FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Decem­ber 22, 2016
Con­tact: Suman Raghu­nathan, suman@saalt.org

SAALT applauds today’s announce­ment from the Depart­ment of Home­land Secu­ri­ty on a final rule that for­mal­ly ends the deeply flawed, patent­ly inef­fec­tive, and open­ly dis­crim­i­na­to­ry Nation­al Secu­ri­ty Entry-Exit Reg­is­tra­tion Sys­tem (NSEERS) pro­gram (known as spe­cial reg­is­tra­tion) effec­tive imme­di­ate­ly.

As a nation­al South Asian orga­ni­za­tion that has since its incep­tion been fight­ing the deeply dis­crim­i­na­to­ry NSEERS pro­gram as well as racial and reli­gious pro­fil­ing writ large, SAALT thanks the Depart­ment of Home­land Secu­ri­ty, White House, and the Oba­ma Admin­is­tra­tion for their deci­sion to rescind the reg­u­la­tion behind this dor­mant pro­gram.  SAALT in par­tic­u­lar salutes the stead­fast lead­er­ship, orga­niz­ing, and advo­ca­cy of South Asian, Mus­lim, and Arab indi­vid­u­als direct­ly impact­ed by the pro­gram and grass­roots South Asian and Mus­lim orga­ni­za­tions-includ­ing mem­bers of the Nation­al Coali­tion of South Asian Orga­ni­za­tions (NCSO)-who have been involved in long­stand­ing advo­ca­cy against NSEERS. The pro­gram was dis­con­tin­ued in 2011, but its reg­u­la­to­ry frame­work remained dan­ger­ous­ly on the books until today.

NSEERS, first cre­at­ed in the imme­di­ate after­math of the events of Sep­tem­ber 11, 2001, required cer­tain non-immi­grant male vis­i­tors from 25 Mid­dle East­ern, Arab, and South Asian coun­tries and North Korea to appear at local immi­gra­tion enforce­ment offices. Over 80,000 men were forced to reg­is­ter and over 13,000 indi­vid­u­als were placed into depor­ta­tion pro­ceed­ings, which did not result in one ter­ror­ism-relat­ed con­vic­tion. SAALT and South Asian Amer­i­cans nation­wide have expe­ri­enced first­hand the ways pro­grams such as NSEERS have dec­i­mat­ed our trust in law enforce­ment.  Today’s announce­ment begins us on the path to restore some of that trust.

South Asians are the most rapid­ly-grow­ing demo­graph­ic group in the Unit­ed States, and there are an esti­mat­ed 3.3 mil­lion Mus­lims nation­wide.  Even as our com­mu­ni­ties con­tin­ue to grow, we are remind­ed that we are all safer when we refuse to racial­ly and reli­gious­ly pro­file indi­vid­u­als.  As an orga­ni­za­tion with a deep and long­time com­mit­ment to racial jus­tice, civ­il rights, and civ­il lib­er­ties, SAALT will con­tin­ue fight­ing to ensure South Asians and indeed all Amer­i­cans are able to enjoy and exer­cise the basic rights and lib­er­ties enshrined in our Con­sti­tu­tion and con­cor­dant with our val­ues as a nation.

Dear Friend,

Each day that pass­es brings anoth­er dis­turb­ing inci­dent of hate vio­lence against our com­mu­ni­ties. In response, each day we are more unit­ed, orga­nized, and deter­mined in our pur­suit of jus­tice for South Asian Amer­i­cans and all.

On Decem­ber 19, SAALT host­ed a webi­nar on hate crimes with groups work­ing on the front lines of this strug­gle. Mem­bers of the Nation­al Coali­tion of South Asian Orga­ni­za­tions, the largest South Asian Amer­i­can net­work of com­mu­ni­ty-based advo­ca­cy orga­ni­za­tions, shared their insights on this urgent call, along with the San Fran­cis­co chap­ter of the Coun­cil of Amer­i­can-Islam­ic Rela­tions, the nation’s largest Mus­lim civ­il lib­er­ties and advo­ca­cy orga­ni­za­tion. The Alliance of South Asians Tak­ing Action, a Bay Area all-vol­un­teer group, also joined to describe how they’re aggres­sive­ly doc­u­ment­ing local hate inci­dents for use as pub­lic evi­dence.

Rep­re­sen­ta­tives from the Fed­er­al Bureau of Inves­ti­ga­tion and Depart­ment of Jus­tice also par­tic­i­pat­ed in this webi­nar, pro­vid­ing a vari­ety of insights into Amer­i­ca’s hate vio­lence prob­lem, as well as an oppor­tu­ni­ty to brain­storm solu­tions for the future.

