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On Wednesday evening, June 4, President Donald Trump signed a proclamation banning citizens of 12 countries from entering the United States. The document – which goes into effect on Monday, June 9 – also partially restricts a further seven countries based on a less severe criterion. Like Trump’s first-term travel ban, the legacy media and left-leaning politicos are aghast at such sweeping actions. And yet, the challenges the previous ban faced (and over which it ultimately prevailed at the Supreme Court) have provided a roadmap for this latest move.

Delivering the proclamation news by video, the president explained that it was a continuance of his Inauguration Day executive order, which instructed the heads of Homeland Security, Departments of State and Justice, and other intelligence agencies to identify “countries throughout the world for which vetting and screening information is so deficient as to warrant a partial or full suspension on the admission of nationals from those countries.”

Trump declared these were all “high-risk” countries and that among their issues were “inadequate screening and vetting processes,” “high visa overstay rates,” and “a significant terrorist presence or state-sponsored terrorism”; some have also “historically failed to accept back their removable nationals.”

And while critics were quick to denigrate Trump’s decision, it seems his first-term efforts were a teachable moment.

In 2017, President Trump brought into force a travel ban on seven countries. This was challenged in the courts and recrafted twice to eventually include the following eight nations: Syria, Libya, Iran, Yemen, Somalia, North Korea, Chad, and Venezuela. The Supreme Court allowed this third version to stand, and it was not repealed until President Joe Biden took office.

Julia Gelatt of the Migration Policy Institute explained that:

“By the third ban, the key thing that convinced the Supreme Court was they strengthened their justification for why it was needed.

“They said basically that the travel ban needed to be in place because the countries that were banned weren’t sharing good information with the United States so it was against U.S. national security.”

This is not a mistake the president is likely to make in this current iteration.

Raha Wala of the National Immigration Law Center noted that “It is true they [the Trump administration] are on stronger ground than they were before the Supreme Court weighed in on this particular order.” Indeed, Trump made clear that the list could change based on whether “material improvements” are made by the countries in question and that “new countries can be added as threats emerge around the world.”

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During his video address, the president said:

“The recent terror attack in Boulder, Colorado, has underscored the extreme dangers posed to our country by the entry of foreign nationals who are not properly vetted, as well as those who come here as temporary visitors and overstay their visas. We don’t want them.”

He explained that “In the 21st century, we’ve seen one terror attack after another carried out by foreign visa overstayers from dangerous places all over the world … Thanks to Biden’s open-door policies, today there are millions and millions of these illegals who should not be in our country.”

Naturally, high-profile Democratic politicians were quick to pounce.

Washington State Representative Pramila Jayapal wrote on X that “This discriminatory policy, which limits legal immigration, not only flies in the face of what our country is supposed to stand for, it will be harmful to our economy and our communities that rely on contributions of people who come to America from this wide range of countries.” Notably, she did not declare that the proclamation was “illegal.”

President Trump said that his first-term travel ban was “one of our most successful policies” and “a key part of preventing major foreign terror attacks on American soil.” But just how effective is it likely to be?

The Migration Policy Institute in 2019 crunched the numbers on visa admittances. “Monthly immigrant visa issuances to nationals of Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria, and Yemen were down an average of 72 percent between FY 2017 and 2018,” the group wrote. While it would be impossible to prove that an almost three-quarters decrease prevented actual terror attacks, it is widely accepted that these nations either commit, sponsor, or support global terrorism.

“We cannot have open migration from any country where we cannot safely and reliably vet and screen those who seek to enter the United States,” Trump said. He concluded, “We will not allow people to enter our country who wish to do us harm, and nothing will stop us from keeping America safe.”

You can read the White House fact sheet on the proclamation here in full.