Fadwa Alaoui, a Moroccan-born Canadian citizen, and her family occasionally drive down to Burlington, Vermont to shop. Other than their trip down on Saturday, they have had uneventful border crossings. But this time, Customs and Border agents, enforcing President Trumps new travel ban, asked more than the usual questions.
This time she was asked her religion and her thoughts on U.S. President Donald Trump. Border agents took her and her cousins phones and fingerprints.
She told Helen Mann on CBCNews radio’s “As It Happens that the agents asked her what her religion was and she replied that she was Muslim. They asked, ‘Do you practice? Which mosque do you go to? What is the name of the imam? How often do you go to the mosque? What kind of discussions do you hear in the mosque? Does the imam talk to you directly?'”
Alaoui said the agent asked her, “What do you think about Donald Trump? What's your opinion of his policy?
The agents found messages containing prayers on her phone and asked about them. The agent asked her what the prayers meant to her?
Four hours later, she was told that her family wasn't welcome and was forced to turn back.
“This isn’t the first time the family has been to the United States. Alaoui’s parents and brother live in the US and she’s visited them multiple times without any problems or questions.”
“ I felt humiliated, treated as if I was less than nothing. It’s as if I wasn’t Canadian,” Alaoui told CBCNews.
