DETROIT — The Northern Borders Coalition (NBC) Immigrants Rights Conference will take place Tuesday, Sep. 16 at the United Auto Workers Ford National Training Center  from 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. 

The event, entitled “From North to South: Civil Rights Along the Border”, will focus on the issue of profiling at the Canada-United States border. Several Arab and Muslim Americans from Dearborn and other parts of metro Detroit have complained about being profiled at the border. In 2012, the Council on American Islamic Relations of Michigan filed a lawsuit against the FBI and CBP on behalf of Muslims over the repeated detention and questioning of their faith. 

According to the NBC, Border Patrol agents have shot and killed 19 people along the border in the past few years, 10 of whom were U.S. citizens.

In a statement issued about the upcoming conference, the group said, “racial and religious profiling continues— families are regularly detained at the border simply because they are Muslim, and residents of border areas must live with checkpoints and warrant-less searches and arrests.” Many Arab and Muslim Americans have also been placed on the U.S. No Fly List without reasonable explanation. That issue is also on the conference’s agenda. 

During the conference participants will discuss the reality on the ground in the north and south, and build concrete organizing strategies to address them.