CLOSE President Donald Trump used his preferred platform to criticize the judge who blocked his administration's travel ban on immigrants. Video provided by Newsy Newslook

Protesters against President Trump's temporary travel ban on citizens from seven Muslim-majority nations stand in front of the Bradley Terminal at Los Angeles International Airport on Feb. 4, 2017, in Los Angeles after the order was lifted. (Photo: Reed Saxon, AP)

President Trump has formally asked a federal court to overturn a Seattle judge’s injunction halting his immigration ban, after a day in which he criticized the judge’s ruling as “ridiculous” and a “terrible decision.”

In a short notice of appeal filed Saturday evening, the Department of Justice, Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson formally notified the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals of their intention. The filing contains no legal arguments; those are expected to come later.

"We'll win," Trump said Saturday night as he arrived for a Red Cross gala ball at his Mar-a-Lago resort. "For the safety of our country, we'll win."

The appeal filing was the latest in a series of twists, most of which were chronicled on Twitter by Trump, that saw federal officials dismantle the travel ban Saturday after a judge blocked it.

That judge, U.S. District Senior Judge James Robart, sitting in Seattle, issued the temporary restraining order Friday night that immediately lifted the ban.

The judge opens up our country to potential terrorists and others that do not have our best interests at heart. Bad people are very happy! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 5, 2017

Trump first blasted the ruling by the "so-called judge," tweeting that his opinion "essentially takes law-enforcement away from our country, is ridiculous and will be overturned!" Even before the president's comments, the White House said the federal government would challenge the decision. ACLU officials promised to oppose the president's newest effort, which is also opposed by 16 state attorneys general.

Shortly attending the Red Cross ball, Trump piled on the judge on Twitter again: “The judge opens up our country to potential terrorists and others that do not have our best interests at heart. Bad people are very happy!"

The opinion of this so-called judge, which essentially takes law-enforcement away from our country, is ridiculous and will be overturned! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 4, 2017

The executive order signed by Trump on Jan. 27 had suspended the entry of all refugees to the U.S. for 120 days, halted admission of refugees from Syria indefinitely and barred entry for three months to residents from the predominantly Muslim countries of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen.

Following Robart's ruling, the State Department said it was restoring tens of thousands of canceled visas for foreigners while the Department of Homeland Security "suspended all actions" for enforcing the ban and instead began standard inspection of travelers.

People hold a banner reading "Make America hate again" during a gathering to protest U.S. President Trump's recent travel ban to the U.S. at Trocadero Plaza next to the Eiffel Tower in Paris, Feb. 4, 2017. (Photo: Kamil Zihnioglu, AP)

Protests over the ban again erupted in several cities in the U.S. and abroad, including New York and Los Angeles, even after the ruling. Several thousand people demonstrated outside the U.S. embassy in London and near the Eiffel Tower in Paris.

At airports across the U.S., attorneys and immigration supporters set up makeshift legal offices and gathered to greet inbound immigrants.

The ACLU and other advocacy groups had been working to extend a temporary stay on the order issued last week after it sparked chaos and protests at airports across the country. On Saturday, such groups were urging travelers caught in limbo to act quickly.

"We encourage all U.S. visa holders who have been affected by the order to travel to the United States as soon as possible, while the stay is in place," said Becca Heller, director of the International Refugee Assistance Project in New York.

Clare Kane, a law student intern at the Jerome N. Frank Legal Services Organization at the Yale Law School, noting the Trump administration vowed to appeal the ruling, said "people should get on planes as soon as possible to reunite with their families, to access potentially life-saving healthcare, to flee life-threatening situations abroad, or to come home to their lives in the United States.”

With legal challenges pending, two prominent Middle Eastern air carriers, Qatar Airways and Etihad Airways, national carrier of the United Arab Emirates, said U.S.-bound travelers from those countries with valid visas would be allowed to board. Air France, British Airways, Egyptair, Emirates Airlines, KLM, and Lufthansa also notified affected passengers about the change.

Government-backed Qatar Airways is one of a few Mideast airlines operating direct daily flights to multiple American cities. Its U.S. destinations from its Doha hub include New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami and Washington.

Royal Jordanian was also resuming flights to the U.S. from the seven countries targeted by the Trump ban as long as people present valid visas or green cards.

In Kenya, about 140 Somali refugees whose resettlement in the United States this week was stopped by the travel ban have been sent back to their refugee camp instead, one of the refugees said Saturday.

