Men Without a Country

This is deeply offensive:

Federal authorities have prevented two relatives of a father and son convicted recently in a terrorism-related case from returning home to California from Pakistan unless they agree to be interviewed by the F.B.I.

It is unclear whether the men, Muhammad Ismail, 45, and his son Jaber, 18, have a direct connection to the terrorism case or if they have been caught up in circumstance.

[...]

The Ismails discovered they were on the federal government’s no-fly list of people not allowed to enter the United States after they were refused permission to board a connecting flight in Hong Kong on April 21; they had been trying to return to California after several years in Pakistan, said Julia Harumi Mass of the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California, who is representing them.

[...]

Jaber Ismail, who was born in the United States, was questioned by the F.B.I. at the American Embassy in Islamabad, but his father, a naturalized United States citizen from Pakistan, declined to participate, Ms. Mass said. Jaber Ismail has refused further interrogation without a lawyer and has declined to take a polygraph test; Ms. Mass said the men were told these conditions had to be met before the authorities would consider letting them back into the United States.

We're talking about US citizens not being allowed to enter the US. If the FBI has evidence of these men committing crimes then charge them and put them on trial. If not, leave them alone.

Let me stress, these are American citizens. If this is allowed to stand then it can happen to me and you. We will all be "provisional" Americans.

I can think of nothing more offensive than some Caeser-wannabe in the White House having the power to strip all rights and privileges from American citizens on a whim.

At the conclusion of the Constitutional Convention in 1787 Benajamin Franklin was famously asked if we had a republic or a monarchy. Franklin replied, "A republic, if you can keep it."

I fear we're now learning the true answer to that question.


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