This online event could­n’t have come soon­er. The FBI’s most recent Hate Crimes report revealed not only a 7% increase in hate crimes over­all, but also an alarm­ing 67% increase in hate crimes tar­get­ing Mus­lims. SAALT’s own data­base con­firms an uptick in hate vio­lence and xeno­pho­bic polit­i­cal rhetoric against our com­mu­ni­ties nation­wide in 2016, with inci­dents expect­ed to accel­er­ate in the new year.

SAALT will continue to push back against hate, but we need your help.

Big bat­tles require big sup­port. Please stand with SAALT as we take on the chal­lenges ahead. By donating today, SAALT can con­tin­ue track­ing hate, sup­port­ing our part­ners nation­wide, and demand­ing jus­tice and coop­er­a­tion from our gov­ern­ment.

With you by our side, we can make Amer­i­ca bet­ter, togeth­er.

We can only do this with your sup­port. Stand with us today.

With deter­mi­na­tion,
Suman Raghu­nathan,
Exec­u­tive Direc­tor, SAALT

Dear Friend,

On Decem­ber 6, moments after leav­ing a pol­i­cy con­fer­ence at the White House, a taxi dri­ver called Min­neso­ta Rep­re­sen­ta­tive-Elect Ilhan Omar a mem­ber of “ISIS” and threat­ened to forcibly remove her hijab. Ms. Omar calls it the “most hate­ful, deroga­to­ry, Islam­o­pho­bic, sex­ist taunts and threats I have ever expe­ri­enced.”

A day ear­li­er in New York City, Soha Sala­ma, a Met­ro­pol­i­tan Trans­porta­tion Author­i­ty (MTA) employ­ee was harassed, called a “ter­ror­ist”, and pushed down a flight of stairs at Grand Cen­tral sub­way sta­tion. She was told to “go back” to her coun­try by her assailant dur­ing the attack.

Days ear­li­er in Pitts­burgh, Ankur Mehta was work­ing on his com­put­er in a Red Robin Restau­rant when a drunk­en man told him “things are dif­fer­ent now” and “I don’t want you sit­ting next to me.” He then pro­ceed­ed to use racial slurs such as “sandn****r” before strik­ing Mr. Mehta sev­er­al times with his fists and elbows.

These inci­dents occurred in a span of a lit­tle over one week. Sad­ly, there are many more. In 2016 SAALT tracked over 200 inci­dents of hate vio­lence and xeno­pho­bic polit­i­cal rhetoric against our com­mu­ni­ties. These inci­dents have surged mas­sive­ly in the wake of the Pres­i­den­tial elec­tion.

We need your support now more than ever to push back against hate.

In the com­ing weeks and months, SAALT will:

• Release a detailed report to pol­i­cy­mak­ers and the media on hate inci­dents against South Asian, Mus­lim, and Arab Amer­i­cans dur­ing the 2016 elec­tion cycle to ful­ly illus­trate the extent to which our com­mu­ni­ties are under attack;
• Orga­nize town hall meet­ings through­out the coun­try to under­stand the local con­cerns of our com­mu­ni­ties nation­wide;
• Hold the 10th anniver­sary of our Nation­al South Asian Sum­mit where hun­dreds of thought lead­ers, orga­ni­za­tions, and activists from across the coun­try will come togeth­er to strate­gize on how to sup­port and defend our com­mu­ni­ties in this new and uncer­tain future. We will then take to Capi­tol Hill to engage with pol­i­cy­mak­ers and gov­ern­ment agen­cies en masse.

The time to answer the urgent call for South Asian Amer­i­can jus­tice is now. Please stand with us as we take on the enor­mous chal­lenges ahead. Will you make a con­tri­bu­tion to our work?

With your support, we can push back against hate so that our com­mu­ni­ties can enjoy the free­doms and rights owed to all Amer­i­cans. With your con­tri­bu­tion, we can help make Amer­i­ca bet­ter for us all.

Please donate as gen­er­ous­ly as you can today.

With deter­mi­na­tion,
Suman Raghu­nathan,
Exec­u­tive Direc­tor, SAALT

Dear Friend,

In a year defined by hate, where our com­mu­ni­ties have suf­fered his­toric lev­els of vio­lence and xeno­pho­bic polit­i­cal rhetoric nation­wide, SAALT worked even hard­er to ensure our com­mu­ni­ties’ voic­es were heard loud­er and far­ther than ever before.

