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Samoa Repeals Arab American Ban Congressman Rahall Led Successful Fight

Posted on Friday December 20, 2002

Washington—Yesterday the Attorney General of American Samoa, Fiti Sunia, rescinded his previous alert refusing entry to “any individual of Middle Eastern descent.” Once again, the Governor of American Samoa, Tauese Sunia, reiterated the island’s commitment to the principle of equality. “The Security Alert has raised understandable concerns in the U.S. Rest assured that American Samoa does not condone discriminatory practices—such are illegal here,” said Governor Sunia.

The issue was resolved after the Dean of the Arab American Congressional Delegation, Congressman Nick Rahall, wrote to the Governor of Samoa noting his concerns. As the ranking member on the House Resources Committee, Congressman Rahall has oversight responsibility for American Samoa. In his letter to Governor Sunia, Rahall argued:

“Under this policy, it would appear that I would be prohibited from traveling to American Samoa even in my capacity as the Ranking Democrat on the Resources Committee since my grandfathers emigrated to the U.S. from Lebanon, and I am as such, of “Middle Eastern descent….this predicament illustrates the absurdity of directives of this nature premised on ethnicity…. I strongly encourage you to adopt such suggestions made by the Interior Department to address [this situation].” [full text of Congressman Rahall’s letter]

AAI also commends Department of Interior Deputy Assistant Secretary David Cohen, who took quick and decisive action to resolve the situation.

While the Arab American Institute views this as a victory for Arab Americans and all Americans of Middle Eastern descent, AAI remains concerned with the island’s new policy of denying entry to citizens or nationals of many Arab and Muslim countries without special prior approval by the island’s Attorney General. (Affected countries include: Afghanistan, Algeria, Bahrain, Cuba, Eritrea, Iran, Iraq, North Korea, on, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia Sudan, Syria , Tunisia, UAE, Yemen Indonesia, Philippines and Fiji.) AAI will be alerting the relevant embassies in Washington, DC to make them aware of the new American Samoan policy.

This entire situation stems from an incident occurring in Western Samoa involving two persons who were described as being of ‘Middle Eastern descent’ and were reportedly photographing the U.S. Embassy in Western Samoa. Press reports in Samoa now indicate that they were most probably U.S. citizens of Samoan descent who were visiting the island nation.

“This whole situation points to the insanity of basing security procedures on ethnicity. We have worked hard to make sure that this blatantly discriminatory policy would not stand. It was right that it was repealed and we thank Congressman Rahall and the Department of Interior for their quick action in this case,” said AAI Managing Director Jean AbiNader.

The now repealed policy came to light after the Samoa News reported that Michael Hosmany, a U.S. citizen of Arab descent and resident of Samoa, filed the lawsuit because he feared that he would banned from returning to the island after receiving medical treatment in Hawaii. Upon learning the news Hosmany said he was a very happy with the result and thanked all those that played a part in remedying this discriminatory situation.

Founded in 1985, the Arab American Institute (AAI) is a nonprofit organization committed to the civic and political empowerment of Americans of Arab descent. AAI provides policy, research and public affairs services to support a broad range of community activities.