A San Diego middle school teacher recorded a recent encounter with several U.S. Border Patrol agents that has since gone viral. Shane Parmely was stopped at an immigration checkpoint and asked if she was an American citizen. As she wasn’t crossing a border between countries, Parmely didn’t think that there was any need to answer the question.
“Are we crossing a border? I’ve never been asked if I’m a citizen before when I’m traveling down the road,” Parmely is heard telling an agent.
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The two then get into a back and forth in which Parmely implies that if she were Mexican, she would be detained without cause. Ultimately Parmely is detained and naps in her car while the agents wait her out. In a series of videos posted to her Facebook page, Parmely details the experience.
“Basically, make sure you have a full tank of gas to keep your air conditioner running, some water and some snacks. I also recommend a pillow cuz this was a great place to take a nap,” Parmely wrote on Facebook.
“And they do have bathrooms in the cells where they hold people when they pull them out of their cars (my son got to use it).”
Parmely later added that the border patrol agents showed fascist tendencies.
“And what’s up with this dude’s straight up nationalist propaganda?” she said of one of the officers.
“The philosophy governing our southern border (cuz there ain’t none of this (expletive) along the northern border or eastern or western) can be reduced to: Fascism > Terrorism.”
In a statement to the media, the U.S. Border Patrol defended its agents' actions.
At a Border Patrol checkpoint, an agent may question a vehicle's occupants about their citizenship, place of birth, and request document proof of immigration status, how legal status was obtained and make quick observations of what is in plain view in the interior of the vehicle.
During the course of the immigration inspection, if an occupant refuses to answer an agent's questions, the agent may detain the driver for a reasonable amount of time until he or she can make a determination regarding the occupant's immigration status.
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