‘Should We Quit and Leave?’: Muslim Government Officials Contemplate Trump Presidency

By Sameer Rao Dec 01, 2016

President-elect Donald Trump‘s Muslim registry proposal, appointment of noted Islamophobes to his transition team and foreign policy plans have left many Muslim government employees worried about their futures. A number of those officials aired their concerns in a new Politico article.

"My initial reaction was, ‘Oh my God, should we quit and leave?’" said one Muslim State Department official under condition of anonymity. "People are still struggling to understand what it means right now. Does it make sense to stay on board? Do you wait to see what the policies are going to be? I just feel like it’s completely mysterious how this is going to work out."

"I feel apprehensive," said an intelligence official. "I fear that—whatever White power movement or equivalent all of a sudden feels empowered by the president-elect, whatever tidbits of that community make their way into government—at the most basic level people who are Brown, Middle Eastern, Muslim or Sikh or whatever will either be looked at with a lens of suspicion or concern, or something more." 

Several sources said that Trump’s proposals to vet Muslim immigrants could make recruiting crucial agents and employees for CIA projects—particularly those fluent in languages from regions with terrorist activity—much more difficult. Others said that it would be hard to defend many of his policies and statements to representatives of allied Muslim-majority countries like Saudi Arabia. Still others were scared that even with civil service protection measures, Trump aides could "make moves that are hard to prove as being based on overt ethnic or religious discrimination, such as simply appointing fewer Muslims or other minorities to prominent posts."

Read the full article here.

(H/t The Intercept)