New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo says an Iranian infant in need of a life-saving heart surgery who was banned from entering the United States after President Donald Trump's executive order will now be allowed to travel for the emergency procedure.
Cuomo said Friday that Manhattan's Mount Sinai Medical Center has offered to perform the surgery. But the family reportedly chose to do it in Portland, Oregon, where they have a relative.
Cuomo told the New York Daily News that the four-month-old Fatemeh Reshad and her family had received a waiver on Friday allowing their travel to the U.S.
Cuomo says he worked with the International Refugee Assistance Project in order to help secure the waiver.
The baby’s family planned to enter the country earlier this week after picking up a tourist visa in Dubai.
The baby’s uncle, Samad Taghizadeh said Iranian doctors told the family that the infant needed at least one urgent surgery, maybe several, to correct the serious heart defects.
The right thing happened tonight: the federal gov granted Fatemeh Reshad & her family documents to come to the US. https://t.co/RqXRoooCTe
— Andrew Cuomo (@NYGovCuomo) February 4, 2017
Cuomo said in a statement that he plans on continuing to work with the group “to ensure this baby receives the treatment she needs, and fight for those being unfairly shut out of America’s gates by this policy.”
Cuomo said a law firm has agreed to cover the family’s travel expenses. While Cuomo announced that the Mount Sinai Hospital’s pediatric cardiac surgical team “has generously offered to provide the surgery and medical care at no cost to the family.”
"She's in an emergency situation and if it takes a long time, they're going to lose her," Taghizadeh told the Associated Press.
The waiver comes on the same day that a federal judge in Seattle issued a ruling that temporarily halts Trump’s controversial ban.
Washington is the first state to sue over the order which temporarily bans travel for people from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Libya and Yemen and suspends the U.S. refugee program.
Fox News' Edmund DeMarche and Alyssa Madruga contributed to this report.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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