With your help, we've made significant strides.

In 2016, we tracked over 220 inci­dents of hate vio­lence and xeno­pho­bic rhetoric against our com­mu­ni­ties. In the com­ing weeks we will release a report to pol­i­cy­mak­ers, law enforce­ment, and the new admin­is­tra­tion to make sure they ful­ly under­stand the extent to which our com­mu­ni­ties are under attack.  We will demand that the gov­ern­ment use its full pow­er to ensure our com­mu­ni­ties are pro­tect­ed, not tar­get­ed or ignored.

In 2016 we ter­mi­nat­ed a 7‑year rela­tion­ship with South­west Air­lines due to repeat­ed inci­dents of racial pro­fil­ing against our com­mu­ni­ties on their flights. Doing so meant return­ing $10,000 in spon­sor­ship that sup­port­ed many of our vital pro­grams. At SAALT, we advance ideals of jus­tice and equal­i­ty, and live by them fierce­ly and faith­ful­ly.

One such pro­gram is the Young Lead­ers Insti­tute (YLI), which brings togeth­er 13 young adults to learn lead­er­ship skills, con­nect with activists, and devel­op prac­ti­cal tools and action plans to pro­tect immi­grant rights on and off cam­pus.  For 4 years SAALT has trained 72 young adults to take on the chal­lenges of the future, and with your sup­port we can con­tin­ue train­ing tomor­row’s lead­ers today.

Through our We Build Com­mu­ni­ty pro­gram, we pro­vid­ed $45,000 to four grass­roots South Asian Amer­i­can groups to sup­port and increase their capac­i­ty to fight for racial jus­tice and immi­grant rights across the coun­try.

We con­tin­ue to coor­di­nate and expand the Nation­al Coali­tion of South Asian Orga­ni­za­tions (NCSO), a group of 54 com­mu­ni­ty part­ners that fos­ter a broad­er move­ment for racial, gen­der, and immi­grant jus­tice.  The NCSO is the largest net­work of South Asian Amer­i­can orga­ni­za­tions in the coun­try, and is a cru­cial voice as we con­front the ongo­ing chal­lenges fac­ing our com­mu­ni­ties.

These exam­ples reflect our increas­ing com­mit­ment to South Asian Amer­i­can jus­tice. We need your support so we can con­tin­ue defend­ing and demand­ing rights for our com­mu­ni­ties nation­wide.

Please donate today to sus­tain and expand our work on this long road ahead.  While the future may be uncer­tain, what you can be sure of is SAALT’s com­mit­ment to our com­mu­ni­ties, our part­ners, and our mis­sion.

Please stand with us today and donate as gen­er­ous­ly as you can.

With resolve and grat­i­tude,

Suman Raghu­nathan,
Exec­u­tive Direc­tor, SAALT

Hi Friend,

My name is Jasveen and I am a col­lege stu­dent liv­ing in Amer­i­ca’s post-elec­tion real­i­ty.  I am also a 2016–2017 Fel­low of SAALT’s Young Lead­ers Insti­tute (YLI).

In acknowl­edg­ment of Giv­ing Tues­day, which fol­lows the Thanks­giv­ing Hol­i­day each year, I want you to know how grate­ful I am that gen­er­ous donors support SAALT and this amaz­ing pro­gram.

With intol­er­ance and even vio­lence tar­get­ing our com­mu­ni­ties and surg­ing nation­wide, it is becom­ing dif­fi­cult to find safe havens any­where. Going to school, trav­el­ing, prac­tic­ing my faith, even walk­ing the street in broad day­light now present unmis­tak­able risks to my life.

YLI became an impor­tant out­let for me and eleven oth­er young South Asian Amer­i­can Fel­lows who are part of this year’s cohort.  It gave us an oppor­tu­ni­ty to con­nect with activists and men­tors, and explore equal­i­ty and immi­grant jus­tice strate­gies to imple­ment on behalf of the South Asian com­mu­ni­ty.  It has also become a place where I found com­mu­ni­ty amongst like-mind­ed South Asians Amer­i­cans who are pas­sion­ate about jus­tice.

The 2016–2017 YLI Cohort dur­ing a two-day lead­er­ship con­ven­ing in Sil­ver Spring, Mary­land

I also want­ed you to know that until recent­ly YLI was fund­ed in sig­nif­i­cant part by spon­sor­ship mon­ey from South­west Air­lines.  This year, SAALT made the right choice to end its rela­tion­ship with South­west because of mul­ti­ple inci­dents of racial pro­fil­ing by its employ­ees, includ­ing against a Mus­lim uni­ver­si­ty stu­dent in Cal­i­for­nia.

