Washington, DC | www.adc.org | May 7, 2015 – The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) calls on the Arab-American community to stand up for justice and urge Congress to end the practice of racial profiling.
It is time for Congress to pass legislation that ends the discriminatory practice of targeting individuals for suspicion of a crime based on their perceived race, ethnicity, national origin, or religion.
Take Action: Stand up for our civil rights and demand that Congress end racial profiling!
Racial profiling harms individuals and entire communities. From Ferguson, toDearborn, to New York to Baltimore, law enforcement continues to profile and target communities of color, including Arab-Americans.
Profiling practices directed at Arab-Americans are ineffective and result in the destruction of civil liberties for everyone. Law enforcement needs the trust of minority communities in order to be effective, but racial profiling results in a loss of trust and confidence between law enforcement and the communities they serve.
In order to stop this discriminatory practice of racial profiling, Congressman John Conyers, Jr. (MI) and Senator Cardin (MD) introduced the End Racial Profiling Act of 2015 (ERPA) in the U.S. House of Representatives and in the U.S. Senate (S. 1056/H.R 1933).
Why Pass The End Racial Profiling Act (ERPA)?
- It clearly defines the discriminatory practice of racial profiling;
- It prohibits discriminatory profiling by law enforcement at all levels of government;
- It provides funding to train law enforcement on how to avoid profiling;
- It punishes law enforcement agencies that continue to use racial profiling.
The End Racial Profiling Act (ERPA) is needed to help ensure that Arab-Americans and other minorities are not stopped, investigated, detained, or arrested based on their race, ethnicity, national origin, or religion.
Want to learn more about the problem of racial profiling and how you can act to change the current discriminatory policies of law enforcement?
ADC is planning to host multiple panel discussions on civil rights and racial profiling and at the 2015 ADC National Convention! ADC will host a civil rights panel on Friday June 12th. ADC will also host a panel on Saturday June 13th which will feature prominent Arab-American and African-American community activists from Ferguson and Baltimore, as well as from Palestine. The Saturday panel will address the increasing militarization of law enforcement, and focus particularly on how law enforcement disparately targets communities of color.
**More details to come! Don’t miss out on these important and timely panels! Click here to register for the 2015 ADC National Convention at the early bird rate of $100 off!