ATLANTA (CN) – A CNN journalist claims in court he was unlawfully detained over the weekend as a result of President Donald Trump’s controversial executive order banning immigrants from seven countries in the Middle East from entering the United States. 
 
 In a lawsuit filed in the federal court in Atlanta on Monday, Mohammed Abdullah Tawfeeq says he’s traveled abroad for CNN as both a producer and editor for years without incident. 
 
 However, he says, that changed on January 29, as he was returning to Atlanta from Baghdad. 
 
 Two days earlier, President Donald Trump signed an executive order banning entry into the country from seven countries. Tawfeeq’s native Iraq is one of seven countries affected by the ban. 
 
 “When Mr. Tawfeeq presented himself for inspection at Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, the [U.S. Customs and Border Patrol] officer in primary inspection notified him that he could be refused entry under the President’s recently-signed Executive Order,” the complaint says. 
 
 Tawfeeq says the officer scanned his passport and green card, and then began asking him pointed questions about the nature of his trip. 
 
 “CBP officials then told Mr. Tawfeeq to wait because they needed to seek ‘an e-mail’ concerning whether he would be allowed into the United States,” the lawsuit claims. 
 
 Tawfeeq says when he was finally allowed to leave the airport, customs officials offered him no explanation for their decision, no documents relating to his entry, and no one stamped his passport. 
 
 In his lawsuit he maintains the implementation of Trump’s executive order and his detention at Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, violates the Immigration and Nationality Act and the Administrative Procedure Act. 
 
 Tawfeeq, a permanent legal resident of the United States since June 2013, says that under the Immigration and Nationality Act, his status entitles him “to greater procedural protections than non-immigrants/temporary aliens.” 
 
 “The Executive Order has greatly increased the uncertainty involved in current and future international travel for returning lawful permanent residents like Mr. Tawfeeq,” the complaint says. “Defendants have sent conflicting signals regarding how and whether the Executive Order will be applied to permanent residents like Mr. Tawfeeq.” 
 
 According to the complaint, after Trump signed the executive order, the State Department announced it would apply to all returning immigrants. 
 
 A day later, White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus attempted to clarify that it would not affect green card holders, but hours before Tawfeeq’s flight landed in Atlanta, the Department of Homeland Security said “it will continue to enforce all of President Trump’s Executive Orders.” 
 
 The statement, release by Homeland Secretary John Kelly did say the order would not be applied to lawful permanent residents “absent the receipt of significant derogatory information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare,” but Tawfeeq says it was and continues to be unclear whether the department’s guidance to its employees matches that statement. 
 
 He is seeking a declaration that the ban does not apply to legal permanent residents as well as an order of mandamus preventing it from being applied to those individuals. 
 
 The defendants named in Tawfeeq’s lawsuit are the Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the State Department, Department of Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, and acting Secretary of State Thomas Shannon. 
 
 Tawfeeq is represented by Theresia Moser of Atlanta. 
 
 Like this: Like Loading... ||||| Mohammed Tawfeeq, a CNN producer, editor and Iraqi national who was detained at an Atlanta airport on Sunday, has filed a federal lawsuit challenging President Trump's executive order on immigration, according to The Atlanta Journal Constitution. 
 
 Tawfeeq has been a permanent legal resident of the U.S. since 2013. 
 
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 Tawfeeq’s CNN duties include frequently traveling to the Middle East, according to the lawsuit filed Tuesday.“This is a basic request to clarify and assert his rights under the law. We support him in this effort and hope its resolved quickly," a CNN spokesperson told The Hill. 
 
 Tawfeeq was detained Sunday at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport for additional screening, delaying his entry into the United States. 
 
 
 
 “The executive order has greatly increased the uncertainty involved in current and future international travel for returning lawful permanent residents like Mr. Tawfeeq,” the lawsuit states. 
 
 Trump's executive order bars people from Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya and Somalia from entering the U.S. for 90 days. It also bars refugees from entering the country for 120 days and indefinitely for Syrian refugees. 
 
 Updated at 10:02 a.m. ||||| Mark Doss, Supervising Attorney for the International Refugee Assistance Project at the Urban Justice Center speaks on his cell phone at John F. Kennedy International Airport in Queens, New York, U.S., January 28, 2017. REUTERS/Andrew Kelly 
 
 CAIRO/BAGHDAD Arabs and Iranians planning U.S. trips reacted with fury on Saturday to new American travel curbs they said were insulting and discriminatory, as five Iraqis and a Yemeni were stopped from boarding a New York-bound flight in Cairo. 
 
 In some of seven Muslim-majority countries affected by the restrictions, would-be travelers preparing family visits, work trips or seeking to escape war reported chaotic disruption to their plans. Some said they had been humiliated. 
 
 Iran, one of the seven countries, said it would stop U.S. citizens entering the country in retaliation to Washington's visa ban, calling it an "open affront against the Muslim world and the Iranian nation". 
 
 "It's not right to portray huge groups of Arabs and Muslims as possible terrorists," Najeeb Haidari, a Yemeni-American security manager in Yemen, said a day after Trump put a four-month hold on refugee arrivals and temporarily barred travelers from war-torn Syria and six other mainly Muslim nations. 
 
