The thing about phantom threats to national security is they never seem to go away.

So should temporary bans be...banned? It seems there could be use for a temporary ban in the general sense.

AFAIK, this was a good scenario for a temporary ban. More strict anti-terror regulations are announced to be coming, and to prevent people from trying to get in before that ban, you have a temporary ban.

It made sense to me.

Temporary + infinitely renewable = permanent, in 95% of the cases.

I'm certainly familiar with the continual extension of US copyright law. What are other examples?

The USAPATRIOT Act and the expanded surveillance powers were "intended to sunset," eventually.

Temporary government orders have a habit of becoming permanent ones. (Cf. every temporary tax ever.)

Another one that most people overlook in that category are "affirmative action" quotas. They're always sold as "temporary" for the brief time it'll take for their effects to manifest and fix stuff. But alas, in the majority of cases, they are never repealed or "finalized".

One way of interpreting that is that it's easy to sell an unpalatable something as a temporary thing because it sounds "corrective" rather than a final decision.

It isn't. Syrian refugees are barred indefinitely. All immigration from countries on the famous list of 7 is suspended for 90 days, and then may be resumed if they are able to come up with adequate vetting procedures.

The entire refugee program, worldwide, is suspended for 120 days, and may be resumed on a country-by-country basis when the administration is satisfied that it is in the national interest.

Not even that. It's been vacated by a 9th Circuit Court of Appeals panel.

Right now, it appears that the administration won't even defend it and instead will issue a more narrowly defined EO.