gathering the votes together and helping to influence other actors and helping to build an alliance so you can get whatever your project is through the iraqi parliament. they are very influential actors in iraq but they are willing to get down and dirty and engage with iraqi politics on the level of individual politicians. figuring out what they want. they like doing some great congressional lobbying. it's not that nefarious. there are nefarious aspects to it. we can compete. we choose not to. there are people who will happily take u.s. help instead in building an alliance to pass something through the iraqi parliament that we think is actually in the better interest of stability in iraq.

>> yes, sir? >> i really joined the discussion, from the international stability operation bringing it back a little bit to the u.s. election. one of the candidates, donald trump, has specifically said that he would take the oil, if the u.s. is involved. how much play received in iraq that you actually have a candidate that says if we're going to be involved we take the oil? >> dr. yoonis, do you want to start? >> i think that's what iraquis have always thought they were doing. that's a bit of a problem when pr is so bad they can't differentiate between some outlandish idea and often constructive policy of actually being. that's on us for not making it very clear what we've been doing there. >> you mentioned in your comments iranian narrative about is is the one that dominates in

iraq? i wonder if you would give details how the iranians depict us? >> an iranian narrative of what the u.s. is doing in iraq is building its -- building its empire in the middle east to it can dominate and extract resources and to maintain american emperfectly domination over the world and that iran is the leader of the resistance access that seeks to resist american hedge money. oil domination has always been a part of that narrative. ordinary iraquis, oil rich cities, then don't see investment in their schools and health services and see sewage on the streets. they are not seeing that money. it's going somewhere. they don't know where. it happens to be going into the pockets of corrupt iraqi politicians, not coming to the u.s. but for ordinary citizens

made a difference. >> public discourse often a bit more subtle than it is in the united states. i suppose an iraqi reaction could be, well, we knew that but it really shouldn't be said in public. >> i'll get you on the next time around. sorry. >> thank you. ga gabe. i'm wondering what should u.s. policy be? specifically should that be nation building, seemed to implied by speakers. if it does imply troops, the immunity question. finally, which of the candidates is more likely to implement such

a policy? >> mr. ambassador, do you want to take a shot at that? >> it does involve state building. here i will invoke famously what reputedly was put at the colin powell pottery barn rule, the united states dismantled state of iraq when it was wholly unnecessary to do so in 2003. it was an idiotic decision, singularly the worst decision made in iraq at least. it does involve that. so i think that that's a part and parcel. look, a place the united states refused to engage in state building when it seemed the mission was quote, unquote, accomplished was in afghanistan when the russians finally with drew. how did that work out for us? here we are in the heart of the middle east, in an oil rich

state, which if i'm right, if it continues down the path it has been on, if it breaks up, it will break up into, as i think i said, another somalia, except this will be a somalia where some of the factions at least will sell oil, smuggled on the mark, some are doing anyway. there is a united states interest. as to which candidate, i can't really answer that question, because i haven't heard either candidate address -- we have had a dispute between the two candidates as to what their thoughts and views were in 2003 and whether they were right or wrong in 2003, but i have not heard what they would do in iraq. there's been minimal discussion about syria but none that i'm aware of on iraq. i can't address that part of it. >> mike, do you have some thoughts? >> the most important part is a commitment to stay not as a military force but a force that continues to put leverage and

pressure on baghdad, engage and do the right thing. it doesn't -- we have a very patient enemy and there are very patient actors in the middle east. they don't operate on western clocks. you tell the taliban you're leaving in five years, the taliban says the day after they leave we'll attack. same with al qaeda and isis, patient actors in the middle east. the best way for us to do anything, if we're going to send soldiers there and spend money there is not to say we're going to leave until something is accomplished. when i say that, trust is built to the point where u.s. leverage is continuous. it's not fleeting. >> a very dear friend of mine is a retired american general who always says on this question with his kids, he never had an exit strategy. he had a long-term engagement strategy, which moderated as they got older.

i think the analogy works pretty well in iraq. you can't treat iraq as you did in 2003 and certainly not with what you could have done but didn't when there were 150,000 troops, american troops there. but simply kicking them out the door and saying, well, i hope you don't starve in the streets hasn't worked terribly well. >> dr. younis. >> i would make the point we're engaged with international coalition, doing heavy lifting, making significant contribution. once mosul is liberated that coalition needs not to be dismantled but transition into stabilization. it's not about the u.s. pouring in resources to try and do all of this job on its own but about using the weight of the international community and the coalition that's been built up pretty painstakingly to support

the goal of the defeat isis, to persuade those actors to remain object board for the task of stabilizing the country. >> we passed over ed back there. >> yeah. i'm here at hudson, senior fellow. i would like to ask the ambassador if he could expand a bit on what he sees as the actual way of going about the state building project. you've mentioned that the current constitution and current government is certainly weak and seems to be somewhat hanging on by its fingernails. one possible way of looking at the iraqi's fate in the future would be going down the regionization route and say, okay, there will be a sunni region, as some sunnis were interested before. maybe even more than one region in the shia area so basra has a greater sense of its ability to

controlity own future and so forth. that would be one way of trying to rebuild the iraqi state. i get the impression it's not your preferred way." i wonder, do you have any other way of looking at the question how to rebuild the iraqi state and what that would begin to look like. who are the people this would rest on? >> what you're talking about, the arrangement in iraq, which i think may be gaining some traction. unfortunately i will say in iraq, let me purpose my remarks by saying that i understand that the kurdistan region of iraq, to the extent it remains in iraq, occupies a special status i'm not advocating the

reintroduction of sort of the centralized state with respect to the krg fl that's an important point to keep in mind. having said that, we have been in a phase, if i may use an analogy to the american -- to american history, in the articles of confederation phase where a government in baghdad has been created, which is fundamentally devoid of all powers. it may -- it didn't work 250 years ago in a continent separated by two oceans from meddling neighbors. it is not working in the middle east in a country surrounded by hostile authorities -- powers, sorry.

powers. i would say to the kurdish leadership, the greatest threat -- again, please keep in mind the prefatory remarks i made about krg, i would say to kurdish leadership the greatest threat that the kurds faced since 1991, but in any event since 2003 was not from baghdad but from isil, which arose because of a weak state, weak at every level, including level of politic and political environment i've spoken about. a baghdad that's too strong as was the case for too long under

the rule and perhaps before i understand is unacceptable to many players in iraq. but a baghdad that's too weak has resulted in 2014, and we're still dealing with that and potentially could be dealing for years with the consequences. there has to be an intermediate point. so a stronger -- we need a constitutional arrangement that creates a more cohesive state. and that builds state institutions. we have not only not built physical infrastructure of the country since 2003, i'm talking about the part of baghdad -- part of iraq controlled by baghdad, i'm not talking about krg, before isil and before the crash of oil prices, seen myself. in the area south of krg we've not built school, hospital since

2003. in addition as a state we have not built a single state institution over that period of ti time. so i think you have to create a stronger -- not a centralized government but a federal government that actually has powers, actually can act as a focus of cohesion and unity of the state. >> that's fgoing to have to be the last word. we're already over time. for those of you that have questions, i'm sorry, you'll have to wait until next time. i'm sure some of our panelists will answer you after we conclude here. please join me for thanking the panelists. it was very engaging. [ applause ]

hode to the white house including hillary clinton 5:15 eastern live from detroit. at 7:00 eastern donald trump holding a campaign rally in hershey, pennsylvania. >> election night on c-span, watch the results and be part of a national conversation about the outcome. be on location hillary clinton and donald trump headquarters and watch victory and concession speeches in key senate house and governor's races starting live c-span. watch live on c-span, on demand at c-span.org or listen to live coverage using free c-span radio app.