 "This is a stupid, terrible decision which will hurt the American people more than us or anybody else, because it shows that this president can't manage people, politics or global relationships," Haidari added. 
 
 Sudan called the decision to ban entry of its citizens very unfortunate in light of "historic steps" just weeks earlier to lift U.S. sanctions for cooperation on combating terrorism. 
 
 In the most sweeping use of his presidential powers since taking office a week ago, Trump signed an executive order on Friday to pause the entry of travelers from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for at least 90 days. 
 
 He said separately he wanted the United States to give priority to Syrian Christians fleeing the war there. The travel curbs began immediately, causing confusion for would-be travelers with passports from the seven countries. 
 
 UNFAIR DECISION 
 
 Sources at Cairo airport said the five Iraqi passengers and one Yemeni, arriving in transit to Cairo airport, were stopped and re-directed to flights headed for their home countries despite holding valid visas. 
 
 A Syrian family holding U.S. visas who had traveled overnight from Beirut to Paris was prevented from boarding a connecting flight onto Atlanta, Lebanese airport sources said. They flew back to Beirut later on Saturday. 
 
 In Doha, Qatar Airways advised passengers bound for the United States from the seven newly banned countries that they needed to have either a U.S. green card or a diplomatic visa. 
 
 Farea al-Muslimi, a U.S.-educated Yemeni political commentator with the Sana'a Center for Strategic Studies said, "It's insane - but what part of Trump is sane?"ers." 
 
 "This punishes thousands of innocent people for things they have no control over, when the last few attacks in America had to do with radicalized U.S. citizens, not foreigners." 
 
 A 34-year-old Sudanese man who won the U.S. Green Card lottery said he was worried he would be forbidden entry. "If I’m barred...this will destroy my life because I resigned from my work in Sudan and was preparing to settle in America," he said. 
 
 Fariba, an Iranian-American who declined to give her family name and lives in New Jersey, said her parents would not be able to make a planned visit to celebrate Iranian New Year in March. 
 
 "What have we done to deserve such a ban? ... This ban will ruin our lives. Thank you Mr. President. Are you making America great by hurting innocent people?" 
 
 Some people planning U.S. travel said the curbs would harm their careers. Others feared for the safety of their families. 
 
 "HUMILIATING INSULT" 
 
 In Baghdad, Bayan Adil, a doctor working in the Iraqi Health Ministry who applied for a U.S. visa to attend a medical seminar, said Iraqi academics should visit Europe instead of the United States, where they were no longer welcome. 
 
 "Trump's decision is unfortunately a humiliating insult not only for us as academics but for all Iraqis," she said. 
 
 Her comments were echoed by Abd Al-Jafar, a 43-year-old university professor in Sudan's capital Khartoum, who said he had sought to go to the United States for doctoral studies. 
 
 "This decision, if implemented, will be a disaster," he said. "I have work in Sudan and have no desire to emigrate to the U.S., just to study there. This decision is illogical." 
 
 In Beirut, Joumana Ghazi Chehade, 34, a refugee from Yarmouk in Syria living in the Lebanese capital's Burj al-Barajneh camp, said the decision would "destroy a lot of people". 
 
 "Of course we're not going to go blow anything up ... All we are asking for is security and freedom." 
 
 Mirna, an American and a mother of two living in Syria, said it was clear Trump "doesn't want to receive Syrian Muslims ... we have to expect the worst from him because he is a crazy man." 
 
 (Additional reporting by Parisa Hafezi, Babak Dehghanpisheh, Noah Browning, John Davison, Khalid Abdulaziz and Ahmed Elumami.; Writing by William Maclean; editing by Ralph Boulton; Editing by Helen Popper)
– A Trump administration official has called the president's travel ban a "massive success," but a CNN employee may beg to differ. Per the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Mohammed Tawfeeq—an Iraqi national and permanent legal US resident who's an editor and producer for the news network—was held at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport Sunday evening as he returned after being on assignment in Iraq. Now Tawfeeq, who's enjoyed permanent resident status since 2013, is suing the Department of Homeland Security and other government agencies for his detention, which the suit says was illegal. Per Courthouse News, Tawfeeq was returning to the US from Baghdad (he travels to the Middle East often for work) on Jan. 29 when a US Customs and Border Protection officer pulled him aside. Tawfeeq's green card and passport were examined, he was interrogated about his trip, and he was told he'd need to wait for "an email" from the proper authorities to clear him to enter the country. When he was finally allowed to leave, no one offered further explanation, and they didn't even stamp his passport or give him any entry papers. "The executive order has greatly increased the uncertainty involved in current and future international travel" for legal resident such as Tawfeeq, the suit claims, per the Hill. It also adds that, as a legal permanent resident, he should be afforded "greater procedural protections than non-immigrants/temporary aliens." A CNN rep says the network supports Tawfeeq and that his complaint "is a basic request to clarify and assert his rights under the law," per the Hill.