DETROIT — The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) along with the National Lawyers Guild filed a complaint with the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol and U.S. Department of Justice on August 13 on behalf of three U.S. Social Forum participants who were allegedly harassed at the Detroit-Windsor border on June 24 for their perceived political stances.

“It is our position that the Border Patrol has wide authority to question people. They can choose to question persons perceived as a threat, or for security reasons. They cannot do it for political surveillance and to intimidate,” said John Royal, president of the Detroit chapter of the National Lawyers Guild. “We are asking the Department of Justice and Border Patrol to recognize that they cannot harass and detain people.”

On June 24, Christina Santiago, Danielle Demorin and Alicia Teran, students at St. John’s University in New York, took a tourist bus to visit Windsor during their stay in Detroit for the U.S. Social Forum, which was attended by about 20,000 people. Upon returning, they were selected for further questioning although they had all appropriate documentation. According to Santiago, the problem started when one of the officers noticed the three women were wearing orange bracelets that showed they were participants of the social forum .

“The female official tending to us saw our orange USSF bracelets and said ‘Oh, you’re wearing those bracelets. Are you here to protest?’” Santiago said she and her two classmates said no, and were then questioned about their citizenship and then separated for searches of their USSF bags and further questioning, including questions about why they were there.

“This question also hurt the most because, from her tone of asking us this and her demeanor, she was not asking why we were in Detroit but more so why we wanted to return back into the United States, the country in which we lived,” Santiago said.

The questioning took “hours,” delaying the bus of more than 40 passengers.

Santiago said she was mystified by the actions of the agents and felt betrayed.

“We could understand if Canada did not want us but, to feel unwanted, hated, and betrayed by our own country of the United States of America,” she said. “I had gone abroad and traveled to various countries on several other continents over the past few years and I can boldly say that I had never felt that way when returning to the United States.”

Santiago, Teran and Demorian were the only ones taken for extensive searching and questioning although there were other passengers, including one young woman with a large suitcase that the officers never searched.

“The students were subjected to excessive and accusatory interrogations violating their First Amendment rights,” said Rana Elmir, communications director of  ACLU of Michigan. “We believe that the interrogations were focused on constitutionally protected activities rather than any legitimate concern about border security,”

They sent the letter to urge Customs and Border Patrol to investigate the matter and hopefully prevent such incidents in the future. They have not received a reply as of yet.