The United States (US) Secret Service blocked a Muslim mayor from attending a White House celebration with President Joe Biden to belatedly mark the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
Shortly before he was to arrive at the White House for the Eid al-Fitr celebration on Monday, Mayor Mohamed Khairullah said he received a call from the White House stating he had not been cleared for entry by the Secret Service and could not attend the celebration, where Biden delivered remarks to hundreds of guests.
He said the White House official did not explain why the Secret Service had blocked his entry. Khairullah, 47, informed the New Jersey chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations after he was told he would not be allowed to attend the event.
The group has called on the Biden administration to cease the FBI’s dissemination of information from what is known as a “terrorist screening data set” that includes hundreds of thousands of individuals. The group informed Khairullah that a person with his name and birthdate was in a data set that its attorneys had obtained in 2019.
Secret Service spokesman Anthony Guglielmi confirmed Khairullah was not allowed into the White House complex but declined to say why