
Both Vermont and New Hampshire’s attorney generals have come out against the order. T.J. Donovan, Vermont’s chief prosecutor, signed a statement with more than a dozen other attorneys general calling the edict “un-American and unlawful.”
N.H. Attorney General Joseph Foster, a Democrat, in a separate statement said the executive action “violates principles that are fundamental to our democracy.”
New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, a Republican who endorsed the president during the 2016 election, issued a more neutral statement through a spokesman on Monday.
“Our country was founded on immigration and it is both the fabric of my family and families around the United States,” said the statement from Sununu, some of whose ancestors immigrated to the U.S. from Lebanon. “We live in a very dangerous world and I will continue to support the strengthening of the vetting process, as it contributes directly to the safety and security of the people of New Hampshire. I am closely monitoring the President’s executive order and our office is staying in communication with the White House and federal and state agencies to assess the impact of the order on New Hampshire.”
The president’s immigration action met with widespread disapproval from educational institutions around the Upper Valley this week, many of which are home to comparatively large groups of international students, faculty and staff.
A spokeswoman for Vermont Law School in Royalton said that Professor Jared Carter, director of the Vermont Community Law Center in Burlington, is offering free legal advice to anyone affected by the ban.
The spokeswoman, Maryellen Apelquist, shared an email from VLS President and Dean Marc Mihaly that said the order “is inconsistent with the principles upon which the United States was founded.”
Mihaly also expressed support for a statement from the Association of American Universities that called for the order to be rescinded.
Dartmouth College President Phil Hanlon endorsed the AAU statement in a message to the college community on Sunday in which he noted that the school has more than 900 international students and more than 200 international faculty, scholars and staff.
“We recognize, value and celebrate the essential contributions of our international students and scholars,” he said.
Hanlon said the college’s immigration services office “strongly recommends” that foreign nationals from the listed countries avoid all international travel, including to Canada, and said administrators were working with students and faculty affected by the action.
Professor Susannah Heschel, chairwoman of Jewish Studies at Dartmouth, said some of her department’s students were unable to leave for study abroad trips. Others are already abroad and may have delays in returning, she said.
As of Monday evening, Heschel and 32 other current and former members of the college’s Jewish Studies Program had signed a statement against the order in which they invoked U.S. immigration policies during the Holocaust.
“As scholars well aware of the denial of entry into the United States to Jewish refugees fleeing Hitler, we are outraged that fellow human beings fleeing war and death are not being welcomed here,” the faculty members said. “As scholars, we protest the foolishness of trying to combat terrorism in this way. Moreover, we are shocked by proposals of a future religious test for entry into the United States. Such absurd policies will not make this country safer. Moreover, bans on entry damage our ability to carry forward our scholarship overseas and to work collaboratively with colleagues from other countries. We demand that the United States government end this wrongheaded policy immediately.”
Al-Nimr, the Dartmouth-Hitchcock doctor, said on Monday that he had been “blown away” by the support from friends, colleagues and neighbors in the Upper Valley, and had taken his daughters on Sunday to thank protesters marching in support of immigrants on the Dartmouth College green.
“We wanted to let them know that we appreciate and support their message,” he said. “We continue to believe in this nation.”
A small protest of about 15 to 20 people took place on the green on Sunday, according to Hanover Police Chief Charlie Dennis, who said the demonstration had been peaceful. He said he had heard another protest may be coming together for Saturday.
Early moves from Trump and Congressional Republicans sparked political action on other issues this week; on Monday, students at Dartmouth’s Geisel School of Medicine gathered in objection to the ongoing repeal of the Affordable Care Act.
One hundred thirty medical students met to organize against the nullification of former President Barack Obama’s signature health care law, which insures at least 50,000 in New Hampshire. The students attended workshops on phone banking, social media activism and online petitions, according to a news release from the demonstrators.
Rob Wolfe can be reached at rwolfe@vnews.com or at 603-727-3242.