‘I remember thinking this is brutal,’ Blaine lawyer says of scene at border crossing
Inside the U.S. Customs and Border Protection offices at the Peace Arch Point of Entry in Blaine sits a long bench where people can wait to speak to an officer. In approximately two decades, Blaine immigration lawyer Leonard D.M. Saunders said he’s rarely seen more than a couple of people actually sitting on the bench.
But on Saturday, the scene was quite different, Saunders said.
“The bench was full of Persians. ... They were all sitting there on the bench — 75 to 100 of them, young, old, kids,” Saunders told The Bellingham Herald. “I remember thinking this is brutal.”
In describing Saturday’s events at the Blaine border crossing, Saunders said he saw CBP officers bring juice boxes, crackers and small cups of fruit to those seated on the bench, and one officer brought in five or six boxes of pizza.
“I’ve been going to the border for 20 years, and I’ve never seen them feeding someone, unless they’re in the back in a detention cell under arrest,” Saunders said. “The officers were being real polite, though. I think the officers had been told what to do, and they were just trying to make the best out of it.”
On Sunday, CBP said in a statement to The Herald that social media reports that it had detained Iranian-Americans and refused their entry into the United States based on their country of origin were false. CBP also stated reports that the Department of Homeland Security or CBP had issued a directive were false.
That statement came after the Washington state chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations sent out a news release Sunday saying it was assisting more than 60 Iranians and Iranian-Americans who had been detained and questioned for a lengthy time in Blaine.
Iranian general killed
The claims come in the wake of last week’s U.S. airstrike near Baghdad’s airport that killed Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani, head of Iran’s elite Quds Force and the mastermind of its interventions across the Middle East. Iran promised to seek revenge, and the U.S. said Friday it was sending thousands more troops to the region as tensions soared.
After reports of what happened in Blaine emerged, Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee and U.S. Rep. Pramila Jayapal on Monday publicly condemned the reported detention of U.S. citizen’s based on the country of origin.
“The reports out of the border crossing at Blaine are deeply alarming,” Inslee’s statement said. “Washingtonians who happen to be Iranian-American were detained at the Canadian-U.S. border for extended periods of time for no other reason than their ethnicity or country of origin. This is wrong and rife with constitutional and moral problems.”
Spokesperson Jason Givens told The Herald Tuesday that CBP had no further comment than what was released Sunday.
Saunders said the unusual scene he witnessed Saturday seemed to contradict CBP’s statement.
“It’s detention, in my eyes,” Saunders told The Herald. “When you keep an American citizen for four hours to ask them unusual questions and they can’t leave — that’s detention.”
Saunders said he was working in his office near the Peace Arch and Pacific Highway crossings on Saturday, expecting to meet at 10 a.m. with a client of Persian heritage that temporarily lives in Canada and has green-card status in the U.S.
“He’s got a Nexus pass, so he’s a trusted traveler,” Sauders said. “He didn’t show up, and he’s always very punctual. ... Well it’s 10:30 and then 10:45, and he sends me a text saying he got hung up at the border and they’re asking a lot of strange questions.”
Through a text exchange, Saunders said he learned his client was being asked about his parents, where he was born, where he went to school, if he attended military school and if he had any relatives in Iran.
“It was pretty intense — he said they were polite, but they were asking a lot of questions,” Saunders said, adding that his client did not arrive at his office until 1 p.m.
Second border delay
About a half-hour later, Saunders said he got a text message from another client — a woman of Persian descent who had recently gotten her U.S. citizenship after living in Canada and also a trusted traveler with a Nexus pass. She reported a similar lengthy delay and unusual questions.
“She had gone up to Vancouver for the holiday, and this was her first re-entry with a U.S. passport,” Saunders said. “She said it was humiliating and asked me what was the point of being a U.S. citizen if this is how you’re treated?”
Saunders said she asked CBP officers if she could leave and try again Sunday but was told they expected it to take the same amount of time then. She reported getting through at 3:30 p.m. after four hours waiting.
It was then that Saunders said he wanted to check out what was going on for himself and went to the crossing office, and that’s when he said he saw the bench full of Persians waiting.
“I asked an officer, ‘What’s going on?’” Saunders said. “He rolled his eyes and said, ‘They’re all waiting to be vetted. Nobody who is Iranian by berth is allowed in until they’re approved by the port director.’ He said it was taking hours to get them through.”
Saunders said he was surprised to find similar reports weren’t coming from elsewhere around the country.
“I don’t know how the Blaine Peace Arch Point of Entry can do this and nobody else is,” Saunders said.
