American Civil Liberties Union

Today, the ACLU sent letters to the Departments of State and Homeland Security asking them to grant a visa to Kerim Yildiz, a British citizen living in London. Yildiz, the executive director of the U.K.-based Kurdish Human Rights Project (KHRP), has apparently been refused a visa to enter the U.S., and we worry that the delay — which has lasted nearly a year — relates to his human rights advocacy on behalf of Kurds in Turkey, Iraq, and elsewhere.

Over the weekend, it was reported that renowned Columbian journalist Hollman Morris — one of 12 international journalists selected to participate in the prestigious Nieman fellowship program at Harvard University during the 2010–11 academic year — has been denied a visa by the State department. The U.S. embassy in Bogota informed him that he has been found permanently ineligible for a visa under the Immigration and Nationality Act.

Yesterday, The New York Times opined about “ideological exclusion” — the practice of denying foreign citizens entry into the U.S. based on their political views and associations, rather than any suspicious activity — writing:

"The Bush administration eagerly revived the practice, barring numerous people from entering the country for speaking engagements or conferences or to teach at leading universities — all under a flimsily supported guise of fighting terrorism.

[…]Months ago, a group of free speech advocates, including the Association of American Publishers, the American Library Association and the American Civil Liberties Union called on the Obama administration to end ideological exclusions and to review dubious visa denials. We hope Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton takes heed.

Although “ideological exclusion” originated during the Cold War, when critics of U.S. policy were often excluded as supposed Communists, the misguided practice was revived in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.