In 1944, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the forced relocation of over 120,000 Japanese Americans in Korematsu v. United States. Most were citizens. None were charged with any crime. The justification? Military necessity. Faced with wartime fear, the Court deferred to the executive’s judgment.
Decades later, the ruling was widely condemned. And in 2018, the Court explicitly stated that Korematsu was wrong the day it was decided. But the broader concern it raises—the use of race, religion, or ancestry as a proxy for danger in national security contexts—has not gone away.
In the years after 9/11, Muslim, Arab, and South Asian communities faced sweeping surveillance and profiling. Airport detentions. Visa delays. Secret watchlists. Registration programs that targeted men from predominantly Muslim countries. Many of these policies were not framed in explicitly religious terms, but their effects were undeniably racialized.
As I argued in my book When Islam Is Not a Religion, Muslims in America have often been treated not just as adherents of a faith, but as a racialized group, as if their religious identity were something fixed, foreign, and inherently suspect. This dynamic didn’t emerge out of nowhere. It reflects a longstanding pattern in American law and culture, where racial meaning attaches to national origin, names, clothing, and religious practice.
What Korematsu Teaches Us About Racialization
Korematsu is frequently cited as a cautionary tale about racial discrimination. But it also reveals how race is constructed by the state. Japanese Americans were not interned because of individual conduct. They were confined because of ancestry and presumed disloyalty. Their race was not just seen, it was made meaningful through policy.
The same can be said of the racialized identity of Muslims post-9/11. The phrase flying while Muslim became shorthand for the anxiety and humiliation many travelers experienced, not because of what they did, but because of how they looked or what their names suggested. As with driving while Black, the burden of suspicion falls unevenly.
In legal terms, these policies may be framed as facially neutral. But the lived experience and the disparate impact tell another story.
What Courts Are (and Aren’t) Willing to See
One of the most complex cases to address these issues in recent years was Trump v. Hawaii, which involved a presidential proclamation restricting entry into the U.S. from several countries. Critics pointed to statements made by the president and his advisors that appeared to express anti-Muslim animus. Supporters argued the policy was about national security, not religion.
In reviewing the case, the Court acknowledged the history of Korematsu and stated that its reasoning no longer held. Yet the policy in Trump v. Hawaii was upheld. The Court emphasized the facial neutrality of the proclamation and the broad discretion the executive branch holds in immigration matters.
The question is not whether the Court made the right call. It’s what we learn from the record itself.
The evidence presented—including campaign statements, public remarks, and early versions of the policy—reflected a narrative of fear linked to Muslim identity. While the final version of the policy applied to a broader set of countries, the case sparked a renewed conversation about when national security concerns can become a cover for religious or racial exclusion.
The Ongoing Challenge
Korematsu reminds us of what’s at stake when courts defer too easily to generalized fears. It shows us how ancestry or belief can become the basis for sweeping restrictions. And it warns against accepting “neutral” justifications without close scrutiny of how those justifications operate in practice.
Today, the challenge is to understand how racialization continues—often subtly, often legally—under the banner of security. Whether through airport screenings, visa delays, or law enforcement profiling, certain bodies are still treated as threats before they are treated as citizens.
And that is where the deeper danger lies, not just in the policies we enact, but in the assumptions we fail to question.