The Council on American-Islamic Relations was not pleased by Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum’s call to profile Muslims as a way to combat terrorism during Tuesday night’s GOP debate on CNN.
Answering debate moderator Wolf Blitzer’s question about whether he would support ethnic or religious profiling, Santorum replied that Muslims should be profiled.
Santorum explained that he would support profiling “the folks who are most likely to be committing these crimes.”
“Obviously Muslims would be someone you’d look at, absolutely. Those are the folks — the radical Muslims — are the people who are committing these crimes by and large,” he said. “As well as younger males, I mean these are things, not exclusively, but these are things you profile to find your most likely candidate.”
CAIR took offense. In response, the Muslim advocacy group called on the Republican Party to repudiate Santorum’s remarks.
“Last night, Rick Santorum casually tossed aside every American’s constitutional right to equal protection under the law in favor of discriminatory profiling of Muslims,” said CAIR National Legislative Director Corey Saylor. “Mr. Santorum’s obvious lack of appreciation for the Constitution and for the rejection of profiling by top law enforcement experts raises reasonable questions about his ability to lead our multi-faith nation.”
According to Saylor, based on Santorum’s criteria, Jesus would be profiled.
“We remind Mr. Santorum that the Prophet Jesus (peace be upon him), a man of Middle Eastern heritage, would fit his ‘profile,'” Saylor said.
The group noted that the International Association of Chiefs of Police and other security specialists oppose racial profiling and that both former President George W. Bush and President Barack Obama rejected the strategy. (RELATED: Santorum, Paul spar over profiling)
CAIR went on to thank GOP presidential candidate and Texas Rep. Ron Paul for being an outspoken opponent of racial profiling.