A modest proposal: federal racial profiling.

• Author: Shackford, Scott
• Position: Citings - Brief article

In December, Attorney General Eric Holder gave a speech at a church in Atlanta declaring that the Department of Justice would be introducing new policies to "help end racial profiling once and for all."

The reality turned out to be less grandiose. The department did introduce new policies regarding racial profiling. But they were significantly less ambitious than Holder claimed. The new guidelines prohibit FBI agents from considering national origin, sex, sexual orientation, or religion when opening a case, adding those to existing prohibitions against considering race and ethnicity. Similar prohibitions were implemented for domestic activities by federal law enforcement officers.

But the new policies will not affect state and local law enforcement agencies, only the feds. Furthermore...