Dear Future President,

I think that we as a community should try and abolish racial profiling in the United States, approximately eighty percent of drivers pulled over by police in two-thousand eleven felt they had been stopped for a non-legitimate reason. In two-thousand eleven, about sixty-nine percent of black drivers believed police had no legitimate reason for stopping them compared to twenty-four percent of white and fifty-four percent of Hispanic drivers who felt they had a legitimate reason to get pulled over. In the article “Philado Castile’s Driving Records Raises Questions About Racial Profiling” by Kim Bellware, brings awareness to the racial profiling in the case of Philado Castile’s. Castile was shot and killed at the age of thirty-two, and from the time he was nineteen to thirty-two he had received fifty driving violations. In paragraph seventeen it says “Castile, who was licensed for concealed carry, disclosed during the stop that he was armed and had a valid license, according to Reynolds.¨ Reynolds has said that the officer asked Castile to both put his hands up and also get his ID- and then shot him when he reached for his wallet. This shows when you allow racial profiling to continue and exist you don't get a reduction in crime you get an increase in racial activity.

In the article “I Was Racially Profiled In My Own Driveway” by The Atlantic, the article talks about how retired Major League Baseball player is stopped and frisked in his own driveway. Doug just got detained by West Hartford Police in front of our house while shoveling our driveway, questioning him about asking to be paid for shoveling. “The officer left when Doug told him that it was his house. There were several other people on our street out in front of their houses shoveling snow at the same time. None of them were stopped for questioning, Just wanted to vent to someone whom we know cares and would be equally outraged.” says the atlantic. The way the environment treats people of color is affecting the way our kids grow up, ¨When I called my wife to tell her what had happened, she was on her way home from the Black History Month event, and my son heard her end of the conversation. Right away, he wanted to know whether I’d been arrested. My four-year-old daughter couldn’t understand why a police officer would ¨hurt Daddy’s feelings.¨ In a place where we are supposed to be ¨Free¨ it's sad that men and women of color have to worry more about the police than anything.

From two thousand-five to mid two thousand-eight, whites made up eight percent and Blacks more than eighty-five percent of all individuals frisked by the NYPD. In addition, thirty-four percent of whites stopped during this time period were frisked, while fifty percent of blacks and latinos stopped were frisked. I feel that as a president it is your job to abolish the amount of racial profiling we have.

I was on my way to my brother's house to pick him up for my mom's birthday party, on my way there I passed a police officer. I took the same road home but this time i was pulled over with my big brother in the car. The officer automatically asked me when he approached the driver side window if I knew the black male in my passenger seat and if I felt that I was in danger. Another officer pulled up and asked my brother to get out of the vehicle. As a sister, I was pissed hearing them tell my brother to get out of my car when there was no reason for me to be pulled over. After the police officer searched my brother we went back to the car the with police officers name and squad car number. I called the hotline with my information and they told me that there was nothing they could do. If we could just make it so that white and black are equal then our economy would be better, I feel that the crime rate would go down.

There is a couple ways we could abolish racial profiling, we will never live in a world where there is one hundred percent no racial profiling but we could “Pass the end Racial Profiling Act, which would ban profiling based on race. Second, the Justice Department must revise its guidelines to provide protection based on religion and national origin and to close gaping loopholes that ostensibly exist in the name of national security,” says Nadita Tonova. Almost everyday someone is arrested because of racial profiling and we live in a world where the same sex can marry so I don't see why we still have racial profiling in our world.

Sincerely, Cassandra Ford