It was not clear why they were returned a day after a U.S. court order blocked Trump’s ban on travelers and immigrants from seven predominantly Muslim countries, including Somalia. Officials with the International Organization for Migration, which runs the transit center in Nairobi where the refugees had been waiting for their flights to the U.S., could not be reached for comment.

“How would you feel? One day you are telling friends bye, wishing them well, and the next you are back where you started,” 28-year-old Nadir Hassan told The Associated Press by phone from the camp. “My home for 27 years was a refugee camp. I was hoping to start a new life in the U.S., get an education, a job, a life. We feel bad.”

He had been on a waiting list to leave for about a decade, he said.

In issuing his decision, Robart sided with Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson, who filed a suit to block key provisions of the president's executive order, which sought to block people from seven majority-Muslim countries, or any refugees, from entering the country.

Robart's ruling sets up a judicial process that appears to favor immigration rights groups and other opponents to the ban at every potential stage of the process, from his own court to the liberal U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit all the way up to the Supreme Court, currently divided 4-4 as it awaits confirmation hearings on a new nominee.

Still, Justice Department attorneys defending the executive order are likely to highlight the president’s broad legal authority to restrict entry of immigrants when deemed in the national interest of the United States, citing congressional authority in the Immigration and Nationality Act. In this case, the federal attorneys could argue the purpose of the executive order is “intended to protect the American people from terrorist attacks by foreign nationals.”

Amnesty International applauded Robart's ruling, but called for further action.

"This decision is a short-term relief for thousands of people whose lives have been upended, but Congress must step in and block this unlawful ban for good," organization spokesman Eric Ferrero said in a statement.

Lee Gelernt, the lawyer who successfully argued for the stay against Trump's ban in federal court in Brooklyn, N.Y., last week said Robart's decision shows that courts will stand up to the president.

"The courts have and will continue to recognize that this executive order favors Christians and disfavors Muslims and that is antithetical to American values and flatly inconsistent with the United States Constitution."

Contributing: Melanie Eversley, Associated Press

Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/2k7aLzi</s>Judge James Robart wore a bow tie to the hearing, opened with a joke and finished with a thunderclap.

He was known for that sort of thing.

“The amicus law professors,” Robart said Friday, noting the many groups that waited in his Seattle courtroom to argue for or against a motion to halt President Donald Trump’s travel ban. “Sounds like the three amigos.”

People laughed, despite the tension. The federal judge had a habit of mixing soft speech and extraordinary pronouncements.

At the end of the hearing, with no jokes or spare words, Robart halted Trump’s ban and potentially changed the fate of tens of thousands of refugees, Muslims and others around the world who had been denied entry into the United States.

His order challenges a White House that had spent all week defending the ban.

“The opinion of this so-called judge, which essentially takes law-enforcement away from our country, is ridiculous and will be overturned!” Trump wrote in a tweet Saturday morning.

But Robart had been called judge for more than a decade. President George W. Bush nominated him to the federal court for Washington’s western district court in 2004. Though he had held no judgeship before, senators of both parties praised him.

Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., introduced him to the judiciary committee as a man who had fostered six children with his wife.

Sen. Patrick J. Leahy, D-Vt., went over Robart’s 30 years as a lawyer – up to his work at the time as managing partner at Lane Powell Spears Lubersky, where he handled mostly commercial law cases.

Utah’s Republican Sen. Orrin G. Hatch noted Robart’s “representation of the disadvantaged” – including his work representing “southeast Asian refugees.”

“I was introduced to people who, in many times, felt that the legal system was stacked against them or was unfair,” Robart replied.”Working with people who have an immediate need and an immediate problem that you are able to help with is the most satisfying aspect of the practice of law.”

“Well thank you,” Hatch, a Republican, said. “That is a great answer.”

No one opposed his confirmation.

In his 13 years on the federal bench, the judge handed down criminal sentences no lighter than the law recommended – 78 months in prison for a crack dealer, life for a man who murdered a woman on a Native American reservation two decades earlier.

His job as a federal judge got more complicated after Seattle police shot and killed John T. Williams – a partially deaf woodcarver who did not put down his carving knife one day in 2010.

Hundreds surrounded a Seattle police station to protest Williams’ death, which had followed other accusations of police brutality in the city. A Justice Department investigation “found routine and widespread use of excessive force by officers,” the Seattle Times reported. That led to a long series of settlements and lawsuits – the bow-tied Robart presiding.

“Well, there certainly are a lot of you!” he said last August. His tie was green, his beard as white as ever.

