Mohamed Duale can still remember the feeling in the pit of his stomach when a border officer stopped and subjected him to a battery of questions as he tried to re-enter Canada last year.
“It’s because of where you were born — you’re Somalian, right?” the Canadian citizen recalled the agent telling him.
It was a moment that he says stopped him in his tracks.
“I was literally frozen … Being a Black, male, Muslim person with about a dozen CBSA officers alone in a front gate of a departure gate, I’m literally scared,” Duale said.
“I never thought that the discrimination would be so overt or verbalized in such clarity. And it’s words that I will never forget for as long as I live,” he told CBC News.
The interaction, which allegedly happened Sept. 2, 2019, is now the subject of a complaint filed against the Canadian Border Services Agency and accepted by the Canadian Human Rights Commission this past August.
Representing Duale is the National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM), which argues the 33-year-old’s experience is part of a broader pattern of discrimination by the CBSA and underlines the need for independent oversight of the agency — something that was in Bill C-3 last year before it died on the order paper when Parliament was prorogued over the summer.
Canadian citizen Mohamed Duale says his goal in filing the complaint is ‘to make sure that this does not happen to anybody again.’ (CBC)
‘A pattern that is systemic’
“The reality is that discrimination at the border, at the hands of the CBSA, is a pattern that is systemic,” NCCM chief executive officer Mustafa Farooq told CBC News,
Farooq also cites a 2019 report by the auditor general that found the agency did not do enough to address harassment and discrimination in the workplace. He says it shows there are problems with how the CBSA treats people both inside and outside the organization.
“That is the culture. That is the problem at the CBSA,” said Farooq, adding his organization has received two to three complaints per month about the agency over the last year and a half.
A doctoral student at York University, Duale had been travelling back from doing research in a refugee camp, when he arrived at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport close to 5 p.m.
Shortly after disembarking, he says in the complaint, he was told to proceed to secondary screening — something he’d never been asked to do before. There, he says, a “white female CBSA officer” asked him whether he was really a PhD student, what his dissertation topic was and his central argument.
Although examination may seem unpleasant at times, and the relevance of questions posed by our officers may not be obvious… they assist in verifying a traveller’s declaration.– CBSA
Duale says he explained he had been researching the experiences of refugee youth, but as the questions grew more detailed, he says he told the officer he wasn’t obligated to disclose such information to enter his own country.
At that point, he says, the officer put his passport in her pocket and said she wouldn’t return it until he sufficiently answered her questions. Duale tried again to explain the purpose of his trip, but added he hadn’t written his dissertation yet and hadn’t come up with a central argument.
‘Interrogated for trying to enter my own country’
According to the complaint, the agent asked why he wanted to do a PhD. Duale responded that he wanted to become an academic and asked for his passport back, to which the agent replied he would need to show additional identification.
After inspecting his driver’s licence, he says, the officer “threw the passport” into his hand and that it fell to the ground. As he bent down to pick it up, he says the officer told him, “You look nervous.”
Duale on Aug. 21, 2019 at Kakuma Refugee Camp on the way to his research site. (Submitted by Mohamed Duale)
“I replied that I was nervous because I was being interrogated for trying to enter my own country,” Duale said, asking the officer why he’d been treated this way.
It’s at that point that the agent allegedly told him it was because of where he was born, saying he was “Somalian” and adding it was her job to ensure “everyone has the passport that belonged to them.”
Duale says he replied that “Somalian” is an offensive characterization of Somali people and that being born somewhere else doesn’t make a person any less a citizen. Born in Mogadishu, Duale had been a Canadian citizen for 15 years at the time of the incident.
Officers acted professionally, CBSA review finds
When he tried to file a complaint with the CBSA, he says, another officer told him, “Normally there isn’t a problem unless people don’t tell the truth.”
In October of 2019, the CBSA responded to Duale’s complaint, concluding its officers carried out their duties professionally and followed proper procedures.
