Washington, DC (Press Release) – The following is a statement from Johnathan Smith, legal director of Muslim Advocates, regarding a report issued earlier today by the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security. This report was issued pursuant to Section 11 of Executive Order 13780 (“Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States”), the latest iteration of President Trump’s Muslim ban:
“Today’s report relies on skewed, conclusory data to overstate the threats that immigrants pose to our nation’s security. As others have already highlighted, it ‘portrays some misleading and meaningless statistics as important findings.’ The report also completely overlooks the far more significant threat posed by American-born individuals.
Like the Muslim ban itself, the true intention of this report is to stir up fears about Muslims by relying on debunked tropes and stereotypes. Tellingly, although the President directed his agencies to collect statistics about ‘honor killings,’ the report only cites to discredited information, and makes clear that such conduct occurs infrequently in the United States.
The Trump administration needs to stop the fear-mongering, stop the lies, and stop this hateful, discriminatory campaign against Muslim and immigrant communities.”