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2016 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION
Last updated on: 5/25/2016 1:55:16 PM PST

Should Law Enforcement Be Allowed to Use Racial Profiling?



Pro
Trump
Trump

Con
Clinton
Clinton

Johnson
Johnson

Stein
Stein

Not Clear or Not Found





Pro (Yes)

Pro
Donald Trump
Donald Trump
Republican

"Well, I think there can be profiling. I mean… If they thought there was something wrong with that group and they saw what was happening, and they didn't want to call the police because they didn't want to be profiling, I think that's pretty bad. People are dead. A lot of people are dead right now. So everybody wants to be politically correct, and that's part of the problem that we have with our country… We are having a problem with radical -- with the radicals in the Muslim group. Let's not kid ourselves. And you can say it, or you don't have to say it. And maybe you won't even want to. But I've been saying it loud and strong. So if you have people coming out of mosques with hatred and with death in their eyes and on their minds, we're going to have to do something, John. We can't just say, 'We're not going to look at it.' Now I made that statement a number of weeks ago. It took a lot of -- you know, a lot of, whatever, a lot of people were not exactly thrilled with it. And now everybody seems to agree with me… You have people that have to be tracked. If they're Muslims, they're Muslims. But you have people that have to be tracked. And we've better be --I use the word vigilance. We have to show vigilance. We have to have it. And if we don't, we're foolish people."

Source: CBS News, "Face the Nation Transcripts December 6, 2015: Trump, Christie, Sanders," cbsnews.com, Dec. 6, 2015
Con (No)

Now Con
Hillary Clinton
Hillary Clinton
Democrat

"As president, Hillary will invest in law enforcement training programs on issues such as implicit bias, use of force, and de-escalation. She will also create national guidelines for use of force, provide federal matching funds to make body cameras available to every police department in America, and support legislation to ban racial profiling by federal, state, and local law enforcement officials."

Source: Hillary for America, "Racial Justice," hillaryclinton.com (accessed May 16, 2016)

[Editor's Note: Clinton previously expressed a PRO opinion on this question. Read Clinton's former position on racial profiling.]
Con
Gary Johnson
Gary Johnson
Libertarian

"Stop and frisk policies in New York. 700,000 New Yorkers have been stopped in the last year and basically searched. And we're not talking about getting on an airplane here. We're talking about on the streets of New York and Mayor Bloomberg had criticism for Arizona's law [SB 1070] said it was going to lead to racial profiling. Well I have got to tell you in New York I think racial profiling is going on right now with regard to the whole stop and frisk. Isn't this why we fought wars when it comes to protecting our civil liberties? Well this is civil liberties out the window."

Source: Electad, “Gary Johnson Talks to Alyona Minkovski on The Alyona Show – April 25 2012,” electad.com, Apr. 25, 2012
Con
Jill Stein
Jill Stein
Green

"It's clear that we need to rein in police violence, we need to hold police forces accountable, the stop and frisk program in New York City which is all about racial profiling too, we need to put an end to racial profiling, they do not make us safer and are inherently violent and degrading... It's really important for people to acknowledge the institutional racism that is built into the functioning of our society. We need to talk about this so we can understand how tilted of a playing field we are on. We are not in a post racial era, these problems are alive and well and they are only getting worse."

Source: Yana Kunichoff, "Interview with the Green Party's Jill Stein, Candidate for Organizer in Chief," truth-out.org, Aug. 7, 2012



FORMER CANDIDATES
(Candidates who have withdrawn or who no longer meet our criteria appear below in black and white and in alphabetical order.)



Pro
Con
Sanders
Sanders

Not Clear or Not Found
Bush
Bush
Carson
Carson
Christie
Christie
Cruz
Cruz
Fiorina
Fiorina
Graham
Graham
Huckabee
Huckabee
Kasich
Kasich
O'Malley
O'Malley
Paul
Paul
Rubio
Rubio





Pro (Yes)

Con (No)

Con
Bernie Sanders
Bernie Sanders
Democrat

"In too many instances, deportation programs like the Priority Enforcement Program (PEP), the 287(g) program, and the Criminal Alien Program have unjustly turned local law enforcement officials into immigration officers. Racial profiling and the criminalization of communities of color form the foundation of these deportation programs which will be eliminated under a Sanders Administration...

Senator Sanders will fight to end racial profiling. Immigrants should never face deportation as a result of racial or ethnic profiling. A Sanders Administration will work to revise the U.S. Department of Justice’s Guidance Regarding the Use of Race by Federal Law Enforcement Agencies. Under the current guidance, the Department of Justice carved out significant exceptions for federal law enforcement agencies like the FBI, TSA and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to profile racial, religious, and other minorities at or in the vicinity of the border...

Steps taken by the CBP surrounding excessive force on the southern border must be expanded and we must eliminate racial profiling, violence and prolonged detention."

Source: Bernie 2016, "A Fair and Humane Immigration Policy," berniesanders.com (accessed May 24, 2016)


None Found
Jeb Bush
Jeb Bush
Republican

Withdrew on Feb. 20, 2016; no additional research done as of that date to determine candidate's position on this question.





None Found
Ben Carson
Ben Carson
Republican

Withdrew on Mar. 4, 2016; no additional research done as of that date to determine candidate's position on this question.





None Found
Chris Christie
Chris Christie
Republican

Withdrew on Feb. 10, 2016; no additional research done as of that date to determine candidate's position on this question.





None Found
Ted Cruz
Ted Cruz
Republican

Withdrew on May 3, 2016; no additional research done as of that date to determine candidate's position on this question.





None Found
Carly Fiorina
Carly Fiorina
Republican

Withdrew on Feb. 10, 2016; no additional research done as of that date to determine candidate's position on this question.





None Found
Lindsey Graham
Lindsey Graham
Republican

Withdrew on Dec. 21, 2015; no additional research done as of that date to determine candidate's position on this question.





None Found
Mike Huckabee
Mike Huckabee
Republican

Withdrew on Feb. 1, 2016; no additional research done as of that date to determine candidate's position on this question.





None Found
John Kasich
John Kasich
Republican

Withdrew on May 4, 2016; no additional research done as of that date to determine candidate's position on this question.





None Found
Martin O'Malley
Martin O'Malley
Democrat

Withdrew on Feb. 1, 2016; no additional research done as of that date to determine candidate's position on this question.





None Found
Rand Paul
Rand Paul
Republican

Withdrew on Feb. 3, 2016; no additional research done as of that date to determine candidate's position on this question.





None Found
Marco Rubio
Marco Rubio
Republican

Withdrew on Mar. 15, 2016; no additional research done as of that date to determine candidate's position on this question.








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