NEW YORK, 31 July 2004 — The US Census Bureau has provided population data on Arab-Americans to the Department of Homeland Security, including their ancestry and the cities and postal areas in which they live, The New York Times reported yesterday.
Data on Arab-Americans are being linked to a shameful period of US history. The action is being called a dangerous breach of public trust by both American civil liberty groups and Arab-American organizations.
“We are required to provide information to other federal agencies, “Hermann Habermann, deputy director of the Census Bureau, told reporters. When pressed over how the data could be disseminated, he said: “We do worry about how information will be used.”
“The only way we can guarantee that no one will ever be harmed by our information is to release nothing,” said Habermann. “We understand that groups can be affected by what we give out, and we understand that we can be sensitive. But that is a societal debate, not a census debate.”
A spokeswoman for the Customs and Border Protection, a division of Homeland Security, denied any nefarious designs for the information. “The information is not in any way being used for law enforcement purposes.”
Christiana Halsey told journalists the real purpose was to use the basic demographic information “to help us communicate US laws and regulations to the traveling public” in airports frequently used by Arab and Arab-American travelers.
While the information sharing is legal, so long as the data do not identify individuals, civil liberties and Arab-American groups called it a breach of public trust and likened it to steps taken against Japanese-Americans in World War II, the newspaper said.
One set of data listed cities with more than 1,000 Arab-Americans. The other, more detailed set, provided ZIP code breakdowns and sorted Arab-Americans by country of origin. The categories were Egyptian, Iraqi, Jordanian, Lebanese, Moroccan, Palestinian, Syrian, “Arab/Arabic” and “Other Arab.”
The Census Bureau disclosed the data sharing in response to a request from a civil liberties group, Electronic Privacy Information Center, which shared the documents with The Times.
A spokeswoman for Customs and Border Protection told the newspaper the requests were made not for law enforcement purposes, but to help identify in which airports to post signs and pamphlets in Arabic to assist travelers.
James Zogby, head of the Arab American Institute, told the newspaper the data sharing would harm efforts to build trust within Arab-American communities.
