The Supreme Court has upheld that grandparents qualify as a "bona fide" relationship for travelers looking to enter the U.S.
For the record, cousins and other relatives do, too.
This is certain to be welcome news for those residing in the six Muslim-majority nations included in the travel ban: Iran, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia. However, there have been so many rulings back and forth that it is hard to keep track of where the controversial executive order stands at this point.
After a June ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court allowed the travel ban to take effect in a limited capacity, it carved out an exception for travelers who had a "bona fide" relationship with someone in the U.S.
After that ruling, the U.S. State Department announced that the criteria which constituted a relationship to a person or entity in the U.S. did not include grandparents, grandchildren, uncles, aunts, cousins and fiancés but did include sons- and daughters-in-law.
Hawaii challenged the administration's interpretation, and a federal judge in Hawaii ruled that grandparents are exempt from the travel ban.
"Common sense, for instance, dictates that close family members be defined to include grandparents. Indeed, grandparents are the epitome of close family members. The Government's definition excludes them. That simply cannot be," said judge Dereck Watson in regards to his ruling.
[READMORE]READ MORE: Instagram's 'Banned Grandmas' Calls Out Travel Ban[/READMORE]
The administration then asked the Supreme Court to overturn the ruling from the Hawaii District Court, once again banning grandparents and other relatives from entering the U.S.
Today, the court refused to do that.
Six of the judges agreed with the Hawaii ruling while three conservative justices-Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch-said that they would have allowed the travel ban to stay in effect the way it was originally interpreted by the Trump administration: excluding grandparents, grandchildren, cousins and other relatives from entrance to the U.S.
The matter of refugees and determining whether or not working with a U.S. organization on resettlement constitutes a bona fide relationship remains up in the air. The matter was referred back to the Ninth U.S. Court of Appeals.
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