Hansen Clarke made history as the first member of the US Congress of Bangladeshi descent but when he goes to the airport, he still feels that he is singled out with suspicion. “If I don’t shave for a few days and I wear my hoodie on, or I’m in the airport and I have my jogging clothes on — oh yeah, I get subjected to the random explosive tests almost every time,” Clarke said.
Since entering Congress in January, the Detroit-based congressman has made it his mission to try to stop racial profiling in the United States, using his position as a member of the House Committee on Homeland Security. The 54-year-old comes to the issue from a unique dual vantage point. His mother was African American, a community that has long protested against racial profiling by law enforcement. “After 9/11, South Asians had some experience of what African Americans have had to go through for centuries here,” Clarke, his voice animated, told AFP in an interview in his office.
