Travel ban: Oh for two

[Bricker]

As I said here in 2017:

@Bricker

However, individuals within the United States have a First Amendment right to “hear, speak, and debate with” a visa applicant. This from the Supreme Court in Kleindienst v. Mandel, 408 U.S. 753 (1972). This makes the visa applicant a “symbolic plaintiff.” Id at 762.

So courts have the power of judicial review when a visa is denied and someone inside the country asserts that this denial affected their First Amendment rights.

However, the scope of this review is not the Lemon Test. The First Amendment creates standing for judicial inquiry, but does not extend the “excessive entanglement,” Lemon Test to visa decisions. Instead, the rule is that if the exclusion is “on the basis of a facially legitimate and bona fide reason,” then the courts will not further examine the exercise of that discretion. Specifically, the courts may not “test it by balancing its justification against the First Amendment interests of those who seek personal communication with the applicant.” See Mandel at 770.

I can only assume Justice Roberts is an SDMB reader:

@SCOTUS Majorty opinion by CJ Roberts in Trump v Hawaii

In Kleindienst v. Mandel, the Attorney
General denied admission to a Belgian journalist and selfdescribed
“revolutionary Marxist,” Ernest Mandel, who
had been invited to speak at a conference at Stanford
University. 408 U. S., at 756–757. The professors who
wished to hear Mandel speak challenged that decision
under the First Amendment, and we acknowledged that
their constitutional “right to receive information” was
implicated. Id., at 764–765. But we limited our review to
whether the Executive gave a “facially legitimate and bona
fide” reason for its action. Id., at 769. Given the authority
of the political branches over admission, we held that
“when the Executive exercises this [delegated] power
negatively on the basis of a facially legitimate and bona
fide reason, the courts will neither look behind the exercise
of that discretion, nor test it by balancing its justifica-
tion” against the asserted constitutional interests of U. S.
citizens.