GOP Candidate Dan Fanelli Backs Racial Profiling in Ad

By: Brian Montopoli
Topics: Campaign 2010

Dan Fanelli, a Florida Republican hoping to emerge from a competitive Republican primary field to challenge Democratic Rep. Alan Grayson, has released an ad in which he appears to argue that the United States should engage in racial profiling to fight terror.

"Does this look like a terrorist?" he asks in the spot, pointing at a white-haired white man in a tie. Then a darker-skinned man in a black t-shirt enters the frame as Fanelli asks, "or this?"

The Washington Post's Greg Sargent, who first flagged the spot, interviewed Fanelli about it. The candidate, a pilot, insisted the spot wasn't intended to suggest that people with darker skin are more likely to be terrorists. The point, he said, was that people from countries like Iran and Iraq require more security.

"You can be light and from those countries," he said.

Fanelli also argued that people from the Middle East should support profiling.

"If the people that were doing this kind of thing looked like me, even though I'm not the guy doing the terrorist thing I would want to be examined more closely," he told Sargent.

Contacted for comment, Julie Tagen, a senior advisor to Grayson's campaign, said that "Mr. Fanelli is running in a very crowded Republican field."

"In the highly-unlikely event that he wins the nomination, Congressman Grayson will comment on his ads, however misguided or offensive they are," she said.

Brian Montopoli
Brian Montopoli is the senior political reporter at CBSNews.com.
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by hanadikalla May 12, 2010 3:27 PM EDT: I find it quite offensive how everyone is talking about how an olive skinned Latino, or Italian can look Middle Eastern, and how some white people may look Middle Eastern or not. It seems as though the word Middle Eastern has an automatic implication to terrorism and bombing. I'm not saying that these SO-CALLED Muslims are exempt from being called terrorists, but on the same topic, have we all forgotten the German Third Reich terrorism agains the Jews, or the CONTINUING Jewish/Israeli terrorism among the people of Palestine, (whom by the way, May 14th marks the 62nd year of the Palestinians living in constant fear, GENOCIDE, unemployment and being stripped of their basic human and civil rights). I wish that all of you would educate yourselves more when it comes to using the word TERRORISM, and truley understand the real meaning behind its usage, as well as the culture of which countries and ethnicities fall under Middle Eastern.. Pakistan, Afghanistan etc are NOT Middle Eastern. I would also hope that you all start learning how to target the word Terrorist to a specific type of people, ie those who walk around bombing, and not tie an ethnicity to it..; Reply to this comment


by jrpactor May 5, 2010 10:16 PM EDT: Looks like Mr. Dan "Ripped" Fanelli is pulling his ads off You Tube and everywhere else! I suspect Mr. Grayson will win in a Land Slide!; Reply to this comment


by obwan222 May 5, 2010 4:52 PM EDT: "a good looking, ripped guy without much hair"

Okay, that's a little disturbing. Does that mean that police should stake out gyms, wrestling events and school athletic departments?

I don't know about you but his idea of a terrorist looks more like a cast member of "The Sopranos" to me.; Reply to this comment


by heavynne May 5, 2010 3:20 PM EDT: Let's not forget about G.I. Jane, who had blond hair and blue eyes.; Reply to this comment

by toldyouso21 May 5, 2010 2:41 PM EDT

"It's time to stop this political correctness and the invasion of our privacy," he says. He then goes on to make an apparent joke about how he wouldn't mind being pulled out of line at the airport if "a good looking, ripped guy without much hair was flying airplanes into the twin towers."

HOW BIZARRE. Is this more on a commentary of racism or him being attracted to men or ...what? And if lighter skinned Middle EAstern people should be scrutinized more --why did he not use one in his ads?

Maybe he should have used a black person or a chinese person then used a Middle EAstern light person... or maybe he should stop pretending he really wants to hold office because as offensive and bizarre as he is--who'd want him?

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by bradkt1 May 5, 2010 3:59 PM EDT: There are a also a lot of Spaniards, Italians, Greeks and North Africans who look like persons from the Middle East. In addition, the shoe bomber and the underwear bomber looked like many African Americans that you can see walking down the street.


by bradkt1 May 5, 2010 2:23 PM EDT: This proposal by this Republican candidate is born out of ignorance and fear, is not well thought out and, as a practical matter, is unworkable...not to mention just plain wrong. I'll let others argue about the legality or morality...of lack thereof...of this. I'll just briefly illustrate how unworkabkle and ineffective it would be to try to profile people based on their physical appearance. It will not be anywhere near as easy and workable to racially profile Middle Easterners as some people think because the physical appearance of a lot of people doesn't easily fit into little racial boxes anymore. They don't have "Middle Easterner" stampted on their foreheads.

I can recall when I worked in a law office in Washington, D.C. that specialized in immigration law, I dealt with several clients from Middle Eastern countries. Almost without exception, applicants from these countries (including Iran and Afghanistan) listed "White" or "Caucasian" when asked to indicate their race on their immigration forms.

In addition, there are a lot of olive-skinned Black and Hispanic people as well who can be mistaken for Middle Easterners...and some Whites. There are also Whites who are followers of Islam who can be radicalized just as easily as a dark-skinned follower of Islam. One of them is that American propagandist for Al Qaeda...Azzim the American.

In short, based on physical appearance alone there would be so many poterntial candidates for racial profiling for Middle Easterners as to make any racial profiling system either practical or workable...in addition to no sure way to identify a significant number of Middle Easterners.

There have also been terrorists from Nigeria and other African countries as well. Remember the two U.S. embassies in Africa that were blown up by Al Qaeda? So now that means that everyone who is dark-skinned and who is from Africa, the Caribbean and South America are going to be profiled as well. That list also includes African-Americans.

That makes the list of potential candidates for racial profiling anywhere between 15-25% of the population of the United States, plus the huge number of the immigrants or foreign visitors in this country from the Middle East, Africa, the Carribbean and South America.

It's not quite as easy as you think, is it?; Reply to this comment


by Zann-Zel May 5, 2010 1:18 PM EDT: Wow! The republicans are rolling downhill fast!; Reply to this comment