>> the capital area muslim bar association and american bar association co-hosted a discussion recently on recent friends in anti-muslim bullying and ways lawyers can better advocate for students bully. the way students, teachers involved can most help muslim students involved in bullying about their faith. the audience took part in questions. this is about an hour and 20 men. >> we're going to get started. feel free to grab a seat. >> capital area bar association program, anti-muslim bullying, emerging issues and pro bono opportuniti

opportunities. i'm one of the board members of the association, associate professor of law and university of columbia david a. clark school of law, public interest law school for district of columbiaia commit to eradicating social issues such as we're discussing today. before we get started, wasn't to thank our host for tonight's event. thank you. sponsoring reception for us. civil rights and social justice bully proof committee joining us as a co-sponsor. cortney we thank you for making this happen. in 2013, the section had bully proof initiative for schools and centers and bringing together

schools, students, teachers, to address and collaborate on solutions to the bullying epidemic. tonight's program part of campus initiative to amplify our voice so that we are, in fact, working as a collaborative to identify issues that are impacting the muslim community. we believe this collaboration with aba is moving us closer to fulfilling that mission. our panel consists of policy work and systemic reform. directly to my left jonathan smith, who is executive director of lawyers committee for civil rights and urban affairs. next to jonathan aisha, executive director, muslim lawyers. director of citywide bully prevention program at d.c. office of human rights.

and muslim advocates, director of the program to strengthen muslim charities. so appropriately october is national bully prevention month, a month to educate and raise awareness of bully prevention. this week is also national pro bono week. that initiative is designed to increase access to justice by recruiting volunteers who will assist in representing people who are low income and those often vulnerable. tonight's program is really about addressing an issue that impacts the most vulnerable members of our community, our children and our youth. so when we're looking at muslim children in particular we focus on issues impacting them as children, which i think that part of the conversation is often overlooked. i think it's fair to say that there is an assertive campaign

to create this otherness, if you will, when you talk about muslims. muslims as foreigners, as terrorists, as extremists. just for the record, i'm muslim and i'm born in boston, massachusetts. for those questioning i do have a birth certificate to even prove that. but this image of muslims as foreigners and terrorists helps to perpetuate that narrative, if you will, that makes it acceptable for our legislators, for courts also to somehow justify discriminatory practices under the umbrella of national security. so i think the first question i'd like to pose to the panel as we initiate and start this conversation is has this prevalent anti-muslim climate created school cultures where schools are actually able to

demonstrate an indifference to harassment against muslim students. maybe you can start us off. what is that nexus between the rhetoric that we hear and bullying. >> thank you for that and thank you all for being here this evening. unfortunately there is a direct correlation between the rhetoric that is all too common now in our society that is anti-muslim, that is very xenophobic, otherizing american muslims. that is unfortunately infiltrating not only monks adults, social media but pervading mass media screens and unfortunately our most vulnerable population, our children, are being exposed to that rhetoric. it's becoming almost the norm. it's very troubling for me. i'm executive director of

nonprofit based here in d.c. and we get calls from mothers and fathers on a daily basis, it seems, on how to deal with their young children being asked about very harrowing issues. anti-muslim issues, about what's happening overseas and a lot of different kinds of things. i thought i'd share a quick story to illustrate this point. i think this is really -- this really broke my heart. so i was invited to speak at a local school in maryland. some students came up to me afterwards, two young women came to me afterwards and said, you know, we're not out as muslims at school. i said, okay, and i asked them to tell me more. they said we just don't feel comfortable, not only amongst

their peers but also from the administration, from teachers, from the principal. they didn't feel comfortable even owning their identity as muslim women. i think there had been some incidents. i'm smiling because i'm not as aware of all the different social media platforms but i was informed of a certain social media platform where you can anonymously post particular to that one school. so only people at that school can post about that school. so there had been some very troubling remarks about muslims, about women on this platform. that had made these young women, these two young women hide their identity publicly. and they felt they needed to come -- to use their terms -- out themselves to me so they could talk about what they were going through. i think that's an example -- after this happened, it's

happened to me multiple times where people have started to say they go by a different name in school. they wear different clothes at school. i think there's a direct correlation and we can go into statistics later of hate speech and the rhetoric that is in our public spaces and how it's impacting muslim identity and bullying in schools. >> so thank you. i know you're doing a lot of this work on the ground as well. what are you seeing at muslim advocate if you had anything you wanted to add onto that. >> yeah. and thank you again for having me here. i always say anti-muslim bullying does not happen in a vacuum. similar to aisha's point, we are seeing a direct correlation between the climate of anti-muslim policies and how that impacts school children. more than any other time in the history of our organization, we have tracked many, many, many

instances of anti-muslim bullying. even instances where families where their children haven't been bullied, it's the number one concern we hear across from board all the time. i'm a parent myself, i'm always worried somebody is going to say something to one of my children at school. you raise your kids to be proud of who they are. you know, i fear similar to what aisha just said they may want to not share that part of their identity as they get older and become more aware of the rhetoric that surrounds them. one thing i will add to that is, you know, it happens in multiple layers. there's certainly what we call peer to peer bullying which happens between a student and another student. however, we also see a significant number of instances where administrators at the school are the ones that are perpetuating the anti-muslim climate at the school.

these are relationships in which students trust their teacher, go to their teacher when they have a problem. this a person they are learning from. we have that teacher themselves perpetuating stereotypes, saying hateful comments, your dad is part of the taliban, go sit down. these types of derogatory comments that come from teachers also play a role in that overall climate for how students feel at school. may not come from their peers but administrators, wanted to add that extra layer. >> so do we have any data or statistics showing whether muslims are disproportionately targeted when it comes to bull ling. i'm looking at suzanne, we used to cross paths representing students with disabilities. students with disabilities obvious very vulnerable and targeted. i'm wondering if we have any data or statistics about muslims being disproportionately targeted. if we don't, quite honestly, why

don't we have it. does anyone know? >> i can speak from the local level, we are collecting that data. we have a law in the district of columbia which defines bullying in a lot of specific ways. it doesn't trip off the tongue. it's not an easy definition. a part of it we very much want to know if the bullying is based on a particular trait. so we have covered the list of traits, 19 traits all covered by d.c. human rights act. so we are definitely collecting that. i have, in fact, put out the call for all of our schools to report their incidents from last year on this. we will be reporting. i have to tell you anecdotally i have had many parents call me not about specific incidents but fears. more than that i really do feel like we've triggered our adults if we haven't figured kids into this equation yet.

the district is somewhat different in terms of population. i'm hearing it a lot from immigrant communities in general, certainly latina community is hearing all kinds of things on the playground that wasn't said before this last year, quite to that level. so we are hearing it anecdotally. i don't know if we have numbers yet but we have definitely triggered the adults. >> so let me step outside of my normal advocacy role for a moment and work on the dark side. why is this bullying? why isn't it just the normal power dynamic that happens at school and the way kids are on the playground. you talked about the identifying factors d.c. human rights act -- not d.c. human rights act. so why isn't it just that power dynamics how kids are in the playground? how are we distinguishing the two sthf i would say what's

fascinating to me, they have two different school buildings here in the district. half of our kids in charter schools, half d.c. public schools. i would say that building by building, it looks very different depending on what the demographics of that building are, depending on the leadership in that building of how they set a tone, who is welcome, how welcome they are, who acknowledged. if we have a lot of immigrants in the building and you don't see any signage in other languages regard spanish or any other community languages, there's a real recognition of who is in that building. i can promise you going across the the city, there are schools that are literally two blocks electric each other that the climate and culture looks very different in terms of who is recognized. that's true tore kids with disabilities and our gay, lesbian and transgender kids. >> i'm just going to add to that. i think part of why i say it's now become the norm to have this

kind of rhetoric, i was reading an article and many of you may have read it, i can give you the citation later. she was talking about how she was speaking to a group of young muslim women and asked a question, have you ever been bullied? nobody really responded. and then she said, well, have any of you been called a terrorist, and almost every hand went up. it's a very troubling -- i use that anecdote or story to say because it's so normal to be disparaged in such a horrible way, people and children oftentimes i don't think are calling that or defining that bullying. kind of to your point of kids will be kids. they are saying things, roughhousing each other on the playground, saying weird things to one another. it's more that the parents are sort of hearing it and saying, wait a second, that's not okay.

