RELIGION

Texas splits with other states, defends Trump travel ban

Associated Press
Published | Updated

FILE - In this Feb.9, 2017 file photo, a man stands outside the main door outside the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals building in San Francisco. The state of Texas on Wednesday, Feb. 15, 2017, defended President Donald Trump's ban on travelers from seven predominantly Muslim nations as an assertion of presidential authority intended to protect the country from terrorists, splitting with states that have denounced the order as a religious attack. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez, file) (The Associated Press)

FILE - In this Feb.9, 2017 file photo, a man stands outside the main door outside the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals building in San Francisco. The state of Texas on Wednesday, Feb. 15, 2017, defended President Donald Trump's ban on travelers from seven predominantly Muslim nations as an assertion of presidential authority intended to protect the country from terrorists, splitting with states that have denounced the order as a religious attack. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez, file) (The Associated Press)

Texas is splitting with other states and defending President Donald Trump's ban on travelers from seven predominantly Muslim nations.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton filed documents with the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday asking the court to reconsider its decision not to immediately reinstate the ban. Paxton says the ban is a legal exercise of presidential authority.

A three-judge panel last Thursday refused to block a lower court decision that suspended the ban. The panel rejected the Trump administration's claim of presidential authority and concluded that the order was unlikely to survive the legal challenge mounted by the states of Washington and Minnesota.

The 9th Circuit will decide whether to have a larger panel of judges reconsider that decision.