Billboard Plan Offends Arab Americans

A group that is trying to tighten the standards for obtaining driver’s licenses is being criticized for a planned billboard with a picture of an Arab clutching a grenade and a North Carolina license.

“The message of the adsays that Arabs are dangerous and violent people and that therefore they shouldnot get driver’s licenses, and I think that is bigoted. It’s racist,” saidChristine Saah Nazer, spokeswoman for the Washington-based Arab AmericanInstitute.

Amanda Bowman, president ofthe New York-based Coalition for a Secure Driver’s License, which is launchingthe billboard campaign in North Carolina and two other states—Wisconsin and NewMexico, said: “We’re not going after Arab-Americans. We’re going afterterrorists.”

Bowman complained that in North Carolina, drivers do not have to show proof that they are in the country legally. She cites an audit this summer of the state’s licensing process that said information provided by applicants are not double-checked and can easily be forged.

ErnieSeneca, spokesman for the North Carolina Department of Transportation, said themessage behind the ad was “flat-out wrong, totally inaccurate andoffensive.” He said the department has addressed many of the issues raisedin the audit.

source: Associated Press, Dec. 15, 2005
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