it's not okay for my kids to hear that.cousin, very casually telling me, oh, yeah i've been called a terrorist in school. i said, really, did that make you upset? no. it's like i'm muslim, everyone calls everyone a terrorist who are muslim. i think there is a bit of -- i know your collection what us about data collection, i think there's a reporting issue, a reporting issue of whether children have the right tools to say -- use that language that this is bullying, i'm feeling harassed enough to report it to a school administrator or even your parent. >> i think maybe that circles back to the point brenda was making that i, at least, initially started this conversation talking about student on student bullying and something that i think brenda raised that's an important point that we also have school administrators that are

perpetuating and feeding into that same anti-muslim rhetoric. let's rewind -- yes, please? >> i do want to jump in, we have a specific definition in the p definition, which is the part that throws everybody is it does have to cause harm. i want to caution our notes because i honestly don't want any child to be called a terrorist for any reason. but we have learned that effect of bullying on kids is really the important issue. and some kids really are affected differently. we learned this with other populations the same way. kids will walk into the room and be called names and they don't think anything of the other kids and they don't care. and they move through their life just fine and their resiliency is built and they have a good self definition and they feel a part of the community. there are other kids who don't tell us also they're being targeted and it undermines their

sense of self, their sense of safety and the ability to learn in that classroom. but trying to figure out just because the kids are learning it -- we learned this with our kids with disability and our gay kids. bullying itself is about the psychological harm. so i think it is a really important question. that doesn't mean they shouldn't be sensitive or call it out and that we should in any way normalize that language but how we address it is complicated. >> perhaps that is part of the challen challenge. growing up in boston when mandatory bussing was implemented, trigger warning, tw trigger warning, every day was called a nigger. we don't have tim pact it has on a child. here i am some 4-something years later and realizing it did have an impact on me. so i'm wondering if because it's

so much the norm to call muslim students terrorists -- maybe we could look at the legal standard. are we looking at the subjective standard? can we rewind a little bit -- jonathan, i know your office does a lot. what are we see in the courts as far as what courts are requiring. we have this great statute within d.c. but on a national level we're probably ahead of the curve thanks to suzanne's office and what you're doing. >> i think on just on the question of studies in preparing for tonight, i spent a little time doodling around the internet and is there are a fair number of people who have looked at this question. and under the law the question is not -- there is no national prohibition on bullying, no statute that says you can't bully. it says you can't discriminate

and it's how we interpret this kind of conduct inside the anti-discrimination statutes. and the care in california did a study, they interviewed 600 kids, muslim kids, and 55% has been subject to discrimination by students and 20% by teachers. so it is -- it's very prevalent in teachers as was just noted. really set the tone and the kids do follow the tone of the institutions in which they live in. so to some extent -- and the tone of their home and the national media and all of the other characteristics. to some extent the fact that you have a high percentage of teachers engaged in discriminatory conduct is reflective of what's going on inside the schools. there is no national statute that prohibits something called bullying. there are a number of laws that

provide that students who go to school have to be free from discriminatory conduct. so the school itself can't engage in conduct discriminatory through its teachers on educational program. what is said and done in the classroom by the teacher is critical to whether you create a climate where each student doesn't have equal access to an education. and if you're bullied and you can't get the benefits of the education in the way that a student who wasn't subjected to the harassment, that's discrimination prohibited by federal law. it equally so the school is responsible to make sure that there's a climate, not deliberately indifferent to the conduct of the other students and to prevent that conduct from interfering with the student's ability to get an education on equal terms with everyone else. that's the extent that the law provides that kind of

protection. there are private litigation you can bring but some of the most potent work is being done by the department of justice and the department of education. there are a range of statute that they apply. the department of justice has no statutory authority to look at discrimination based on religion. there's an enormous hole that prevents -- that goes to race, national origin, gender, color but doesn't protect against religious speech. but the department of education has prom gaited regulations and offered guidance that when the discrimination based on religion is such that it goes to actual perceived shared ancestry or an ethnicity that it's prohibited discrimination under the federal statutes. the department of justice does have under title 6 and title 9 and title 4 prevents

discrimination by religion, title 6 prevents discrimination based on national origin, any federally funded program, every school in the country and title 9 requires a free and equal education for everyone. the department of justice can get directly at religious-based discrimination. it's a very trick area under the law. you have to balance and first get to the more complicated question we were discussing, what is the impact on the child, when does it cross the line between a discourse on a public policy question to become discrimination that prevents a child on equal terms being able to get an education and how do you balance the first amendment and other rights of the students who are engaged in expressive conduct. the courts have been reluctant to deal with cyberbullying which

has become an increasing problem. the courts have provided very little guidance there and what guidance they've provided, they've given wide latitude to speakers on social media, less so in the school building, in the schoolhouse. but they have left some room for there to be negative hurtful kinds of comments that don't go as far as those kinds of comments that would prevent children to get an education on equal terms. >> i should mention those of you who do not know, my former colleague here, i think he's done some great social justice work was with the department of justice and under his direction doj authored the ferguson report. and i actually snubbed my nose at it because it was coming from the department of justice until i read it. and it was one of the most balanced insightful -- you could

here jonathan's advocacy coming out of that report. it made me think about that because i'm wondering, what are we seeing that's actually working. these are the standards, it seems like they wer climbing a mountain. do we know of what strategies have been most effective when we're looking at protecting children in schools? >> i mean, i think these folks may know better than i do. i do know that the courts have -- there have been a number -- >> it's deliberate indifference. >> it's deliberate indifference. and the court remedies, if you look at tin junction junctions that have been entered, they're not effective, have a policy, correct some data. and it doesn't provide the leadership in the schools to make the behavior unacceptable. >> if i'm correct when we're looking at deliberate indifference, there has to first be a great policy is that correct?? there has to be a policy in place and the school district is

demonstrating deliberate indifference. >> one of the things we did because we had so many parents out of the sphere what can we do, we drafted a letter to every single state superintendent or whatever their title would be in varying states that's responsible for education in their state. and in that letter we highlighted some of what you just went through, the legal obligations as a public school district in that state. and what, under title 6 in prohibiting discrimination as well as potential liability there and section 1983 as well. and what we've done is we attached to that, which a fantastic letter that went out the last day before former secretary ernie duncan left and before incoming secretary king started on december 31st, the letter went out. a dear colleague letter that highlights not just the obligations of each school district for what they should do

but also highlighted some potential, you know, strategies for how to talk about these issues in school and highlighting the climate for that. and after we sent that letter out, we got so many wonderful e-mails back from state superintendents saying thank you, you know, we're not aware if this is happening at the schools but we're going to look into it or we're going to have these conversations with our school districts. and we've asked parent to take that letter and share it with their local school districts as well. we took the sandwich approach, we'll send it to your state superintendent, you take it to the school district because the resources from the department of education, coming particularly in that dear colleague letter were quite wonderful. >> so i know krama had been doing work on providing support for students. we have a roomful of lawyers and the courts aren't working. we have an advocacy letter,

we're at least getting some responses from the schools being responsive to the students who are being bullied. what about trainings, workshops, working with students, identifying some of the ways we can actually -- i don't know, changing behaviors and providing supports? >> so i think that one of the things that is really important is having kind of these know your rights type workshops and training really for parents. and some for children. it's interesting. i did one with children and parents together for karama at a local mosque and i think the parents were horrified by what their children were sharing in this kind of a forum. because i think -- there's a couple of lawyers of problems here. one layer is that i think that there's not a lot of communication happening between parents and children about particularly about

cyberbullying. i think a lot of parents are not aware of all of the social immediate ymedia platforms that their children are on. they want to turn a blind eye to what is being shared. i'm making generalizations but that's what i gathered. and then i think when the young people started sharing some of the things that they were sharing with one another and how they were talking with one another, i think the parents were sort of just surprised that that was even happening. so that's one layer. and then i think that the next layer is just not knowing the laws or the standard and how to even approach an issue. so a lot of the calls that we're getting, as i referenced before from parents is really how do i go about reporting an issue. so should i go to the school principal, should i go to their teacher, should i put my child in counseling. what are the kinds of mechanisms for relief. and i do think that the courts

right now are still flyi ining blind. we're still trying to figure out what the right mechanism for relief is. many years ago when i was practicing in tennessee there was a case, it's an interesting sort of remedy, two girls -- a girl had filed a protective order against another girl for harassment and for -- actually we got it under stalking which i thought was really not so creative, but it was -- it's not a good long term -- in the end i thought it was not a good long term solution. but in tennessee the statute was that as long as there were three or more incidents of stalking-like behavior you could file a protective order against somebody else with whom you did not have a relationship. that's a standard in protective order cases. and i remember even then, and this was several years ago, the

judge juz scratching his head thinking, i don't know how i feel about a child getting a protective order against another child and how would that work in the school setting. do they not stay in the same classroom? do they say, you know, 50 feet apart from one another? how is that going to be regulated? what are the regulatory mechanisms of this happening at the school. and frankly i'm not in favor of more police officers being in schools. it was just a complicated question. so i think that certainly having -- so the "know your rights" thing is a catch 22 because you have to know what you're going to be pitching to parents of what you should be doing. and without guidance from the courts, you know, it's a little bit difficult. but i do think, even just starting dialogue, starting conversations between parents and lawyers about feeling like you're not totally without any m mechanism of relief is very important.

