Legal rulings and post-attack rhetoric normalize suspicion of all Muslims.

Evidence

This ruling reinforces the acceptance of the association of Islam with terrorism. It legitimizes the idea that it is necessary to treat Muslims with suspicion in order to uncover terrorist plots and threats. In June 2013, the ACLU along with other organizations filed Raza v. City of New York arguing that the NYPD surveillance program violated the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause and the First Amendment’s right to exercise religion freely and mandate that the government act with neutrality toward all religions (New York Civil Liberties Union 2013). In January 2016, the NYPD agreed to a settlement in this case, promising to reform their practices, including barring profiling based on religion, race, and ethnicity. While these reforms represent movement toward protecting Muslim populations from civil rights abuses, the rhetoric in America continues to encourage the surveillance of Muslims, especially after someone who is identified as Muslim commits a mass shooting or act of terror. — Saher Selod, Forever Suspect_ Racialized…, 58

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to Beydoun’s American Islamophobia framework on how state-legal action legitimizes suspicion of Muslims.
• SEED: Angle: the chasm between formal civil-rights settlements (Raza v. City of New York) and continued post-attack surveillance rhetoric — how legal wins fail to change public discourse.