Speak­ing on behalf of the rest of my YLI cohort, we great­ly admire and respect the bold stand that SAALT took in cutting ties with Southwest, because it meant return­ing a $10,000 con­tri­bu­tion. Tak­ing a stand against large pow­er­ful cor­po­ra­tions like South­west showed me what a ded­i­cat­ed orga­ni­za­tion SAALT is and made me proud­er to be in YLI.

So today, on Giv­ing Tues­day, a glob­al day ded­i­cat­ed to gen­eros­i­ty and char­i­ty, I’m ask­ing you to please take the walk towards jus­tice with SAALT and YLI. Please support SAALT and make sure it has enough funds to replace the $10,000 it lost in end­ing its rela­tion­ship with South­west. It’s in your hands now to help make sure that SAALT and YLI can thrive for years to come, and more young adults can get the vital lead­er­ship train­ing we need to take on the chal­lenges of tomor­row.

Sin­cere­ly,

Jasveen and the 2016–2017 YLI Cohort

P.S. More than ever, our com­mu­ni­ty and our coun­try need young lead­ers to cre­ate the change that we all want to see.  Please stand with us today for a better tomorrow.

Dear Friend,

The weeks after the most divi­sive elec­tion in mod­ern Amer­i­can his­to­ry have left our com­mu­ni­ty shak­en.  Hun­dreds of inci­dents of hate vio­lence and intol­er­ance have been report­ed since Novem­ber 8, and SAALT has tracked more than 200 of these inci­dents even before Elec­tion Day.  From cam­pus­es to places of wor­ship, from air­plane cab­ins to the side­walks of Amer­i­ca, our com­mu­ni­ties con­tin­ue to be tar­gets. As we pre­pare for an uncer­tain future, we must look to our chil­dren to be the ambas­sadors of change.

We must support our young people to help solve these problems.

Young adults like  Nikhil Mandalaparthy, a stu­dent at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Chica­go who came to Wash­ing­ton, DC as a part of SAALT’s Young Lead­ers Insti­tute (YLI) 2016–2017 cohort.  As a YLI Fel­low, Nikhil joined 11 oth­er young peo­ple in a two-day con­ven­ing where men­tors and activists took them through work­shops and activ­i­ties to strength­en their lead­er­ship skills.  This year’s theme was Build­ing Immi­grant Justice,and pro­vid­ed the cohort with prac­ti­cal tools and action plans to orga­nize with­in the South Asian com­mu­ni­ty while spot­light­ing undoc­u­ment­ed immi­grant rights.

Nikhil found this expe­ri­ence “eye-opening”, and believes “our efforts to have these important conversations in our communities can have a much greater impact than we could ever imagine.”

"The theme of this year's YLI was Immigrant Justice, and after hearing
about the different projects we were hoping to execute on our campuses,
I was honestly in awe." -Nikhil Mandalaparthy, 2016-2017 YLI Fellow

In order for SAALT to con­tin­ue skills build­ing and com­mu­ni­ty train­ing for these young lead­ers of tomor­row, we need your support - Today!  The need is made even more urgent by our recent deci­sion to return $10,000 in spon­sor­ship funds to South­west Air­lines, mon­ey that helped sup­port our YLI pro­gram.  South­west employ­ees have been racial­ly pro­fil­ing South Asian, Mus­lim, and Arab pas­sen­gers in the last year, includ­ing at least five well-pub­li­cized inci­dents.

South­west ignored SAALT’s repeat­ed demands to address racial and reli­gious pro­fil­ing in their train­ing guide­lines and com­plaint pro­ce­dures.  Enough was enough, and we said goodbye to their sponsorship.

Now we need you! Please step up now as an indi­vid­ual stand­ing for equal­i­ty and jus­tice.  Any amount you can con­tribute that is mean­ing­ful to you would make a big dif­fer­ence.

Your gift supports young lead­ers as they chart out a path for a bet­ter future for our com­mu­ni­ties and coun­try.  Lead­ers like Nikhil, who believes that the Young Lead­ers Insti­tute “will serve as inspi­ra­tion to many more young South Asian Amer­i­cans, just as it did for me.”

With your help, we can ensure that our future is filled with young lead­ers who are inspired to work for South Asian jus­tice, and indeed jus­tice for all.  Please give today.

With resolve and grat­i­tude,

Suman Raghunathan,
Exec­u­tive Direc­tor, SAALT