Attorney who got Melania US citizenship slams Trump's immigration ban: 'It's embarrassing'
President Donald Trump's recent announcement of a temporary immigration ban amid the growing coronavirus outbreak in the US has been severely criticized by the attorney who helped the first lady and her parents become citizens of the country in the past.
On Monday, April 20, the POTUS tweeted: "In light of the attack from the Invisible Enemy, as well as the need to protect the jobs of our GREAT American Citizens, I will be signing an Executive Order to temporarily suspend immigration into the United States!"
Following the announcement, Michael Wildes, managing partner at Wildes & Weinberg law firm that specializes in US immigration and nationalist law, who once helped multiple members of Melania Trump's family relocate to the US, told former actor turned relocation specialist Andy Newton-Lee in a web-chat that he thought that the president enforcing an anti-immigration policy amid a health crisis in the nation was "embarrassing."
"Embarrassing, embarrassing, I think it's embarrassing, but I think we have to not criticize, we have to step up and all hands on deck are needed, whether it's the medical professionals in our hospitals and our first responders in people's homes. I'm also a mayor in a small city in New Jersey where I live. But now is not the time for us to judge, history will judge the way we respond as a nation," he said in a video obtained by Daily Mail.
After she became a permanent resident of the US in 2001 via a green card, Melania was helped by Wildes to obtain US citizenship in 2006, a year after marrying Donald Trump. The lawyer aided Melania's Slovenian parents, Viktor and Amalija Knavs, to take the oath of citizenship in New York City after being sponsored by their daughter in 2018. Even FLOTUS's sister Ines, a New York resident, obtained a green card with his help recently.
Apart from this, Wildes is known for securing visas in the past for celebrities like supermodel Yasmin Le Bon, soccer icon Pele and famed British artist Sarah Brightman.
Wildes hinted at the fact that he will probably not be voting for Trump in the upcoming elections, although at the same time he highlighted the importance of fellow Americans supporting their current president in such trying times.
"We have an opportunity in November to elect somebody different if we don't feel that the president ought to continue that trust, but right now he is our president in the midst of a Covid-19 campaign. It's our job, you, me, others to make sure that those people with accents in this country feel the same sense of hospitality that our founding documents and parents have envisioned and that we realize that it's that golden experiment, that regeneration of America's dream and immigration is a huge part of that DNA that will help right this ship. I can judge, but it's not for me to say, right now it's for me to do," he said.
On April 21, Trump said at the daily press briefing that he would be imposing a 60-day pause on green cards, which was already in place due to the ongoing pandemic.
"This pause will be in effect for 60 days. Afterwards, the need for any extension or modification will be evaluated by myself and a group of people based on academic conditions at the time. This order will only apply for an individual seeking a permanent residency. In other words, those receiving green cards," he said.
Those seeking temporary status or a temporary work permit will not be adversely affected by the order.