>> there are two challenges, one for parent to know the remedies that they have for their students. but then once they determine that remedy, finding an advocate who will help you navigate the often very complicated legal system. suzanne, i know your office has some kind of -- i'm not fully familiar with. the d.c. office of human rights had some kind of complaint process. >> yes. >> could you share that with us? >> i want to echo something that was said. you're absolutely right where the kids don't share. a big problem around the issue of bullying is that your kids don't tell us exactly what's going on but there's a really good reason why they don't tell us and that's because we usually overreact and we make it worse as far as they're concerned. and this is sort of that double edged part of this that we work in especially as our kids get older. they don't tell their parents because their parents yor overr.

and think feel that's going to make it harder on nthem in schol of how to navigate it. we have a process certainly in the office of human rights. but part of the work of the bully prevention program that i run is that prevention mode and getting parents in the door to schools before an incident happens to talk about how do we illustrate an inclusive communities. how do we siillustrate where people are recognized and validat validated. we need parents to do it. school don't always want to do it without a little bit of pressure. that piece is very important. through my office there is a claim through a hostile educational environment based on a particular trait that you can use to address bullying in a public educational institution. we have a dual process because we want to make sure that you actually get to me first and we

try to resolve the issue for the child because sometimes the court process, no offense to all of the lawyers in here, takes a long time. i can't afford to have a kid stay in that kind of environment for any length of time. so we try to work immediately with the school to shift the dynamics, provide the support to the kid so that they feel -- the most important piece is making the kid feel safe and protected again and understand that the adults can do something and do something helpful. that's the part we want to work on first and then we'd really appreciate it if the legal folks come behind us to actually ensure that it doesn't happen over and over again in the same school. >> i think that -- you know, and the dear colleague letter is very helpful in taking on this issue because it recognizes the balancing question of people wanting to have a public debate against the need to protect students. but i also think as we think about this from the legal

perspective that there's often not an understanding of what is it that one understands whether it's bullying and what deliberate indifference looks like in the context of a school. and if you've got a lot of students that are saying things that are hostile and harmful, that is probably -- that may or may not be enough. and we need to look at those things. like do muslim kids spend more time getting through the screening of the school resource officer. you know when they go to school, do teachers talk about you know, the greatness of america? what are the permissions that are being given to students by subtly and not so subtly by the school itself. do they do things like the dear colleague letter says that it's important that people have a respectful mechanism to express these things. you know, how do they do that. or is it does the school shut people down so there isn't an outlet for people to actually

understand each other. and so i think in terms of thinking about how i would build a legal case, just knowing what one student said to another, how frequently that happens itself would not be enough. the more you dug, the more you would find this is school-promoted kind of conduct. this isn't happening in isolation because the school administration sets the client. >> i have one quick thought on that, and this is sort of related in a circuitous way. i'm thinking a lot about this issue of access to education, a basic right for children and the idea safe from discrimination. it's interesting because one of the pieces of advocacy that we're working on currently is the teaching of islam in public schools. so there's actually quite a large movement, it's becoming a national movement starting in tennessee and texas and colorado

of just an e ray sure of islam from the curriculum and from textbooks. there was actually -- i don't want to get into the politics of it but there were a lot of politicians who were saying that we were indoctrinating children in islam by even teaching. so for example if you're teaching the basics of theology saying that muslims believe in five pillars, the first pillar is faith in god and there's an arabic saying that goes along with that. it just so happens that that's the saying that people say when they convert to islam as well. that's what they're saying. there's this idea that oh my gosh muslims are designing this curricula to convert all of these children in the public schools. it's kind of funny, it's really awful. but it's really vilifying other

islam and erasing islam and islamic history as if it had no significance in the context of our world. and saying that we should be, you know, taking it out of textbooks all together. we've made inroads with the department of education but they're saying that's really up to the schools, the individual schools. there's a jurisdiction question of of what guidance can the federal government give to local schools of how to conduct the curriculum. this is a subtle way that is sort of infiltrating the overall discourse in the schools that there's something wrong with islam, we shouldn't be talking about islam. which is also impacting how kids are feeling in schools. >> if all you hear is the cr crusades of 9/11. >> exactly. that's the only historical fact

you need to be aware of. >> i think it's important that you mentioned the overall climate for students. and one thing that i always try to remind folks is that when we talk about anti-muslim hate crimes, what we've seen in the past year, you know, just to give it a date, since the attacks in paris we started mapping on a map hate crimes all across the country. and at one point we had 50% of those attacks were against houses of worship. what i tried to remind folks is this is where students, young children go on their weekends for, you know, koran lessons. this is where they go to have potlucks with their families and family friends. this is where they go for spiritual enlightenment, for prayer. this is their safe space that they go to. after the paris attacks we had mosques smeared in feces, we had mosques that were fire bombed.

we've seen two different attacks that were thwarted where they were malitia type attacks with 16 weapons and thousands of bullets being found in someone's home. they were planning a columbine attack in a house op worship. so we have to keep in mind that when their community centers are attacked, how that makes them feel even if they go to school, maybe their classmates aren't saying to them but they're already feeling that something is wrong, something is different. why would my worship service be attacked. why is saturday school canceled? it's canceled because somebody was going to shoot it. >> brenda, can you share some of the strategies that you embedded in the dear colleague letter, suggestions that you had in. >> so the dear colleague letter actually came from the two secretaries -- >> not the dear --

>> oh, the letter we sent. our approach to the letter was to describe the environment for students. so we highlighted a number of examples, both of peer-to-peer bi bull lynning and instances -- there was a teacher in texas who created what do you need to know about muslims and created facts, 38 pshs of muslims think you need to be executed if you don't want to be muslim. we tried to highlight the multifaceted complex issues. we talked about hate crimes as well. and then being true lawyers we subtly put in there by the way obligation is to provide a safe and healthy environment for students to learn in and then we attached the resources. that was the approach we took to say hey, administrators, this is

a real climate across the country. we had considered sending it to individual states with, you know, instances of bullying in each state but we were like, this is really a national problem, regardless if something has happened in the state or not. this is an overall national climate. >> i do think one of the strategies is to, when you mention the facts, just by a show of hands, a thirds of -- this is your pop question for the day. a third of the muslim in this country are what ethnicity. >> african-american. >> south asia. >> what do you say? >> african-american. a third of the muslims in the country are african-american. it's estimated that 10% of the africans that migrated to this county were africans as well. african muslims who came through this country through one of the most horrific holocausts of slavery. a third of the muslims that live

in this country today are african-americans. it's a narrative that we never hear because going back to the facts about muslims, we want to make sure that everyone has the perception of muslim otherness, of being foreign terrorists who are coming to this country to do nothing but bad to us. that becomes critical going twak to how do we create cultures within schools that are inclusive. i do want to return to social media. within the legal context it does create a very different legal framework when we talk about trying to regulate private speech in that social network. has anyone been work in this area of social media and bullying? suzanne, you? you're smiling. >> i'm smiling because it's a constant. we know our law covers bullying whether it's physical, social

emotional, verbal or happening electronically. so we cover it. the difference between having a great policy and actually making sure it's implemented is a very long road, i have to tell you. but we have it on paper and that's a start. but i do -- my hats off to the people who wrote it. they thought about a lot of things. the social media piece is interesting again. and i just want to say, it does work somewhat differently with youth than it does with adults. we again see that most kids who are targeted on social media are also targeted in real life. it's very rarely disconnected. so what that means is that it's not that the social media is a problem, it's now a 24/7:00 that they're under. they don't get away from it. old fashioned bullying, you got away from when you left school. they're sort of under that feeling at any time. but a lot of social media, actually the responsibility of how kids use social media, their

access to social media goes back to parents. i have to remind parents. i did a lot of parent talks. the schools did not give your kids those phones. they don't issue those. i as a parent gave my kids their first phones. how we talk to kids about how to use them, how to stay safe with them, what they should be used for is really part and parcel. we have to work with our kids on this stuff. but it's a really much more complicated conversation. right now all we have is sort of the input of we know when something goes really wrong and social media has a piece to it. we're trying to figure out how to punish that piece and that's really all we've been able to accomplish so far on that. but we need to step back and think about it in a much larger context. social media is, as you mentioned, i can't keep up on what app or what my kids are doing. my kids are in college. i'm not going to try.

but i know it's an extension of who they are. part of their personality is in their social media profile. and i can't stop that. i need to help them become good digital citizens, help them understand the consequences of behavior, help them understand how to be safe themselves. there's a lot of things they need to be thinking about because we're not going to stop social media from happening. >> one thing that i'll add there, and this is something that we did a few years ago, not related to bullying but we did a report called click here to end hate. and it was an effort for -- we do a lot of work with social media companies. muslim advocates is based in san francisco, in the bay area. and you know, what that report highlights is, you know, what you do if you feel that, you know, there's hate speech, how to report it and what to do and where to click and how long should you wait for a response. and there have been several

instances where in the past year alone where there will be -- there was a picture of a woman wearing ining a hijab in a walm parking lot. somebody took a picture and wrote hateful comments about her. turned out to be a meme. she didn't know about it. somebody pointed it out to her. with our relationship with the social media companies wer able to not just click here and have it taken down, we went straight to the social media companies sean got it taken down right away. there are also ways to combat that once it's out there and that's what we try to do because sometimes it's not fast enough. we see how quickly these things spread like wildfire, hundreds of thousands of shares quite quickly.

