PROVIDENCE, R.I. — A Syrian doctor says he won’t return to the United States to finish his studies at Brown University because of the Trump administration’s travel ban.
Khaled Almilaji said Wednesday there’s too much uncertainty, even though he possibly could get a student visa under the scaled-back version of the ban. The administration has given itself a Thursday deadline for implementing it.
Almilaji, 35, moved to Canada this month to pursue his master’s degree at the University of Toronto’s Dalla Lana School of Public Health. He said it’s unfortunate he had to withdraw from Brown, but “bad things happen and you have to adapt.”
He’s still working with his mentors at the Ivy League school as he tries to reopen a large underground hospital for women and children in northwest Syria. He plans to get specialists at Brown to train hospital staff online and answer their questions about complicated cases.
Trump says the ban is needed to protect the U.S. from terrorists.
Almilaji was recently awarded the Meritorious Service Medal by the Canadian representative of Queen Elizabeth II.
“Nothing really slows him down including Donald Trump, and including all the many other obstacles that arise along the way in doing this work,” said Dr. Adam Levine, who leads the Humanitarian Innovation Initiative at Brown.
