Thousands of demonstrators gathered in downtown New York City this Sunday to protest President Trump’s Executive Order barring citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the US for 90 days, all refugees for 120 days, and Syrian refugees indefinitely.

NEW YORK CITY – Lima Charlie News Political Correspondent Tahlia Burton attended New York City’s mass “Muslim Ban” demonstration on January 30th, in which protesters slammed President Donald J. Trump’s Executive Order barring citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States.

Walking towards the Battery early Sunday afternoon, I marched past Alexander Hamilton’s grave to a chorus of crescendoing voices I couldn’t help but keep step with. “No ban! No wall! Justice for all!” Hamilton, an American Founding Father and an immigrant himself, was surely with the crowd of more than 10,000 in spirit, as the Statue of Liberty and the Freedom Tower laid the backdrop, no less.

It all started on Friday when President Trump signed an Executive Order prohibiting entry of citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries (over 130 million people) into the United States for 90 days. The “Muslim Ban,” — entitled “Protecting the Nation from Terrorist Attacks by Foreign Nationals” — drew both praise and dissent from Americans and the international community as a whole. The ban blocks all refugees from entering the U.S. for 120 days, and bars Syrian refugees indefinitely. Because of this, many have criticized the executive order as legislation chock-full of human rights violations.

President Trump argued that his policy is similar to the Obama Administration’s 2011 visa ban in which Iraqi refugees were prohibited from entering the country for six months. In an official press release, he stated, “this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion — this is about terror and keeping our country safe.”

Trump immediately took to Twitter to make his argument.

Protesters, elected leaders, and advocates from around the country disagreed with the President’s position and the constitutional legitimacy of the ban itself. Senators Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Senator Cory Booker (D-IL), and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio were among the demonstrators on Sunday, all of whom addressed the crowd with words of solidarity.

“Due process is under assault!” de Blasio shouted to the masses, as cheers of “No justice, no peace” broke out in the northeast corner of the park.

Booker told the crowd that as Americans, “we cannot just luxuriate in our freedoms and our liberties — we must earn them by fighting to expand them to all citizens and all people.”

These people put everything they had on the line for us. Why was I protesting? How could I not?

– U.S. Army Combat Veteran, Matt Zeller

Also among the protesters were American military veterans in droves, many of whom served with Muslim interpreters and security forces during their deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan.

Matt Zeller, a veteran of the U.S. Army who, in 2008, served in Afghanistan as an embedded combat adviser with Afghan security forces, says that the only reason he’s alive today is because an Afghan interpreter named Janis saved his life.

“These people put everything they had on the line for us. Why was I protesting? How could I not?” Zeller said in an interview with Lima Charlie.

“My brother Janis served eight years on the front lines with us. He’s been blown up six times fighting for our country, yet we don’t celebrate him as a combat veteran because he wasn’t born here. But look at everything that he did. The only reason I’m alive today is because the United States made a promise to Janis that he and his family would get visas to come here if he served with our military.”

Zeller contends that the United States must keep its promise to interpreters like Janis, as it’s a matter of national security. He explained that terrorists track down, torture, and kill their co-nationals who have aided the United States in order to dissuade others from helping American wartime efforts.

“How many Americans will needlessly die because interpreters believe that working with us is a death sentence?” Zeller added.

Wartime interpreters are not the only group of immigrants and refugees that veterans came to stand up for. Many of the former service members are students whose friends and fellow classmates have been affected by the order.

“I’d say that at least a quarter of my classmates — my friends — are affected by this [executive order],” said Ben Feibleman, a veteran of the U.S. Marine Corps and current student at Columbia Journalism School. “I came in that Saturday and the school looked like a WWI sanitarium — everyone had shell shock.”

Feibleman described how many of these students are unable to return to their home countries to visit their families, and their family members are unable to come to the United States for graduation. “As long as this executive order stands, they are cut off from their families.”

On that unusually sunny day under unusually somber circumstances, New Yorkers — veterans, civilians, immigrants, natives, men, women, children, and everything in between — were just New Yorkers. And as one voice, one people, New Yorkers stood as an immoveable force, vowing to defend the principles that this nation was built upon: liberty and justice for all.

The demonstration culminated in a densely packed march up Greenwich Street, where protesters relied on the gleaming, titanic Freedom Tower as a reference point and the sounds of a three-man brass band as cadence. Again we passed Hamilton’s modest grave — and in a sea of posters, one serendipitously caught my eye: “Immigrants: We Get The Job Done.”

Tahlia Y. Burton, Lima Charlie News

Tahlia Burton is a veteran of the United States Air Force, where she served six years as a Chinese, Pashto, and French cryptologic language analyst. She spent four years working real-time intelligence operations out of Fort Meade, Maryland, where she supported special operations units in five U.S. combatant commands. In 2014, she was named “Airman of the Year” at the squadron and group levels.

After being honorably discharged, Tahlia was accepted to Columbia University where she currently studies political science and human rights. She serves on the Columbia University Senate, and is the Advisor on Human Rights Coverage for The War Horse, a nonprofit digital magazine focused on Post-9/11 war and trauma. Tahlia is the recipient of the Air Force Achievement Medal for the discovery of an enemy threat that might have cost the lives of 75 U.S. Navy SEALs and other Special Forces personnel. She has received national attention for her journalism, which has been covered in the Associated Press “Big Story,” Task & Purpose, The Washington Post, Fox News, and other numerous news outlets.

Follow Tahlia on Twitter @TahliaBurtonLC

Lima Charlie provides global news, insight & analysis by military veterans and service members Worldwide.

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All images by Tiago dos Santos, USAF (2008-2012)

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