we've been trying to navigate that as well. >> is that something that parents could easily -- >> the report. it's not -- and i can certainly share the report with you. it's not something that's specific to bullying or specific to anything in particular. but there are these variety of categories, i'm embarrassed to say i only know how to use facebook. there are so many others out there. when you click on the drop down, i don't like this post befocaus and there's different categories for it. we're working on the categories, particularly if it's hate speech, or it's my picture and i didn't ask for it to be up. getting them to take swift action on those. >> a lot of this is emerging as an issue. so you know, a couple of weeks ago we were just talking about this, to brenda's point, right before the panel that there was a young boy who was beaten up, who was bullied and had quite

really, you know, sort of physical harm done to him. it wasn't just verbal bullying. and i feel like with that story going viral, with other stories like it going viral, a lot of studying -- so to the point of are there studies, is there data. i think there's a lot more studies that are being done now of the ptsd, of the -- you know, what is the psychological um pact to your point of seeing the images, seeing the stories on social media. and how that's impacting -- and so i think that, you know, facebook and twitter and other social media platforms are coming out trying to be, sort of cool saying we're seeing that this is a problem. but it's sad that it's happening after, you know, these sort of horrible acts have occurred. and i think that it also begs a larger question, and i'm definitely not going to field this. um going to toss it to my right. this issue of sort of free

speech and chilling free speech. in the bullying context it may be easier for people to understand because children are children and there's different standards. whereas, you know, we're seeing a spike in hate speech amongst adults which is leading to hate crimes. so just to reference for you guys, there's a center for the center of hate and extremism out of the california state university and they just issued a study a couple of days ago on -- they did a recent 20-state study of hate crimes. and i won't -- it's a little political. but after a very widely known political candidate tweeted something at 1:47 p.m. on december 2nd after the san bernardino attacks, they saw that there was an 87.5% increase in hate crimes against muslims in a five-day period. which this owner, his name is

robert levin -- brian levin, excuse me. he believes there is a direct correlation of that tweet going viral and the impact of hate crimes. but he also says this is an emerging issue. the university is going to be a lot more detailed study on what that nexus is. we're talking about bullying but then we're talking about killing free speech and social media. i think it's a really complicated league question. >> did you want to add anything? >> you want me to try to handle that? so there are, i think, two body of law to think about in that context and that the courts have recognized. one is liable and slander. if you say something untrue about somebody and it harms them, you can be sued and they can recover damages for that. and if they're a public figure

the standard is much higher and it's more complicated to succeed in securing damages. it's a pretty unsatisfying remedy because the court won't restrain the speech prior to it being made, the court will give you money afterwards, after litigation and a lo process and what have you. the second, to what extent can you criminalize the kind of speech that causes harm. and the courts have been extremely reluctant to -- because of the first amendment, because of the difficulty of trying to wade into the area of trying to understand when someone's speech has a damaging effect in a nonlibelous kind of way on the hearer of that speech. and the court is really focused in on those -- when one speaks

that one does it in a way that creates a threat. so you can't -- you're not permitted to threaten to harm someone else. the laws recognize that there's an injury that occurs to you just by being fearful that someone is going to hurt you. so if you -- it's called truth read doctrine. if somebody says something online or to you in person or writes you a letter and a reasonable person reading that would believe that that person is going to carry out that threat in some way or another, and you subjectively believe that that person may carry out that threat, then that could be criminalized and it's also subject to liability in civil proceedings. we were talking earlier, i litigated -- i personally didn't litigate it, but the team of folks i was working with litigated the issue in a slightly different context. we represented a doctor who provided abortion services in

topeka, kansas. and one of the anti-abortion activists sent her a letter that says, you know, you should be careful going forward because, you know, you should look under your car every day because there may be a bomb placed -- she never said i'm going to put a bomb under your car. but she says you should be careful and look under your car every day, there may be a bomb and you should pray for your redemption and what have you because you never know what's going to happen. >> the court originally threw out the case. saying its not a true threat. her defense is i was being a christian woman because i was warning her that there may be some risk to her. the woman that wrote the let tore the doctor also was good friends with scott roader. he's serving life for murdering an abortion doctor in topeka, kansas. she visits him every week. the doctor knew this. the court of appeals said under

those circumstances any reasonable person could see there may be a basis for which would be fearful that the threat would be carried out, whether she intended to carry it out or not is irrelevant. whether or not a reasonable person reading the letter, knowing the circumstances it might be carried out. and the doctor had a subjective belief that it could be carried out. that was a true threat. so in these circumstances where somebody is encouraging violence in a way that you -- a reasonably objective person may saw the violence could be carried out and they worry that the violence may be carried out against them. that's the extent of the law. in circumstances where there is a specific target in a specific sort of threat, it doesn't have to say i am going to do this to you. it just has to be a reasonably

objective basis for doing that. and that's where the courts have bumped up against the first amendment and where they're sort of drawn the analysis. >> i want to shift a little bit. i think we've been spending some time talking about protections for students whom are being bullieding with having represented students who were alleged to be bullying and school systems suspending them and attempting to expel them. how should we be balancing this? we keep talking about children. i think we forget that part of the equation. suzanne? >> i would -- i will jump in here because the old-fashioned method of addressing bullies in school is you find the bully and punish the bully and that meant suspension and pushing kids out the door. that has been an ineffective strategy for addressing bullying, it has done a tremendous part to increase the school to prison pipeline.

we've pushed back very hard in the work that we're doing in the city to actually not be in the discipline frame but but in a public health frame. and we know from the research that really what makes a difference for kids is that you change the behavior of the kid who's being aggressive. and kids are being aggressive for an unmet need. there's an underlying reason they're behaving that way. it could be honest to god many many different underlying reasons they're behaving that way. one could be they're watching too much political coverage and they're hearing the words and mimicki mimicking them. there coiled be more serious reasons they're acting that way. we're pushing back saying with the kid that's being the aggressor, let's find out what's going on and change the behavior. developmentally that looks different when we've got little kids versus middle school kids versus high school kids.

empathy is good across the spectrum. we know now from the research that we've done a tremendously bad job in addressing the kids who have been targeted and they are the repercussions whether they know it -- i don't disagree with you that it can have harm even if you're not categorizing it as harm. we've done very lit toll reattach our kids' safety and belonging in that school building or wherever it is so that they start thinking that it's about them and they start seeing themselves as the person who will always be ostracized. and until we break that cycle, they're at a much higher risk for all kinds of dangerous behaviors going forward. that's where our energy really should be, in changing behavior, because we are talking about kids and i will -- i do not believe in criminalizing behavior of kids. i really do think we need to think in a developmental framework when we're talking about it. it is their good to push

boundaries, it is their job to figure out where they belong and who their peer groups are and what these things mean. we need to model appropriate behavior, teach them not just tell them what to do. but we also need to be spending a whole lot more time around our kids who are being targeted because we've left them out of the equation in all of the suspensions that we did. >> so i want to make sure that we have adequate time for questions. so i'd like to take this moment to open the floor for questions if anyone has any questions. yes, if you could stand for us, please. >> hi. thank you all very much. everyone is really helpful. as a mom of younger children and as a lawyer, it's great for me to know about the remedies and what i can do. but ultimately my goal is preventing harm, not going to court, right? like to seek a remedy. so i was just wondering -- for

me with the current political climate, part of me is this is our new normal and vi to internalize that because no matter who wins the election, this climate is not going to change overnight. so what are the strategies you discuss with parents to make sure my kids are confident and strong so that -- i can't ignore that it's going to happen because it likely will. i'm lucky to be in a public charter school that's diverse. but what are the things that you guys are working with parents 0en the ground to say you know what anymo what? i'm going to make sure may kids are really strong and if this does happen it kind of rolls off of their back. >> we learned a lot back in the day from the gay rights movement, to be perfectly honest. right after prop 8 happened the level of aggression against our lgbt kids were really strong in california and across the country. and i think that some of the

strategies were to really go out there actually and use social media on the other side. everything from the it gets better campaign to taking the bull by the horns and saying no, that's actually not our reality and we're going to create our own reality and our reality is going to look different. and we really do want to -- i think we have to think about those things. you know, as a parent, i don't want our kids to inherit this mess we presently have here. and i think that there is -- there's a lot of connection that it can actually happen through social media. we saw this again, you know, rural kids isolated from larger communities can come together on the internet in a way they didn't have in real life. certainly for lgbt. so

a parent at the school am concerned about. and i want to let you know this is the climate, most of them already know depending on where you live. i have a child in this school that i want to make sure you're aware of the environment and some of the different ways it may manifest itself. now on the flip side, there are some other organizations that are doing really great work in terms of improving cultural competencies in schools, making sure that teachers and administrators have this greater cultural competency and are aware of what does it mean to be

muslim, what are the statistics, muslim aren't all immigrant communities, they are diverse, the statistics range between 3 and 6 million. you may have one in your school. they may have a name like brenda or whatever it may be. it's something that is a really great effort. and you know, there are ways to bring those kinds of conversations to schools. and then one last thing i'll add is i met this amazing 16-year-old who has started a program at her high school in montgomery county. it's called seek kid to kid. and what she's done is she has, because of the confusion because people didn't understand the different, they started an organization at their school where the kids talk to their teachers about what does it mean to be seek, how is that different from being indue and muslim. and they created a whole program around it. and they talk to students and student groups.

