Donald Trump: Delta Airlines glitch caused chaos at US airports, not refugee ban

Backlash: Donald Trump has sparked a global outcry after he signed an executive order to impose tighter vetting of travellers entering the United States
AP
Saphora Smith30 January 2017

US President Donald Trump has said widespread chaos at airports in America was due to a Delta Airlines computer failure, and not his controversial ban on refugees from certain countries.

Mr Trump took to Twitter to downplay the number of people affected by his newly-imposed immigration policy saying "there is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country."

But he defended the policy saying "there a lot of bad "dudes" out there."

It comes as scores of travellers were prevented from entering the US and dozens were detained at US airports after Mr Trump banned refugees from entering the country.

The US President signed an executive order on Friday shutting down the US refugee programme for 120 days and halting all immigration from seven predominantly Muslim countries for 90 days.

The countries subjected to the restriction are Somalia, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya and Yemen.

Severeal well-known names such as Olympic medialist Sir Mo Farah, who was born in Somalia, and the British-Iraqi Conservative MP Nadhim Zahawi would have been affected by the ban but were granted exemptions because of their British citizenship.

The order prompted confusion at America’s airports and triggered mass protests after reports flooded in of chaos at border control with many US residents left in legal limbo.

One BBC reporter and Iranian national live tweeteed the moment his passport was allegedly confiscated when he flew into Los Angeles.

But on Monday Mr Trump denied his executive order was the cause of “big problems at airports” blaming Delta airlines computer failure instead.

Mr Trump wrote on Twitter: “Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage,….”

Bloomberg reported that a Delta Airlines computer breakdown grounded 170 flights leaving passengers stranded across the country. But the Federal Aviation Administration said international flights weren’t affected.

In his flurry of tweets on Monday morning Mr Trump also blasted Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, who protested, along with other Democratic lawmakers, at international airports and demanded for clarification of the new law.

Mr Trump said: “Protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer. [Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly] said that all is going well with very few problems. MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN!”

He added: “There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country. This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world!

"If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the "bad" would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad "dudes" out there!"

Mr Trump’s refugee policy is facing an intensifying backlash from across the globe with more than a million people signing a petition in protest of his planned state visit to Britain.

But Theresa May has dismissed the petition saying she is "very happy" for Mr Trump's planned state visit to Britain to go ahead.

Her comments came after London Mayor Sadiq Khan said Londoners would not support "rolling out the red carpet" for Mr Trump until the muslim ban is lifted.

Mr Kahn told the Standard:"We must now rescind the offer of a full state visit for President Trump - until this ban is lifted."

Delta Airlines have been approached for a comment.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in

MORE ABOUT