“You have made strong accusations regarding the comportment and integrity of our officers … The findings of our review do not support the allegations you have made,” the letter said.
“Although examination may seem unpleasant at times, and the relevance of questions posed by our officers may not be obvious and may seem intrusive, they assist in verifying a traveller’s declaration and purpose for travelling.”
But Carleton University professor James Milner, who supervised Duale’s research in Kenya, says he has never seen a case as overt as Duale’s.
Carleton University professor James Milner, who supervised Duale’s research in Kenya, has been at the university for 12 years. In that time, he’s conducted overseas research numerous times and supported dozens of graduate students doing field work, but says he has never seen a border experience this ‘egregious.’ (CBC)
“It’s certainly the most egregious example of unprofessional behaviour that I’ve heard in the context of an immigration official here in Canada,” said Milner, who is also the project director for the Local Engagement Refugee Research Network — a team of researchers and practitioners “committed to promoting protection and solutions with and for refugees,” according to its website.
“As a white male, middle-aged Canadian myself, my experiences crossing borders are typically cordial … And so there is clearly a differentiation based on nationality, based on name, which evokes deeper questions about the way that profiling continues to be used in our border control systems.
Oversight ‘a noted priority’ for public safety minister
Immigration lawyer Guidy Mamann says CBSA officers have the full authority to ask any questions they like but believes in many cases the law gives them too much leeway.
“The officer, in my view, has way too much power. They have the right to copy all of the data in your laptop, all of the data in your phone. They have the right to go through all of your documents,” he said.
“Some of that in certain circumstances is appropriate. But I have seen that done in situations where it defies belief.”
Creating an oversight body is a “noted priority” for Canada’s Minister of Public Safety Bill Blair, a spokesperson told CBC News.
A spokesperson for Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Bill Blair says he thanks the National Council of Canadian Muslims for their advocacy and collaboration, and says introducing legislation around CBSA oversight is a ‘noted priority’ of Blair’s mandate. (Justin Tang/The Canadian Press)
“Minister Blair remains focused on modernizing policing structures and updating standards regarding use of force, and looks forward to tabling legislation that will strengthen oversight in our agencies and increase public trust,” said Blair’s press secretary Mary-Liz Power.
Power added that “there is much more work to do to dismantle the systems that perpetuate racism in our country.”
Anti-Black racism ‘part of life in Canada’
CBSA spokesperson Rebecca Purdy told CBC News it has not received word from the human rights commission of Duale’s complaint but that when complaints are filed, the CBSA “cooperates fully” with the process.
Purdy added that the agency is committed to ensuring all travellers are treated fairly, and that discriminatory behaviour is “not tolerated” by the CBSA.
The agency also says all complaints received by the CBSA are handled in an efficient, professional and impartial manner.
Meanwhile, Duale, who was at the top of his class before the incident, says the encounter left him depressed and demoralized to the point that he couldn’t focus on writing, was sleeping excessively and had to request multiple extensions on deadlines because of his anxiety.
“It’s hard to put down in a few moments a lifetime of experience being discriminated against as a Black man in Canada … It’s been my whole life, really” Duale said.
PHOENIX (AP) — Arizona voters have approved a constitutional amendment guaranteeing abortion access up to fetal viability, typically after 21 weeks — a major win for advocates of the measure in the presidential battleground state who have been seeking to expand access beyond the current 15-week limit.
Arizona was one of nine states with abortion on the ballot. Democrats have centered abortion rights in their campaigns since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022. Abortion-rights supporters prevailed in all seven abortion ballot questions in 2022 and 2023, including in conservative-leaning states.
Arizona for Abortion Access, the coalition leading the state campaign, gathered well over the 383,923 signatures required to put it on the ballot, and the secretary of state’s office verified that enough were valid. The coalition far outpaced the opposition campaign, It Goes Too Far, in fundraising. The opposing campaign argued the measure was too far-reaching and cited its own polling in saying a majority of Arizonans support the 15-week limit. The measure allows post-viability abortions if they are necessary to protect the life or physical or mental health of the mother.
