Muhammad Ali Jr. was detained by immigration agents asking, 'Are you Muslim?'
Muhammad Ali Jr., the son of legendary boxing champion Muhammad Ali, was detained by immigration agents on Feb. 7 at the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport in Florida, his family reported Friday. Ali Jr. was traveling with his mother, Khalilah Camacho-Ali, on his way home from speaking at a Black History Month event in Jamaica.
The family's lawyer, Chris Mancini, said both were pulled aside by immigration officials asking questions like, "Where did you get your name from?" and "Are you Muslim?" Ali Jr. was held and questioned for two hours.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection declined to comment on the situation, which the Ali family believes is tied to President Trump's now-suspended immigration executive order.
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Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.
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