as your children get older, there are opportunities for them to own their own narrative, right? we raise them while they're young to be proud of who they are. and then you see that. seeing this 16-year-old girl start this organization to increase cultural competency, i'm sure you've met her, it was quite inspiring. and i hope -- maybe there are similar efforts by young muslim students in public schools as well. i want to share there are things you can do as a parent, there are resources that can come to your school for teachers and administrators and then encouraging our high school kids to shape their own narratives as well. >> really quickly, i want to answer the question in a very different way. so we are an educational organization and we work with different marginalized groups within the muslim community, mostly women. a lot of our work is on gender equity, which is, you know, a little bit of a different -- you

know, bullying is one issue of marginalization and patriarchy is another. one of the incredible tools of empowering muslim women is through knowledge of islam. what's the root of what is happening is islam is being vilified, islam is being torn down. and as proud muslims who are proud of their faith, i feel like we have to counter the narrative for our children at home so that, you know, these voices are so loud, but i think there can be much more emphasis placed on creating a strong identity, which is not only in religious teaching of doctrine of practice and rituals which is all very important. but for example, civic engagement, it's the time for voting right now. i find it incredibly powerful for a muslim woman that the first group that ever voted in islamic history is a group of

woman. that's a story that our children should be hearing. the idea of civic engagement from a religious perspective should also be a part of our kitchen table conversations in muslim families so we're countering some of what -- we're not going to able to stop what kids are hearing on the news, we're not going to be able to stop what they're getting in social media. this idea of really teaching islam and its just and equitable sort of scholarship that's being done, you can check out the website -- shameless plugs all throughout this. but i think it's really -- i personally have found that that's been so transformative in the gender context for people who are like we don't know we had these rights. what we don't want to do is create a generation of kids who are saying i'm not out as an muslim because i'm embarrassed of being muslim or i'm scared of being muslim. instead we want to give tools

for parents to be teaching kids about the legacy of islam and what to be proud of. >> question, could you stand please? thank you. >> hi. thanks for coming and helping us learn more. i'm a government paralegal. i've worked with attorneys for nine years. one thing that attorneys fend to work with a hypotheticals. for all of the panelists i want to give you guys two hypotheticals that are similar but related and i would love for the panelists to react to it. how about that? so i want you guys to imagine any public school and i want you to imagine three students kb ka d de -- ka desha, a young muslim, any age, ali, background

immigrant american born whatever and then think about bill, nonmuslim student in the same context. i was really moved by you guys' comments about whether or not kids have internalized and absorbed muslims are terrorists so it's okay for me to be called a terrorist. i want you guys to think about kadeesha being called that and being emotionally affected by it. and i want you to think about ali being called that and ali being yeah like whatever, just like your cousin was. it's no big deal. everyone calls muslims terrorists these days. then think about bill, not muslim, not understanding the same background and just sort of feeling like why is kadeesha so upset. i don't get it. i would love to hear you think about and talk about what

happens in our community where you have these two muslim kids and they're interacting with each other in the schools or in the muslim community outside the school and one kid thinks it's no big deal, another kid is emotionally affected by it. what i'm trying to get at is empathy building and emotional intelligence skills and how this is going to affect muslim youth. the other hypothetical -- flash forward 20 years, all of the kids are 20 years old, they're in the workplace, they've had this situation, i'm 20 years older, i'm still in the workforce and i would love to have you guy think about what all of this will do for people my age, people their age 20 years in the future as members of the workforce and as employees. it's a lot. i'm not worried. you guys can handle it.

>> suzanne, i think you touched on this a little bit -- >> it's wonderful hypothetical and it happens every day. and i've seen it with lots of different sub groups of kids. and one of the great parts about my job is i do focus groups with youth all of the time to talk about what's -- what's affecting them. i think that it does again default+++oé:

thinking about -- we seem to be going in cycles where we'll think about one particular subgroup at a time instead of stepping back saying how do we create a place where everybody, whether you -- maybe bill has some issues. i don't actually know. how do we create a language and consistency around that where everybody's individuality is actually validated. and that's a much harder piece of the work but i do -- i listened to the same panel and that young girl is awesome. and i hope we all get to vote for her some day. everything about her was phenomenal. but the fact of the matter is that she's again in that position of recreating the wheel where, you know, this week it's this subgroup and this week it's that subgroup. when do we step back and help

ourselves see that i can't predict who it's going to be but i can promise you there's a very small native american population here in d.c. but that football team really does undermine a lot of kids safety and security. i want that addressed at the same time. that pulling back to me is how do we really help all three of those kids go forward saying, yeah, that might have happened but that was not right and that's not the environment i want to have going forward. >> i'm going to jump in and try to deal a little bit with both of the last two questions. i don't have -- i have the privilege of not having to have that conversation with my kid. but i have a different special obligation because i have that privilege -- >> what kind of privilege is that, jonathan? say it. >> the old white guy privilege? >> there you go. the thing i love about him, he

acknowledges his white privilege and uses it for good. >> well, i make mistakes just like everybody else. but -- so -- and you know, there is -- so there is an obligation that i then have of modelling the behavior so that bill sees somebody who says that's not okay. so bill understands through the experience of seeing somebody say what happened is not okay. and i sort of -- i'm going to test -- push back on the premise because i don't think -- i don't remember remember the name of the boy. >> ali. >> ali. he may not think he's being harmed by it, he may not even believe he's being harmed. he's being harmed. right. so having some -- my obligation then as a parent is for my daughter to see that i don't stand -- people do bad things. it's easy to silent about it and not intervene and try to make a

difference because there's consequences to trying to, you know, some of my privilege i have to give up and i have to, you know, expand that privilege on things. and for my daughter to see that i do that and build in her to be a human being that will do that as well i think is a critical piece of change. it is something that i think we all have to think about. and i thought of it in the context of the debates. we hoar n we're not saying the names. one of the candidates said something really horrible -- people saw guns and stuff and this counter factual kind of statement, and then the other one said db didn't actually dispute the facts although she should have but went on to say something that was extraordinary because it was the progressive answer which was we need to build relationships into the muslim community so that we have better intelligence and all of

that sort of stuff. dylan roof walked into an african-american church in charleston, south carolina and nobody said why didn't the white community stand up ale tell us that dylan roof was going to do that. it's the sense of unreality about what a community is and what it means and how people are and that there's difference in the separation and stuff that you're talking about. and so -- and it was sort of -- i was watching the debates alone. my wife and daughter refused to watch the debates because it made them crazy. i started yelling at my computer but i realized this there was nothing else i could figure out to do. that's the stuff that's on me in this room. it's too bad there are not many people like me sitting here in this room tonight because that's who we need to be talking to. i have an obligation -- as dr. carmichael said, white people should be talking to white people not black people about

racism. that's important for us to remember. >> i think the only thing i would add to this is sort of a more sort of anecdotal story about my own sister. becausesister. because she is the 20 years later. we grew up in a small town outside of detroit. in the '80s she was on a school trip. this is when there was a spate of hijackings to airplanes, and they were going to florida on a plane. and the chaperones joked around, you know, oh, is your uncle going to, you know, hijack the plane? and this was on the way to their school trip. and you know, when i look back, my parents' response to that was, we packed up. we moved to ann arbor, which is a much more progressive -- so, i grew up in a bubble. my sister did not. so, she spent her first, you know, all the way through seventh grade growing up in an environment where she was the only muslim, the only person of color in her entire school, the entire elementary school. and she grew up in a very

different environment than i did. and it's funny now when we talk about these things, because you know, she grew up in an environment where she didn't feel empowered to say something, right, because she was the only one. she didn't have allies. she didn't have classmates that were there supporting her and helping her sort of get through things. and my experience was very different. i grew up in a bubble where even to this day, you know, and maybe because of social media, my elementary school friends and high school friends are so supportive and what can i do. i have a friend who teaches now in guatemala who e-mailed me, asking me, what can i talk to my students about, you know, anti-muslim bullying in students and what happens in america, right? and that's kind of the true power of, you know, just being in completely different circumstances within our own family. and you know, my sister doesn't have that. you know, her high school friends are not, you know, maybe one or two of them are still her

friends on social media, but you know, have very different views about muslims and islam. you know, so, i think you're absolutely right in terms of thinking about what happens then and what impacts them 20 years later. and i think if you don't do something earlier on, engaging with, you know, the families, talking with students, creating a culture of inclusivity and appreciation for diversity at a young age and a culture that fosters empathy, what you end up with is 20 years later the same people holding those same views. and i think that's really the tragic part of it, so. >> i think we have time for one more question? yes. could you stand up, please? thank you. >> so, my name's teri thompson. i am a school and divinity student at the howard university.

