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Report Urges Changes To Protect Against Improper Searches of Muslims Returning to US

By Howard M. Friedman

Earlier this week, Muslim Advocates issued a report titled Unreasonable Intrusions: Investigating the Politics, Faith & Finances of Americans Returning Home. Here is an excerpt from the Executive Summary of the 52-page report:

Law-abiding Muslim, Arab and South Asian Americans returning home after overseas travel have experienced widespread, systematic and profound privacy intrusions by federal agents at the nation?s borders and airports. U.S. Department of Homeland Security ("DHS") Customs & Border Protection ("CBP") agents have questioned individuals about their political beliefs, religious practices, and charities they support. Agents have also sought to review and copy business cards, credit cards, and data on laptops, digital cameras and cell phones. These interrogations and searches are taking place without evidence or even suspicion that the travelers have engaged in wrongdoing.

These experiences and others chronicled in this report suggest that law-abiding Americans are being systematically selected by CBP agents for searches and interrogations on the basis of race, religion, and national origin. Far from serving legitimate aims, such profiling undermines security, wasting scarce government resources and generating mountains of false leads, as well as eroding trust between law enforcement authorities and the public....

Muslim Advocates proposes a series of discrete policy revisions that would restore constitutional protections eroded by the status quo border security apparatus and allow ample authority for the government to conduct legitimate activities to protect our nation?s security. They include steps that both the executive branch and Congress can take to better protect our nation?s border and our rights.

Farhana Khera, Executive Director of Muslim Advocates, wrote about the report Wednesday on the Washington Post's Faith Divide blog.

Full post as published by Religion Clause on April 24, 2009 (boomark / email).