CLEVELAND, Ohio — Dr. Mohamed Abdalla is a nephrology fellow at Case Western Reserve University, a Sudan native and a permanent U.S. resident.
For now, he knows he can stay in the United States, but President Donald Trump’s ban on travel from seven Muslim majority countries has him worried about himself, his family and scores of others already here or with plans to emigrate here.
“We’re still confused about what exactly to do. It is still a very chaotic situation,” he said Wednesday after his shift at University Hospitals ended and while he worked at the Louis Stokes Cleveland VA Medical Center.
Abdalla expects to graduate from Case in June and planned to invite his father and father-in-law from Sudan to the ceremony. That likely won’t happen now.
The order also means he and his family can’t travel to Sudan for vacation this summer, Abdalla said.
“This is a summer vacation and we need the kids to know their relatives, their cousins and their grandparents,” he said.
Abdalla is one of many medical professionals and students whose future in the United States is unclear in the wake of Trump’s order.
Cleveland is a city with three major teaching hospitals that regularly employ residents from overseas. The 40-year-old Abdalla is one of several Sudanese doctors in the city who are affected by Trump’s order. Cleveland Clinic resident Dr. Suha Abushamma was detained in New York on Saturday before being put on a plane to Saudi Arabia. Abushamma was here on a work visa but claimed in a lawsuit that immigration officials misled her into signing forms to invalidate her visa.
The Clinic, along with Abushamma’s lawyers, are working to bring her back to the U.S.
Trump’s order included a 90-day travel ban affecting citizens of seven countries, including Sudan. The president has said the order was to prevent a terrorist attack on U.S. soil. The ban affected people with work visas and green cards, though the federal government on Sunday said people with green cards may enter the U.S.
Abdalla, a Muslim, does not know Abushamma but expressed concern for her well-being. He said the Islamic State, a terrorist organization that carries out attacks in the name of Islam, has tarnished the reputation of all Muslims, the vast majority who are peaceful.
“I think now Muslims all over the world are paying the price for whatever ISIS is doing,” Abdalla said.
Abdalla has been in the United States since 2010 when he came here on a work visa. He got his green card in 2015.
He lives in Westlake with his wife Nada Abdalla and his six children. His wife and three of their children are permanent residents, while their other three children were born in the United States. The family plans to stay in the country after Mohamed Abdalla’s fellowship ends.
Nada Abdalla said Trump is unpredictable. She worries his actions may affect more than just traveling outside the U.S. She said she plans to become a citizen and worries that might not be possible under this president.
She said she and her husband have been glued to CNN when they are both at home.
“He is very worried,” she said. “I’m a stay-at-home mom, so my worries are contained in the house. I’m pretty sure he worries outside the house more than me.”
Both said they have has never been hassled about their religion in the United States. Nada Abdalla said she answered a question on a form when applying for her visa in 2010. She wears a hijab so her faith is obvious, but she said it has never caused concern.
Mohamed Abdalla said this kind of treatment is why they came to the United States.
“Because of the freedom,” he said. “So now we have to fight for freedom in our country and here.”
He expressed concern for fellow medical professionals from Sudan and other banned countries who either are here or want to come here. Interviews for this year’s residency program, which are conducted for March, are also up in the air for many applicants in the countries listed in Trump’s order. Mohamed Abdalla said he was not sure how program directors for the teaching hospitals in the Cleveland area would react to Trump’s order.
At least one local hospital, the MetroHealth System, has appeared to acknowledge the trouble prospective foreign medical residents might face. Marcie Becker, the hospital’s director of international affairs and graduate medical education, said in a Jan. 26 email to her employees that any doctors matched with the hospital from those seven countries may not be able to come to the U.S. until visa applications are being processed again.
Mohamed Abdalla stuck up for Sudan multiple times during his interview, saying many people who emigrate from the country contribute great things to the United States.
“That’s good for them. That’s good for their families. That’s good for the country,” he said. “That’s even good for the United States because they contribute. Whenever somebody gets something from here and he leaves or stays here, still his contribution is there somewhere.”
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