IT BECAME fashionable during the election campaign to say Donald Trump should be taken “seriously not literally”. Try telling that to the hundreds of mostly Muslim refugees, students, researchers and businessmen currently detained at American entry ports or being slung off long-planned flights to America. They and thousands of other law-abiding and deserving people, including green-card holders with homes and families in America, have been barred from entering or returning to America by the executive order Mr Trump signed on January 27th.

The order, named “Protecting the nation from foreign terrorist entry into the United States”, has suspended America’s refugees programme for four months and barred Syrian refugees indefinitely. It also denies entry, for at least 90 days, to anyone from seven mainly Muslim countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.

During the campaign, Mr Trump promised as a counter-terrorism measure a “total and complete shutdown” on all Muslim entrants to America. That would probably be unconstitutional. Yet his order goes some way to achieving the same aim; the targeted countries were responsible for 82% of Muslim refugees to America last year.

Signing the order in the Pentagon, Mr Trump said his objective was to keep out “radical Islamic terrorists”. “We don’t want them here," he said. “We want to ensure that we are not admitting into our country the very threats our soldiers are fighting overseas.” But if that is his aim, his order is hogwash.

In the past 40 years there has been not a single fatal terrorist attack in America carried out by anyone belonging to the seven nationalities targeted by the order. Excluding the 9/11 attacks, whose Egyptian, Emirati, Lebanese and Saudi Arabian executioners would not have been covered by Mr Trump’s ban, America has suffered hardly any terrorism perpetrated by immigrants. According to a study by Alex Nowrasteh for the Cato Institute, the risk of an American being killed in a terrorist attack by a refugee in a given year is one in 3.6bn.

That reflects the fact that America’s security screening of refugees, which can take over two years to complete, is thorough. It also reflects the fact that, given the opportunity of moving to America, almost every refugee would rather work hard and get on than blow people up. According to David Miliband, the head of the International Rescue Committee, which works with refugees, in the past decade refugees have started at least 38 new businesses merely in and around Cleveland, Ohio, creating 175 jobs and a $12m boost to the local economy. Americans are vastly more likely to find employment with a Muslim refugee than to be killed by one. They are in fact much likelier to be killed by cows, fireworks and malfunctioning elevators than an immigrant terrorist. As a means of keeping Americans safe, Mr Trump’s order is almost worthless.

Now consider the cost of the action, which Mr Trump, flanked by his perma-grinning vice-president, Mike Pence, signed on Holocaust Remembrance Day, a time when many Americans recall with anguish the hundreds of German Jewish refugees denied entry to American ports. This goes far beyond forestalled economic activity. The 110,000 refugees America was due to accept this year, the majority of whom were women and children, included huddled survivors from some of the world’s most wretched conflicts. Compared with the number of refugees taken by some European countries, this was in fact a modest quota; Mr Trump’s order has cut it in half. “It is a repudiation of fundamental American values, an abandonment of the United States’s role as a humanitarian leader,” writes Mr Miliband.

The reputational damage done to America by Mr Trump’s action will be dangerous, as well as large. The attributes that make America attractive to migrants—its openness, fairness and opportunity—are also among its most effective security mechanisms. They help explain why America is at once the most desirable destination for migrants and less prone to jihadist violence than almost any other country with a large Muslim population. By singling out Muslims for discrimination—including a group currently detained at John F. Kennedy airport in New York who had risked their lives working with Americans in Iraq—Mr Trump’s order is a repudiation of these American strengths.

Worsening the damage, he also signalled, in an interview with a Christian television channel, that the ban would not apply to Christians. Syrian Christians, claimed Mr Trump, were “horribly treated” by his predecessor. “If you were a Muslim you could come in, but if you were a Christian, it was almost impossible,” he said. “I thought it was very, very unfair. So we are going to help them.” This was not merely incendiary but untrue: last year America accepted 37,521 Christian refugees and 38,901 Muslims.

In a dark hour, it is at least cheering to see many Americans recoil against Mr Trump’s order. Protesters gathered outside John F. Kennedy airport, calling for the release of 11 people detained there. Many business leaders, especially in the tech industry which relies heavily on immigrant talent, also condemned the ban. “We need to keep this country safe, but we should do that by focusing on people who actually pose a threat,” wrote Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook.

Democratic politicians were united in their condemnation. “As the Statue of Liberty holds her torch of welcome high, there are tears in her eyes as she sees how low this administration has stooped in its callousness towards mothers and children escaping war-torn Syria," said Representative Nancy Pelosi. But from Republican politicians, including the many who had decried Mr Trump’s campaign pledge to ban Muslims, there has so far been hardly a squeak of disapproval.

Senator Ben Sasse, a Republican from Nebraska, suggested the ban went too far: “If we send a signal to the Middle East that the US sees all Muslims as jihadis, the terrorist recruiters win.” But this was a rare exception. Most Republicans have either stayed silent or welcomed the ban. Paul Ryan, the Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives, was among its fans: “We are a compassionate nation, and I support the refugee resettlement programme, but it’s time to reevaluate and strengthen the visa vetting process,” he said. This is a bad moment for America.