Around a 100 US technology firms, including Apple, Facebook, Google and Microsoft, have filed a legal brief opposing United States President Donald Trump's refugee travel ban which bars people from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the States.
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The tech companies, in their brief, have argued that the ban imposes significant burdens on the industry by not allowing the firms to hire talents from the countries included in the ban. Firms like Uber, Reddit, Netflix and Dropbox have also supported Washington state's lawsuit.
However, some companies which reportedly had pledged their support to the Washington lawsuit, were found missing in the list of companies that filed the opposing brief, including Amazon, Tesla and SpaceX. Tesla and Spacex are run by Elon Musk who is a member of Trump's business advisory council, the Guardian reported.
The brief argued that the executive orders harm innovation and economic growth, as well as the competitiveness of American companies while also being unlawful.
It stated that the beneficiaries of America's generally pro-migration attitude "are not just the new immigrants who chose to come to our shores, but American businesses, workers, and consumers, who gain immense advantages from immigrants' infusion of talents, energy, and opportunity".
"There is no precedent for an order like this one in magnitude or kind. No order before this one imposed a categorical ban of hundreds of millions of foreign nationals," the brief also stated.
Last week, a federal judge from Seattle has sided with Washington and had blocked Trump's travel ban across the nation temporarily. The Washington lawsuit has urged for a permanent blocking of Trump's travel ban citing it as unconstitutional.
The US president's executive actions on extreme vetting and visa ban apply to migrants, refugees and US legal residents — Green Card holders — from Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Libya and Yemen. There is an indefinite ban on the arrival of Syrian refugees. Trump cited "terrorism concerns" as the reason behind the order.
