Donald Trump

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump gives a thumbs-up as he arrives for a campaign rally Dec. 16, 2015, in Mesa, Arizona. His call for a ban on Muslim immigration continues to provoke debate.

(Ross D. Franklin, Associated Press, File, 2015)

Donald Trump has called for a "total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country's representatives can figure out what's going on." The vagueness of Trump's proposal has invited fierce media backlash, and anger by Muslim U.S. citizens and other Americans legitimately concerned with Trump's provocative rhetoric.

To honestly judge Trump's proposal, however, one must consider his recent clarifying comments, which are key to understanding the proposal. We should all be able to agree that attacking the proposal because of political orientation or personal views about Trump avoids a valuable debate on this critical issue for all Americans.

Two aspects of Trump's plan that have been misinterpreted must be addressed. First, in an interview with Fox News anchor Greta Van Susteren, Trump stated that the ban on Muslims "does not apply to people living in this country." Critically, the proposed ban is only directed at noncitizen Muslims, and is focused on identifying, among the Syrians currently seeking "refuge," those radical Islamists using the crisis as a cover to do jihad in America.

Second, the ban would only be in place until this "country's representatives can figure out what's going on," or at least until the U.S. intelligence community can improve its screening process. While admittedly it is not clear what Trump means by "figure out" or how long that will take, it is contemplated to be a "temporary" ban, and that time period should be narrowly defined to make it reasonable to Americans and politically feasible.

The questions skeptical Americans should be asking are: "Is a temporary ban on Muslim immigrants unconstitutional? And if it is not, "Is it more harmful to impose than the likely alternative?" I say no to both.

Most constitutional scholars, such as Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, have said that a temporary ban on non-US citizens falls under the umbrella of immigration law, where the president has wide latitude. The Immigration and Nationality Act provides that "whenever the president finds that the entry of any aliens or of any class of aliens into the United States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, he may by proclamation, and for such period as he deems necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens." This discretion has at times been used in reprehensible ways, such as President Franklin D. Roosevelt's infamous decision in 1939 to turn away the St. Louis ship from America's shores, sending 900 immigrant Jews back to Europe.

While the innocent Jews of the St. Louis represented no credible threat to U.S. security and the ban was effectively permanent, it is almost a certainty that some of the Muslim immigrants seeking U.S. entry have the murder of Americans as their mission.

On Jan. 21, 2015, the head of Islamic State, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, made it overtly clear his plans for the United States: "[Our] last message is to the Americans. Soon we will be in direct confrontation, and the sons of Islam have prepared for such a day. So watch, for we are with you, watching." The San Bernardino massacre, perpetrated, by many reports, by radical Muslims inspired by IS, was a predictable result of this clear warning. The more frightening aspect of this warning is that Tashfeen Malik, the Pakistani woman who took part in the San Bernardino attack, passed a K-1 visa test when she was supposedly openly discussing jihad online. The reality is that the FBI is missing these terrorists. They have acknowledged as much. It is entirely reasonable to put this temporary ban in place so that Muslim refugees can be properly screened before we witness 9/11-type massacres across this country.

I don't come to my conclusion easily. There is no doubt that barring a group based on religious affiliation is facially reprehensible, as we are a nation of immigrants. But a reflex reaction against it just because it sounds "un-American" could be a monumental mistake. The greatest democracies are faced with unprecedented situations that lead to decisions that will make many feel very sick and uncomfortable. This is just one of those moments.

There is no doubt that Trump's recent proposal was aggressive and, as he expected, "there would be a storm." To be credible, however, Trump needs to articulate how long this ban should be in place and, specifically, how immigration screening procedures should be enhanced to achieve success. But if he does so, this proposal should be given a chance. The temporary hardship resulting from this ban does not outweigh the very real likelihood of future Paris-like attacks or worse on thousands of innocent Americans. It would not be a historic mistake to put this temporary ban in place. In fact, it very well could be a historic mistake not to.

Benjamin Chevlin of Princeton Junction, New Jersey, is a freshman at Columbia University in New York City.