>> you know. >> i'm also a lawyer, so i'm going to say i agree, lawyers don't have the answers. like to believe that the faith community has some, but right now i don't think that they know what the tools are, and i'd like to hear some discussion about from an interfaith perspective, what are some of the things that the faith community can do, kind of from a more general perspective in helping to eradicate some of this. >> i'm going to let the panel answer this, but i definitely want to piggyback on something that i should mention that i thought was really right on target, this idea of teaching children and girls in particular about how our rights are embodied in islam. and i mention that, because i reverted to islam when i was in my late 20s. and part of, you know -- i hate to intellectualize -- i always hate to intellectualize my religious journey, but part of

my attraction was i was amazed as a feminist about the rights that the religion bestowed on women, i mean, women in 1890s were just getting the right to own property in new york. islam in 7th century arabia was giving women the right to own property. so i do think from the faith-based community, doing exactly what i should mention, teaching and perpetuating and instilling the gender-equitable principles of islam and for other faith-based communities, understanding those commonalities that we often talk about when we do interfaith dialogue and interfaith kind of programs. but let me pass that question on to our panelists. >> i was just going to -- and i always appreciate the question about interfaith efforts, because that's really one area where i have seen where those

interfaith relationships are built before hate crimes happen to see how communities come together, communities of faith come together. and really, for the overall, you know, everything in communities, you know, not just interfaith issues, but you know, broader sort of social issues within a community that can be resolved through, you know, communities coming together. but one thing i wanted to add is that in recent months, every single time there's been a hate crime against a house of worship, almost always the first people to show up are interfaith partners. a mosque was vandalized last week in new jersey. before prayers the next day, you know, interfaith partners were there scrubbing off the hateful rhetoric, you know. and we've seen time and time again where there are armed protests that take place outside of mosques. the first people that are standing there hand in hand to protect, you know, young

children going to pray or protect the congregants that are going in to pray are interfaith partners standing there saying this is not what our community stands for. and that really shows a true symbol for muslim communities that, you know, this is not what america stands for. and so, in moments where it's easy to feel as low as possible when you come to your mosque and you find feces smeared all over it, when you see the community come together, and in large part, it's interfaith communities that will come the next day, clean with you and tell you this is not who we are. that's really, you know, it's truly beautiful, and that truly gives hope after such, you know, tragic attacks. >> so, i love this idea -- unless someone wanted to add -- i love this idea -- i know it sounds very kumbaya, but ending on this concept of hope. so, if we can end there and please give our amazing panelists a round of applause.

[ applause ] i do have a few announcements that i'd like to make. those of you who are not famili famili familiar, we invite you to become members. conveniently, we are here and prepared to take your membership applications. i also want to take a moment to ask -- shannon, could you stand for a moment? so, these are two of the founding members of the capital area muslim bar association. we are very fortunate that they had this vision to pull us back together so that we can begin to address the issues that we are seeing that are so prevalent in the muslim community. so, i thank you both for your vision and your work. we have a few upcoming events. on november 3rd, we have an election and opportunity to meet some of our amazing board candidates. please go to our website so you can see all the events we have going on. november 14th, minority flight: why women of color are leaving

law firms and how to turn the tide. that's co-sponsored with the women's bar association. we have fliers out front that lists some of our other upcoming events. again, i encourage you to get involved. cortney dunn, thank you again for your involvement with the american bar association. thank you all for coming. we appreciate you. election day is four days away, and our "road to the white house" coverage continues on c-span with hillary clinton live from detroit. then at 7:00 p.m. eastern, donald trump's campaign rally in hersh hershey, pennsylvania. election night on c-span. watch the results and be part of a national conversation about the outcome. be on location at the hillary clinton and donald trump election night headquarters and watch victory and concession speeches in key senate, house and governors' races, starting live at 8:00 p.m. eastern and

throughout the following 24 hours. watch live on c-span, on demand at c-span.org, or listen to our live coverage using the free c-span radio app. c-span, where history unfolds daily. in 1979, c-span was created as a public service by america's cable television companies and is brought to you today by your cable or satellite provider. next, a muslim scholar talks about the rise of donald trump's presidential campaign, the war on terror and the plight of muslims around the world. he was one of the speakers at the islamic society of north america annual convention outside of chicago labor day weekend. later, a muslim scholar and consultant spoke about islamophobia and issues facing muslim americans. this is about 45 minutes.

>> have mercy on you. you know what i love the most about muhammad ali? this man would look you dead in the eye with a straight face and a smile and tell you that everything that you believed was absolutely wrong. he would challenge every social norm that he thought was unjust. and yet, by the end of it, you couldn't help but love him nonetheless. very few people have that talent, may allah bless you, muhammad ali. my next speaker is also no stranger to controversy. he's a current resident scholar at memphis' islamic center. he is the associate professor of religious studies at rhode college in memphis. he is the dean of academic affairs. i speak of none other than, of course, sheikh yasir qadhi. he is a prolific commentator on political issues, which is very germane to our time. he started his career as a

chemical engineer but then had a change of heart. he went to the islamic university in saudi arabia where he got his bachelors and masters in islamic theology. he then decided he didn't have enough degrees, so he went to yale and got his ph.d in islamic studies. but more important than any of that, more important than anything that i've just said, yasi qadhi is our own speaker today that has his own barbecue sauce named after him. if you go to tom's barbecue in memphis, tennessee, and ask for yq sauce, they'll bring you this special daisy barbecue sauce. it's kind of on the spicy side, but it is delicious. ladies and gentlemen, sheikh yasir qadhi. [ speaking foreign language ] >> it's such a pleasure and

honor to be here at isna. a little while ago, people come up to me to take selfies and take pictures. i pass by in the hallway and i said, people come to take selfies with me, but i need to take a selfie with you, and i took one with them. years from now, when historians and political analysts are going to analyze the strange rise and eventual fall of donald trump, when they're going to discuss how he lost resoundingly in the november 2016 election, they'll say that the turning point in his popularity, the beginning of the nose-dive that caused him to disappear from public life was the powerful and emotional speech by case kazr khan along

with the silence of khan. he got a smear from the silence, but i swear by allah, her dig inside silence on that democratic convention stage and her calm kominor was far more eloquent and powerful and poignant and profound than compared to anything that donald trump has ever uttered with his mouth. and the message that all of us learned on that day was very clear, america, never underestimate the power of our uncles and aunties. [ speaking foreign language ] 3 and you know, speaking of trump and unfortunately, i have to speak of trump. he's on our minds. he's in our nightmares for the last year. speaking of trump, last month, over 50 senior republicans published a letter in "the new york times" asking their fellow americans not to support their

own party's candidate. imagine that! senior republicans are saying don't support trump. but you know, i have to be honest here, the republicans only have themselves to blame. for the last few years, they were the ones campaigning relentlessly against barack obama, against immigration, against people of other faith, against people of other colors. for years they did everything they could to be racist and xenophobic without actually becoming racist and xenophobic. and the result was that they succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. they riled up the masses. they fomented hatred to such an extent that even mainstream republicans seemed too meek and too passive to fulfill the mob-crazed rhetoric that they themselves had spawned. and in that environment entered donald trump, being the shrewd,

