Elie Mystal: The Supreme Court Just Gave the OK to Racial Profiling

[Nevilledog]

https://www.thenation.com/article/society/supreme-court-racial-profiling-la-raids/

No paywall link
https://archive.li/QR5Cx

On Monday morning, the Supreme Court allowed ICE to resume racially profiling all Latinos in Los Angeles under the suspicion that they might be illegal immigrants. The order is technically temporary, allowing racial profiling to happen only until the court reviews the full record, but the Republican justices made it incredibly clear that, whenever the court gets around to voting on the merits of the case, they will still be in favor of racial profiling. The vote was, predictably, 6-3, along party lines, with alleged attempted rapist Brett Kavanaugh as the only justice in the Republican majority who bothered to explain his racist excuse for reasoning.

The case is called Noem v. Perdomo and it has been on the Supreme Court’s shadow docket for months. The issue emerged at the height of Trump’s attack on L.A., when multiple citizens reported that ICE was rounding-up anybody who was Latino, or looked Latino, for questioning. Racial profiling is unconstitutional (or was, until this morning) and people sued, including the named plaintiff in this case, Pedro Vasquez Perdomo. District Court Judge Maame E. Frimpong (a Biden appointee), issued an emergency injunction prohibiting the raids in July, but the Trump administration appealed that injunction to the Supreme Court.

In a rare example of honesty from this administration, it admitted that it was racially profiling Latinos, and promised to do so again if the Supreme Court lifted the injunction. The government admitted it was only looking at four factors before pulling people off the street:

•Their apparent race or ethnicity
•Whether they spoke Spanish or spoke English with an accent
•The type of location where they were found
•The type of job they appeared to do

I shouldn’t have to explain how this is racist, but since white Republicans might read this, I guess I do. If you are a white guy, anywhere in L.A., you are presumptively “legal” and ICE will not bother you. If you are a Vietnamese woman working at a nail parlor, you are also presumptively okay. If you are a Chinese guy running a dry cleaner, you’re good. Name the race and the racially stereotypical job, and, according to the U.S. government, you are not on their list. At least for now. Obviously, once the government greenlights racial profiling against one group of people, it’s pretty easy for the white people running the joint to support racial profiling against another.

*snip*

[Baitball Blogger]

1. Yup.

Stop and Frisk for Latinos in L.A.

[Solly Mack]

2. ...

[Takket]

3. pretty soon being anything other than a cisgender evangelical will result in your being arrested and harassed

Last edited Mon Sep 8, 2025, 07:07 PM - Edit history (1)

on a daily basis. the only thing stopping them from doing that right now and the sheer number of people that would be required to do that.