The Paradox of Patriot Acts and Muslim Bans

Guest blogger: Linda Ereikat: Masters in Migration Studies, graduate student, University of San Francisco:

The 2016 election experience for me felt similar to an MTV reality TV show. Although it was marketed to be real, I was certain it was all a joke. I was actually sure it was a joke until I woke up the next morning and saw the headlines of Donald J. Trump as our 45th president because I fell asleep during the official announcement. I took a deep breath and got ready for class at San Francisco State University, where I majored in International Affairs. This was definitely an international affair, and upon walking into my Political Theory class, I knew that my reality TV conspiracy had to come to an end as I watched my professor sulk in one of the desks and stared at the wall. He spoke, but I was not focused on his words. My mind went back to a dark time in the United States that many people don’t like to talk about: post 9/11/2001 America under George W. Bush. I remember the 2004 reelection of George W. Bush very clearly as it came a couple of weeks before my eighth birthday. After learning the basics of the American electoral process from my older brother, I became very passionate about the political system. The key points I understood from my analysis were that George W. Bush did not see me, a Palestinian Arab Muslim child, as human. I understood that he was responsible for the murder of my fellow Arabs in Iraq and I blamed him for the stress he caused on my Palestinian immigrant parents and relatives. This is why the election of Donald Trump and the first version of the Muslim Ban in January 2017 felt like a redo of a horrific time in modern American history. After 9/11/2001, I was aware that I was different from my peers through the sudden racial slurs and fascination with where my family came from. The fact that I could not participate in the classroom pizza party if there were only pepperoni options and being absent from class during the holy day of Eid became more visible to my classmates who constantly asked me questions about my culture and religion that I didn’t always have the answers to. My surprise was that the nation acted as though we have never seen a political figure quite as controversial as Donald Trump as if we forgot about George W. Bush’s impact on this country and namely the Arab and Muslim community. With the implementation of the Patriot Act just 45 days after 9/11/2001 and with the creation of the Department of Homeland Security, Donald Trump’s election to power was undoubtedly a part of the long history of United States colonialism and repression on our communities. Our critique of the current political climate in the United States must come with understanding that everything we are seeing are merely results and a buildup of complete injustice that did not begin after the 2016 elections, but when this country was built on the backs of slaves and the genocide of Indigenous people.

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