Access to abortion has been a cloudy issue in Arizona. In April, the state Supreme Court cleared the way for the enforcement of a long-dormant 1864 law banning nearly all abortions. The state Legislature swiftly repealed it.
Voters in Arizona are divided on abortion. Maddy Pennell, a junior at Arizona State University, said the possibility of a near-total abortion ban made her “depressed” and strengthened her desire to vote for the abortion ballot measure.
“I feel very strongly about having access to abortion,” she said.
Kyle Lee, an independent Arizona voter, does not support the abortion ballot measure.
“All abortion is pretty much, in my opinion, murder from beginning to end,” Lee said.
The Civil War-era ban also shaped the contours of tight legislative races. State Sen. Shawnna Bolick and state Rep. Matt Gress are among the handful of vulnerable Republican incumbents in competitive districts who crossed party lines to give the repeal vote the final push — a vote that will be tested as both parties vie for control of the narrowly GOP-held state Legislature.
Both of the Phoenix-area lawmakers were rebuked by some of their Republican colleagues for siding with Democrats. Gress made a motion on the House floor to initiate the repeal of the 1864 law. Bolick, explaining her repeal vote to her Senate colleagues, gave a 20-minute floor speech describing her three difficult pregnancies.
While Gress was first elected to his seat in 2022, Bolick is facing voters for the first time. She was appointed by the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors to fill a seat vacancy in 2023. She has not emphasized her role in the repeal vote as she has campaigned, instead playing up traditional conservative issues — one of her signs reads “Bolick Backs the Blue.”
Voters rejected a measure to eliminate retention elections for state Superior Court judges and Supreme Court justices.
The measure was put on the ballot by Republican legislators hoping to protect two conservative justices up for a routine retention vote who favored allowing the Civil War-era ban to be enforced — Shawnna Bolick’s husband, Supreme Court Justice Clint Bolick, and Justice Kathryn Hackett King. Since the measure did not pass, both are still vulnerable to voter ouster, though those races hadn’t been decided by early Wednesday morning.
Under the existing system, voters decide every four to six years whether judges and justices should remain on the bench. The proposed measure would have allowed the judges and justices to stay on the bench without a popular vote unless one is triggered by felony convictions, crimes involving fraud and dishonesty, personal bankruptcy or mortgage foreclosure.
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Nebraska voters supported a measure Tuesday that enshrines the state’s current ban on abortions after the 12th week of pregnancy in the state constitution, and they rejected a competing measure that sought to expand abortion rights. Nebraska was the first state to have competing abortion amendments on the same ballot since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, ending the nationwide right to abortion and allowing states to decide for themselves. The dueling measures were among a record number of petition-initiated measures on Nebraska’s ballot Tuesday.
What were the competing abortion measures?
A majority of voters supported a measure enshrining the state’s current ban on abortion after the first 12 weeks of pregnancy in the state constitution. The measure will also allow for further restrictions. Last year, the Legislature passed the 12-week ban, which includes exceptions for cases of rape and incest and to protect the life of the pregnant woman.
Voters rejected the other abortion measure. If they had passed it by a larger number of “for” votes than the 12-week measure, it would have amended the constitution to guarantee the right to have an abortion until viability — the standard under Roe that is the point at which a fetus might survive outside the womb. Some babies can survive with medical help after 21 weeks of gestation.
Abortion was on the ballot in several other states, as well. Coming into the election, voters in all seven states that had decided on abortion-related ballot measures since the reversal of Roe had favored abortion rights, including in some conservative states.
Who is behind the Nebraska abortion measures?
The 12-week ban measure was bankrolled by some of Nebraska’s wealthiest people, including Republican Sen. Pete Ricketts, who previously served as governor and donated more than $1.1 million. His mother, Marlene Ricketts, gave $4 million to the cause. Members of the Peed family, which owns publishing company Sandhills Global, also gave $1 million.
