Trump Must "Rule out the Muslim Registry" Says Katirai in Time Op-Ed
Time magazine
"Hate Toward Muslims Is Growing and It's Donald Trump's Fault"
Dec. 2, 2016
As Donald Trump prepares to take office, University of Arizona Law Assistant Clinical Professor Negar Katirai is calling on the President-elect to abandon one idea floated during his campaign: creating a registry of Muslim immigrants in the United States.
Katirai, who is director of Arizona Law's Community Law Group and a Tucson Public Voices Fellow with The OpEd Project, published her views in an op-ed for Time magazine.
In the op-ed, Katirai writes that anti-Muslim rhetoric "is emboldening hate crimes against Muslims and is making many Muslims in the U.S. fearful. Donald Trump and his advisers have only stoked the sentiment. The President-elect must rule out his campaign idea of creating a Muslim registry."
Katirai, whose family fled Iran in 1980 to escape the revolution, writes that a Muslim registry violates the American ideals she learned in her childhood and legal education.
"In my public school education, I learned that America stands for treating everyone equally, with respect, generosity, and an open mind, regardless of where they come from, what they look like or their religion. In law school, I learned how these values are reflected in our laws."
She adds that when political leaders equate Islam with terrorism, they threaten to lead America toward repeating the "darker pages of our history," such as the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II.
"Today, hearing talk that paints all Muslims with the same terrorist brush, I worry that we are abandoning American values and heading down a path that feeds right into the hands of the terrorists."
Work published by University of Arizona Law faculty represents the views of the authors, not the college.