Last week, Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach (who is part of Trump’s transition team) said that the Trump administration is considering reinstating a database of immigrants from Muslim-majority countries — something the federal government did from 2002 to 2011 under a program called the National Security Entry-Exit Registration System or NSEERS.
In light of this, 13,000 non-Muslims recently signed an online pledge on Register US website to stand in solidary with American Muslims amid, as Reuters puts it, “suggestions from President-elect Donald Trump’s camp that he is mulling a national registry for immigrants from Muslim countries.”
As twitter user Nicole Farjani proclaimed on the social site: “If @realDonaldTrump says Muslims have to register, I say all of us non Muslims go register too in unity with our friends. #MuslimRegistry.”
Rebecca Green, who co-founded the online movement Register US, says she is encouraged by the public’s response. “We see this effort as a plea to American values to not become the kind of country that keeps lists based on religion. Nothing is more anti-American than a registry based on religion.”
