A Muslim mayor who has represented Prospect Park, New Jersey, for almost 20 years mentioned Tuesday afternoon he has not heard from the White House because the U.S. Secret Service blocked him from attending President Joe Biden’s night Ed al-Fitr celebration.
Mayor Mohamed Khairullah mentioned he was making ready to affix fellow Muslim leaders on Monday to mark a belated finish of the holy month of Ramadan when he obtained a name from a White House aide telling him to not come.
“As I was driving into D.C., I was about a few minutes away from the White House I received a call,” Khairullah mentioned Tuesday. “We started with small talk then he informed me that the Secret Service did not clear me to attend the White House Eid celebration. He went on to state that the Secret Service did not provide a reason, and he pretty much told me that I should turn around and return home.”
The New Jersey chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) held a information convention with Muslim neighborhood leaders, together with Khairullah, to answer what it known as the Secret Service’s “sudden and baseless” revocation of Khairullah’s White House invitation, they mentioned, resulting from “perceived profiling.”
“When I first ran for office in 2001 — just one year after I became a naturalized citizen — I was hopeful that I could help implement systematic changes within New Jersey and that would make life better for American Muslims and everyday Americans. And while I have been able to see this come to fruition for the most part, incidents like this, being flagged on a watch list, and denied the honor that every leader should be given, make me question our progress,” Khairullah mentioned.
“Our crimes are our names, ethnicities and religion,” he added. “And I call on President Biden to correct the injustices of the previous administrations by disbanding this illegal list and correcting ill-advised and racist policies.”
“We are asking that the White House take this as an opportunity to, once and for all, to disband the watchlist — to no longer have government agencies use this discriminatory list in their vetting — or in their spying — of American citizens,” mentioned Selaedin Maksut, govt director of CAIR’s New Jersey chapter.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre repeatedly deferred to the U.S. Secret Service when requested Tuesday about Khairullah’s expertise.
“Let me just first say this is under the purview of the Secret Service,” she mentioned. “I can say this: I was in the room. The president was very proud to welcome nearly 400 Muslim Americans to the White House to celebrate Eid yesterday.”
Pressed on whether or not Khairullah deserved a extra detailed clarification, Jean-Pierre repeated the incident was “in the purview of the Secret Service.”
After Khairullah went public late Monday, a spokesman for the U.S. Secret Service mentioned in an announcement to reporters that the company regrets the inconvenience however could not remark additional.
“While we regret any inconvenience this may have caused, the mayor was not allowed to enter the White House complex this evening. Unfortunately we are not able to comment further on the specific protective means and methods used to conduct our security operations at the White House,” mentioned Anthony Guglielmi, chief of communications for the company.
Khairullah, born in Syria and a U.S. citizen since 2000, is now in his fifth time period as mayor of Prospect Park. From his perspective, Monday’s expertise “reeks of Islamophobia by certain federal agencies,” one thing he mentioned he needs to debate with Biden if he is invited again — an invite he mentioned he would settle for.
“I think that the big question [for the White House] is what are we going to out the targeting of Arabs, Muslims, South Asians by federal agencies that are basically not telling us why we are being harassed at airports, border crossings, and now, for me to be denied entry into the People’s House is baffling,” he mentioned.
“If someone like me who has a high profile, who has clearly served their community, who has demonstrated dedication to the local community and global community can be targeted like that — I have someone who could speak on my behalf — the average citizen doesn’t know who to turn to and who to speak to,” he told CNN.
Khairullah suspects his hassle stems from his title matching one which appeared on an FBI terrorism watchlist, he mentioned CAIR advised him in 2019. He mentioned he is confronted many incidents of discrimination when flying, which will be embarrassing for his household, he added.
Maksut known as on the White House to apologize and to reinstate the mayor’s invitation.
“If these such incidents are happening to high-profile and well-respected American-Muslim figures like Mayor Khairullah, this then begs the question: What is happening to Muslims who do not have the access and visibility that the mayor has,” Maksut mentioned.
A report from CAIR final 12 months discovered a 9% improve in discrimination complaints from Muslim-Americans in 2021 in comparison with 2020.
