U.S President Donald Trump on Friday made a first real move on his anti-immigration promise by signing an executive order that bars the entry of immigrants from several Muslim countries, including refugees from the war-torn Syria.
These Muslim countries include Iran, Iraq, Syria and Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia. U.S shares a very tense political relationship with each of these Islamic countries. The new order will bar immigrants from these countries for the next 90 days.
But, what makes Trump's executive orders really harsh is the fact that it will be applicable even on green card and visa holders. This will simply affect the tech companies' ability to attract great talent pool from these Muslim countries.
Not surprisingly several tech giants like Facebook, Google and Microsoft are speaking openly against the Trump's executive order. The search engine giant Google said that it is "concerned about the impact of this order" and any proposals creating barriers in attracting great talent to the U.S.
Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg on Saturday expressed his displeasure over the executive order by posting a critical message on his Facebook wall. But in his message he also acknowledged Trump's soft stance on the issue, which denotes that U.S must continue to attract great talent for the sake of prosperity.
Microsoft told Techcrunch that it has already started providing legal assistance to its employees that have been affected by this executive order, while it's CEO Satya Nadella has publicly spoken in favour of immigration on his LinkedIn post.
Meanwhile, a fresh update on the issue is that a federal court in New York has granted a 'emergency stay' to those immigrants who've already landed in U.S on a valid visa, or who are currently in transit to enter into the country.
An 'immigration ban' from Muslim countries was one of the main promises made during Trump's explosive election campaign. However, his anti-immigration promise attracted widespread criticism not only from liberals in U.S, but also from liberals across the world.