Washington, D.C.
Federal authorities violated the civil rights of hundreds of Arab immigrants rounded up after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, according to a Justice Department report released this week. Some were in lockdown for 23 hours a day. Others were taunted by guards and told, “You’re going to die here.” Most of the people rounded up by the government were illegal immigrants, and 762 of them—most of them Arab or South Asian—were charged only with violating immigration laws. They spent an average of three months in jail. Activists said the findings were shocking, and proved that “the war on terrorism quickly turned into a war on immigrants.” A Justice Department spokeswoman said the roundup was “fully within the law, and necessary to protect the American people.”
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