bomb baastic businessman that h is, clearly understood he could upend the republican party by playing their own game and bettering it. he rode the republican wave to the max and he verbalized what mainstream republicans could t not. quite literally, the republican party and the far right created the very frankenstein in donald trump that is now destroying them. i have a message for all republicans, and especially the far right. you claim you want to take your country back. you claim you want to make america great again. well, perhaps you should start by taking your own party back from the radicals and bigots like donald trump, who have hijacked it. and yes, while there's a lot that can be said about the sharp right turn that the republicans have taken, let us be fair as

allah commands us to be fair, and let us be just even against those who we like or don't like. the fact of the matter is that there's quite a lot of blame to go around, and the democrats as well have their fair share. this is president barack obama's last year in office, and we all remember, i remember the hope and the excitement that we felt when he was elected to the highest office in the world. it made us feel so, so optimistic, so passionate. and i can't help but recall how excited and happy i was when the very first bill that president obama signed was the executive order to shut down guantanamo bay. well, eight years have gone by, and guantanamo bay remains open as we speak. for many of us, guantanamo has become symbolic of the stalemate of politics, of the fact that

names and faces might change, but policies rarely do. you know, i'm appreciative that we have the secretary of the department of homeland security here, but facts are facts. in the last eight years, the patriot act has been renewed, unsupervised wiretaps and government surveillance has increased, the entrapment of dozens of young, innocent men and women via the fbi's evil entrapment program has increased, the situation in the middle east has spiraled out of control, and worst of all, the immoral, unethical, counterproductive tactic of drone strikes, which has caused untold civilian deaths, has increased more than ten fold. last month's issue of "the atlantic," which was one of the most mainstream magazines in this country -- it's been published for 160 years -- last month's issue of "the atlantic"

had a cover story that highlighted the fact that after 15 years after 9/11 we have spent over $1 trillion on this supposed war on terror, and yet, the magazine concluded, far from making our country safe again, we are actually less safe than we were 15 years ago. the fact of the matter is that the threat of islamic radicals overtaking the country or even of terroristic plots has been highly exaggerated to the point of ludicrousness. statistically speaking, more americans die from furniture accidents than from radical jihadist attacks. and yes, of course, we criticize even one radical jihadist attack, but we don't spend $1 trillion trying to correct furniture. we don't invade sweden demanding that ikea start producing furniture according to our standards. we have to be realistic in our response to the threat.

never forget that we here in america are far more likely to be killed by a lone, angry, white christian mass shooter or even by a rogue policeman who pulls us over for a traffic violation than by radical jihadists. mr. president, we elected you on the promise of hope, on the promise of change. many of us believed in that promise. many of us believed when you said, yes, we can. i'm sorry to tell you, eight years down the line, that instead of hope, many of us feel even more despair. instead of change, the status quo remains, or perhaps, has even gotten worse. but not all hope is lost, mr. president. you still have a few months left in office. and i know that i speak on behalf of millions of people around the world when i say that you can still leave a positive legacy, you can still leave a positive legacy of your

presidency. you can still leave a positive legacy in the books of history. but you're going to have to do some very, very simple promises that you yourselves campaigned on. mr. president, close down beg guantanamo bay! mr. president, scale down and back the drone strikes! mr. president, help the syrian refugees. support the rights of the palestinian people to live in dignity and freedom like the rest of humanity. our scholars mentioned that when it comes to political power and stability, allah values justice even more than he values faith. and that is why a just society, even if it doesn't have faith, will be blessed in this world with strength and might, and a muslim society that doesn't have justice will not be blessed with that power. and there's no doubt -- and i say this as a critic -- there's no doubt that our country overall has many strengths and freedoms, the freedom to

criticize even as i stand on this stage. and we appreciate those freedoms. american muslims, if you ever feel that the situation is too depressing, all you need to do is to look over the pond and see the european scene. we thank allah that we have freedoms far better than our muslim brothers and sisters in europe. i'm still trying to digest the numbburkini ban coming from fra. this burkini ban, the same country that in its ruling said that the burkini -- and i quote -- is liable to offend the religious convictions or nonconvictions of some people, end quote. the same country that insisted on the right to offend other religions, that insisted on the right to offend prophets, itself felt offended by the modesty of a muslim woman. and another point must be made here. in any other context, brothers and sisters, if a group of men surrounded a woman and forced her to take her clothes off,

they would be labeled as delinquent bullies and rowdy hooligans. i have a message for the french politicians and police. simply because you wield power, simply because you have the law behind you, simply because you're wearing police suits, it makes you no less of a bunch of hooligans and rowdy thugs when you surround a lady and force her to take her own clothes off. shame on you! shame on you! shame on you and your hypocrisy and your shallow claims of being vanguards of liberty and legality and fraternity. but you know what, enough of grumbling and complaining. that has its time and its place. enough of the islamaphobes. our religious tells us we should be thankful and appreciative for our blessings and the koran mentioned that the blessings we have -- [ speaking foreign language ] food so that we are not hungry and safety so that we're not

worried about civil war and [ speaking foreign language ] american muslims have by and large, by and large, these two far better than other lands. here we are in the best ten days of the year, as the pilgrims are gathered in arafat, here we are in these blessed ten days, and i remind myself and all of you that let us think of the plight of muslims around the world. look at our brothers and sisters in syria. look at their plight in person mere. see what is happening in myanmar, in so many muslim lands our brethren go to sleep at night worrying about bombs and they wake up in the morning worried about where to get their food. so -- [ speaking foreign language ] we thank allah for all the blessings he has given us. and i strongly disagree with the sentiment that some people have that they're always complaining about the times that we live in. recently, i heard somebody moan

and say that this is the worst time to be a muslim in america. i disagree. in fact, i believe this is the best time to be a muslim in america. there's never been a better time. do you know why? it goes back to the theme of this convention, navigating challenges and seizing opportunities. we are facing colossal challenges, unprecedented challenges. and it is a struggle navigating our way through those challenges. it's a struggle to always try to find opportunities in the problems around us. these days, we are constantly having to struggle to maintain our faith, to struggle to express our faith, to struggle to defend our faith. in fact, it is a never-ending struggle to overcome the xenophobia and islamophobia. but in that struggle, we feel a renewed passion for our faith, a renewed commitment to our cause

on earth. in that struggle is our continuous attachment to our lord, our prophet, our book, our message, our call. in that struggle, we find meaning and purpose in our life. and you know what, brothers and sisters? i've been using english way too long, because arabic has a word for struggle. and the koran has a word for struggle. do you know what that word is? do you know what the word for struggle in the koran and in the arabic language is? it's a taboo word. it's a word that has been hijacked by a small minority within our own faith and criminalized and sensationalized by the outsiders of our faith. but i don't care about those two extremes, because the word is a koranic word, it is a noble word, it is a pure word, it is a blessed word, despite the extremism of the radicals and the smear campaigns of the bigots. it is a word that has been

praised by our lord and our prophet and our religion. so i, for one, ask allah to make me of those who do not fear the criticism of the critic and who do not care what others speak as i speak the truth, so i will speak my mind. the reason why i love being muslim in this difficult day in age is because i must constantly engage in jihad. there, i said it! i said it! let me say it again! because i must constantly engage in jihad. in fact -- fox news, where are you? get ready for your ten-second quotation. in fact, i stand before you today -- fox news, are you filming? i stand before you today, and i say in front of the largest gathering of muslims in north america, i openly, brazenly, unabashedly call for a struggle, a jihad! and i ask all of you to join me in an american muslim jihad.

but what will our jihad be? well, for sure, it's not going to be the pseudo jihad, the false jihad of violence and bloodshed, of isis and al qaeda. that's not jihad. that's chaos. that's facade. that's evil. that's not jihad. the jihad that i am calling you to be a part of is a koranic jihad based upon the prophetic methodology, our jihad that i want all of us to join. are you listening, donald trump? sean hannity, take notes! our jihad! are you listening, islamaphobes? will be to respond to your evil with our good. our jihad will be to speak the truth even if you lie. our jihad will be to behave with dignity in the face of your crudeness. our jihad will be to counter your ignorance with education. our jihad will be to respond to

your bigotry, your hatred, your islamophobia, with love, kindness and compassion. our jihad will be to stand for justice, to fight alongside the oppressed, to preach the truth to power, especially to preach the truth to teernical power, because our prophets of allah has said that is the greatest jihad. our jihad, brothers and sisters, will be in attempting to make america great again by being true witnesses of allah on this earth and by demonstrating to the world who our beloved prophet -- [ speaking foreign language ] are you going to join me in this noble jihad? [ cheers and applause ] let me take it up one level, then i'll conclude. they don't like the word jihad. we have to reclaim it back, because it's our word and it's a noble word. there's another phrase they don't like. there's another phrase that has al b