The effort was organized under the name Protect Women and Children and was heavily backed by religious organizations, including the Nebraska Catholic Conference, a lobbying group that has organized rallies, phone banks and community townhalls to drum up support for the measure.
The effort to enshrine viability as the standard was called Protect Our Rights Nebraska and had the backing of several medical, advocacy and social justice groups. Planned Parenthood donated nearly $1 million to the cause, with the American Civil Liberties Union, I Be Black Girl, Nebraska Appleseed and the Women’s Fund of Omaha also contributing significantly to the roughly $3.7 million raised by Protect Our Rights.
What other initiatives were on Nebraska’s ballot?
Nebraska voters approved two measures Tuesday that will create a system for the use and manufacture of medical marijuana, if the measures survive an ongoing legal challenge.
The measures legalize the possession and use of medical marijuana, and allow for the manufacture, distribution and delivery of the drug. One would let patients and caregivers possess up to 5 ounces (142 grams) of marijuana if recommended by a doctor. The other would create the Nebraska Medical Cannabis Commission, which would oversee the private groups that would manufacture and dispense the drug.
Those initiatives were challenged over allegations that the petition campaign that put them on the ballot broke election rules. Nebraska’s attorney general said supporters of the measures may have submitted several thousand invalid signatures, and one man has been charged in connection with 164 allegedly fraudulent signatures. That means a judge could still invalidate the measures.
Voters also opted Tuesday to repeal a new conservative-backed law that allocates millions of dollars in taxpayer money to fund private school tuition.
Finally, they approved a measure that will require all Nebraska employers to provide at least 40 hours of paid sick leave to their employees.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Voters in Missouri cleared the way to undo one of the nation’s most restrictive abortion bans in one of seven victories for abortion rights advocates, while Florida, Nebraska and South Dakota defeated similar constitutional amendments, leaving bans in place.
Abortion rights amendments also passed in Arizona, Colorado, Maryland and Montana. Nevada voters also approved an amendment, but they’ll need to pass it again it 2026 for it to take effect. Another that bans discrimination on the basis of “pregnancy outcomes” prevailed in New York.
The results include firsts for the abortion landscape, which underwent a seismic shift in 2022 when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, a ruling that ended a nationwide right to abortion and cleared the way for bans to take effect in most Republican-controlled states.
They also came in the same election that Republican Donald Trump won the presidency. Among his inconsistent positions on abortion has been an insistence that it’s an issue best left to the states. Still, the president can have a major impact on abortion policy through executive action.
In the meantime, Missouri is positioned to be the first state where a vote will undo a ban on abortion at all stages of pregnancy, with an amendment that would allow lawmakers to restrict abortions only past the point of a fetus’ viability — usually considered after 21 weeks, although there’s no exact defined time frame.
But the ban, and other restrictive laws, are not automatically repealed. Advocates now have to ask courts to overturn laws to square with the new amendment.
“Today, Missourians made history and sent a clear message: decisions around pregnancy, including abortion, birth control, and miscarriage care are personal and private and should be left up to patients and their families, not politicians,” Rachel Sweet, campaign manager of Missourians for Constitutional Freedom, said in a statement.
Roughly half of Missouri’s voters said abortion should be legal in all or most cases, according to AP VoteCast, a survey of more than 2,200 of the state’s voters. But only about 1 in 10 said abortion should be illegal in all cases; nearly 4 in 10 said abortion should be illegal in most cases.
Bans remain in place in three states after votes
Florida, Nebraska and South Dakota became the first states since Roe was overturned where abortion opponents prevailed on a ballot measure. Most voters supported the Florida measure, but it fell short of the required 60% to pass constitutional amendments in the state. Most states require a simple majority.
The result was a political win for Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican with a national profile, who had steered state GOP funds to the cause. His administration has weighed in, too, with a campaign against the measure, investigators questioning people who signed petitions to add it to the ballot and threats to TV stations that aired one commercial supporting it.
Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the national anti-abortion group SBA Pro-Life America, said in a statement that the result is “a momentous victory for life in Florida and for our entire country,” praising DeSantis for leading the charge against the measure.
The defeat makes permanent a shift in the Southern abortion landscape that began when the state’s six-week ban took effect in May. That removed Florida as a destination for abortion for many women from nearby states with deeper bans and also led to far more women from the state traveling to obtain abortion. The nearest states with looser restrictions are North Carolina and Virginia — hundreds of miles away.
“The reality is because of Florida’s constitution a minority of Florida voters have decided Amendment 4 will not be adopted,” said Lauren Brenzel, campaign director for the Yes on 4 Campaign said while wiping away tears. “The reality is a majority of Floridians just voted to end Florida’s abortion ban.”
In South Dakota, another state with a ban on abortion throughout pregnancy with some exceptions, the defeat of an abortion measure was more decisive. It would have allowed some regulations related to the health of the woman after 12 weeks. Because of that wrinkle, most national abortion-rights groups did not support it.
Voters in Nebraska adopted a measure that allows more abortion restrictions and enshrines the state’s current 12-week ban and rejected a competing measure that would have ensured abortion rights.
Other states guaranteed abortion rights
Arizona’s amendment will mean replacing the current law that bans abortion after the first 15 weeks of pregnancy. The new measure ensures abortion access until viability. A ballot measure there gained momentum after a state Supreme Court ruling in April found that the state could enforce a strict abortion ban adopted in 1864. Some GOP lawmakers joined with Democrats to repeal the law before it could be enforced.
In Maryland, the abortion rights amendment is a legal change that won’t make an immediate difference to abortion access in a state that already allows it.
It’s a similar situation in Montana, where abortion is already legal until viability.
The Colorado measure exceeded the 55% of support required to pass. Besides enshrining access, it also undoes an earlier amendment that barred using state and local government funding for abortion, opening the possibility of state Medicaid and government employee insurance plans covering care.
A New York equal rights law that abortion rights group say will bolster abortion rights also passed. It doesn’t contain the word “abortion” but rather bans discrimination on the basis of “pregnancy outcomes, and reproductive healthcare and autonomy.” Sasha Ahuja, campaign director of New Yorkers for Equal Rights, called the result “a monumental victory for all New Yorkers” and a vote against opponents who she says used misleading parental rights and anti-trans messages to thwart the measure.
The results end a win streak for abortion-rights advocates
Until Tuesday, abortion rights advocates had prevailed on all seven measures that have appeared on statewide ballots since the fall of Roe.
The abortion rights campaigns have a big fundraising advantage this year. Their opponents’ efforts are focused on portraying the amendments as too extreme rather than abortion as immoral.
Currently, 13 states are enforcing bans at all stages of pregnancy, with some exceptions. Four more bar abortion in most cases after about six weeks of pregnancy — before women often realize they’re pregnant. Despite the bans, the number of monthly abortions in the U.S. has risen slightly, because of the growing use of abortion pills and organized efforts to help women travel for abortion. Still, advocates say the bans have reduced access, especially for lower-income and minority residents of the states with bans.
The issue is resonating with voters. About one-fourth said abortion policy was the single most important factor for their vote, according to AP VoteCast, a sweeping survey of more than 110,000 voters nationwide. Close to half said it was an important factor, but not the most important. Just over 1 in 10 said it was a minor factor.
The outcomes of ballot initiatives that sought to overturn strict abortion bans in Florida and Missouri were very important to a majority of voters in the states. More than half of Florida voters identified the result of the amendment as very important, while roughly 6 in 10 of Missouri’s voters said the same, the survey found.
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Associated Press reporters Hannah Fingerhut and Amanda Seitz contributed to this article.
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This article has been corrected to reflect in the ‘other states’ section that Montana, not Missouri, currently allows abortion until viability.
