On December 7th, 2014 at the Asian Americans Advancing Justice Center in Los Angeles, KARAMAH presented its latest town hall meeting in the Muslim American Stories Series: “State of Immigrant Rights.” For the past year, KARAMAH has traveled across the country speaking to communities about different civil rights issues we face. This dialogue highlighted the challenges that Muslim Americans, and other immigrant communities, face while going through the immigration process in the United States. Developed by KARAMAH, the panel featured three accomplished speakers: Meeran Mahmud staff attorney at Asian Americans Advancing Justice – Los Angeles, Hamid Khan of Stop LAPD Spying Coalition, and Jenny Pasquarella staff attorney at ACLU – Southern California.
To set the stage, KARAMAH executive director Aisha Rahman spoke about the purpose of the event. She stated, “Today we commemorate Pearl Harbor Day with our fellow Angelinos and remember that not too long ago in this country Japanese Americans amongst others were detained because of their national origin. As we fight to restore justice to our broken systems in this country, we have to recognize that our stories are interrelated.” Ms. Rahman spoke about the struggles of immigrant communities, both Muslim and non-Muslim, and how there is still much work yet to be done.
Ms. Rahman introduced Jenny Pasquarella who then talked about the nexus between profiling in our immigration system and national security. Ms. Pasquarella spoke about the current state of surveillance and immigration particularly impacting Muslim immigrants. “We have broad FBI surveillance happening, focusing on religion rather than actual criminal evidence,” she stated. “Thousands of people, particularly those from the Muslim community, are placed on the government watch list, and can’t get off. It means that you could be forbidden from boarding an airplane should you be on a watch list, effectively crippling your travel and activities.” Ms. Pasquarella stated, “Under a secret — and previously unknown — national security program, the government has barred thousands of eligible, law-abiding immigrants from becoming citizens, obtaining green cards and securing other immigration benefits. The program purportedly excludes those who pose a national security threat.” This program is called “Controlled Application Review and Resolution Program” and it is still in existence today.
Meeran Mahmud spoke with the audience next, focusing especially on the rights of domestic violence survivors who seek justice through the immigration process. “One way Muslims differ from other groups is that they are more fearful, especially during naturalization. They are fearful of including identifiers to their mosques and organizations, because they are afraid of US perceptions.” Moving on to the meat of the matter, she said, “obtaining visas for women suffering from domestic violence is difficult and limited. Normalization of domestic violence in immigrant cultures means that abusers are surprised when they are deported because of their actions.” Of course, Ms. Mahmud points out, deportation does not always benefit the survivor if her status was dependant on her batterer or if he was the sole bread-winner in the family.
Lastly, Hamid Khan took the stage. He spoke about the challenges facing the community, particularly minority and religious communities. “We must reflect as a community about our challenges,” he asked the audience, “otherwise, we’ll make poor decisions that only serve to benefit a few.”
KARAMAH and the panel engaged the audience in an hour long town hall meeting–a sharing of stories and ideas. An audience member asked about the significance of the profiling revelations, which Jenny responded to. “It’s troubling that Customs and Border Control were excluded from profiling, which signals that they have an importance seen in racial and cultural profiling.” Another audience member asked, “What kind of criteria lands people on the watch list?” To which Ms. Pasquarella responded, “I know many details of my clients, but can’t find commonalities for the watch list.”
The event was recorded, and can be viewed in its entirety below.
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