In the years since Williams’ death, the Seattle case had evolved from passionate protests and a federal investigation into an endless string of hearings to oversee police reforms.

August’s hearing was one of many, and Robart gave no indication at the beginning that it would be anything of special note. He listened to each side argue, as he had done many times before. When it was his turn to speak, he went over schedules, comments and consent decrees to come.

Then he took a deep breath.

“I will now step back from my very precise legal practice and give you the following observation – from me,” he said.

He spoke of the police – training and accountability and leadership: “The men and women who go out and walk around Seattle and proudly wear the Seattle Police Department uniform,” he said. “They are entitled to know what they may and may not do.”

He breathed in again. Then he spoke of protests against police that had spread across the country, and FBI statistics showing that black people are twice as likely to be shot dead by police as their share of the population would warrant.

His words, the Seattle Times noted, caused “a startled, audible reaction” in the courtroom. Here was a federal judge echoing a slogan used by protesters.

Robart was not done. “Black people are not alone in this,” he went on. “Hispanics, Asians, Native Americans are also involved. And lastly and importantly: police deaths in Dallas, Baton Rouge, Minneapolis and let’s not forget Lakewood, Washington, remind us of the importance of what we are doing.”

If his words were extraordinary, he gave no indication that day. Robart thanked everyone before him “for your hard work” and walked out the door behind him.

Half a year later, a country troubled by different matters waited on the judge’s word.

Robart listened for nearly an hour to arguments of the federal government and to those who oppose its travel ban, then thanked everyone for their “thoughtful” remarks.

He tried to tramp down any anticipation. A judge’s job, Robart said, “is not to judge the wisdom of any policy,” but only whether it was legal.

He would not even do that at the moment, he said, but merely consider whether Trump’s order should be blocked temporarily to prevent “immediate and irreparable injury” to the people it affects.

Robert looked down at his papers and issued his order.

The travel ban must be halted not just in Washington, he said, but for all “federal defendants and all their respective officers, agents, servants, employees, attorneys and persons acting in concert . . . at all U.S. borders and port of entry, pending further order from this court.”

No one said a word. In his manner, Robart recessed and walked away.</s>The Department of Justice has filed an appeal against a federal judge in Washington state’s ruling that temporarily halted President Donald Trump’s executive order on immigration.

The ruling, handed down Friday, came as a result of a lawsuit by the states of Washington and Minnesota to halt the order, which temporarily barred travelers and refugees from seven Muslim countries from entering the U.S.

According to the Associated Press, the request for an emergency stay, which would reinstate the order, was filed Saturday night in the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. This move was largely expected after White House press secretary Sean Spicer issued a statement Friday night calling the ruling an “outrageous order” and saying the administration would file an appeal “at the earliest possible time.”

This is a developing story and will be updated with more details.</s>The Department of Justice has filed an appeal against a federal judge in Washington state’s ruling that temporarily halted President Donald Trump’s executive order on immigration.

The ruling, handed down Friday by Judge James Robart, came as a result of a lawsuit brought by the states of Washington and Minnesota to halt the order, which temporarily barred travelers and refugees from seven Muslim countries from entering the U.S.

According to the Associated Press, the request for an emergency stay, which would reinstate the order, was filed Saturday night in the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. This move was largely expected after White House press secretary Sean Spicer issued a statement Friday night calling the ruling an “outrageous order” and saying the administration would file an appeal “at the earliest possible time.”

Trump also blasted the decision on Twitter Saturday morning, saying it spelled “big trouble” and challenging the authority of “this so-called judge.”

Trump also referenced a ruling by a Boston judge earlier Friday that would have allowed an injunction against the ban to expire Sunday, allowing authorities to reinstitute the travel restrictions. Robart’s decision overrode this ruling and was granted on a nationwide basis, per ABC News.

“Why aren't the lawyers looking at and using the Federal Court decision in Boston, which is at conflict with ridiculous lift ban decision?” Trump wrote on Twitter.

However, the appeal is also likely to create confusion as the Department of Homeland Security and the State Department began giving airlines clearance to accept U.S. visa-holders from the affected countries onto flights on Saturday morning. According to the Associated Press, this has led to a crush of people attempting to enter the country while the order is no longer in effect.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals is headquartered in San Francisco, but also has facilities in Seattle.

This is a developing story and will be updated with more details.
The federal government notifies the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals that it will appeal Judge Robart's ruling that has halted enforcement of the executive order. The filing contained no legal arguments.