ALC 51st Anniversary Celebration: Grab your tickets for our annual event on Wednesday, October 4!

We all deserve to feel safe and protected, no matter where we were born, how we pray, or what language we speak.

National Security & Civil Rights

Team

Caroline Marks

Caroline Marks

Staff Attorney, National Security & Civil Rights

Caroline Marks

Staff Attorney, National Security & Civil Rights

Caroline Marks is a Staff Attorney in the National Security and Civil Rights program at Asian Law Caucus. Caroline’s work focuses on, among other things, state legislative and administrative advocacy challenging surveillance and counterterrorism programs and narratives that harm Arab, Middle Eastern, Muslim and South Asian communities and other communities of color.

Before coming to ALC, Caroline worked on litigation and advocacy with the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice at NYU Law, to hold the United States responsible for its extraordinary rendition program—whereby the U.S. kidnapped and transferred individuals to black sites and proxy governments for their subsequent torture and secret detention. Specifically, Caroline participated significantly in litigation before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in the case Mohamed et al. v. United States.

Caroline graduated from NYU School of Law and holds a BA in International Relations from Brown University. During her time at Brown, Caroline spent a semester Amman, Jordan learning the Levantine dialect and expanding her knowledge of modern standard Arabic.

Hammad Alam

Hammad Alam

Staff Attorney & Program Manager, National Security & Civil Rights

Hammad Alam

Staff Attorney & Program Manager, National Security & Civil Rights

Hammad Alam is a Staff Attorney and Program Manager in the National Security and Civil Rights program at Asian Law Caucus. Hammad’s work focuses on, among other things, the federal Countering Violent Extremism program and state of California’s directly linked Preventing Violent Extremism and other similar surveillance and criminalization programs targeting Muslim and other immigrant and communities of color.

Hammad has helped lead coalitions against both of these programs, helping devise strategy engaging policy advocacy, community organizing, and the law to place pressure on government actors to defund and dismantle these harmful programs. Most recently, as part of the NoPVEinCA Coalition, Hammad led a statewide campaign to defund PVE in California, successfully blocking the harmful program from receiving state funding to staff and operate it.

In addition to anti-surveillance and anti-policing work, Hammad also drives NSCR’s work against the Muslim Ban, through both litigation and ALC’s participation as a core member of the No Muslim Ban Ever campaign. Hammad comes to ALC with prior federal litigation experience and served as a law clerk in the Eastern District of California. He is a graduate of the UCLA School of Law and holds a Masters in Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School.

Sanjana Potnis

Sanjana Potnis

Community Advocate, National Security & Civil Rights

Sanjana Potnis

Community Advocate, National Security & Civil Rights

Sanjana is a Community Advocate in the National Security and Civil Rights program at Asian Law Caucus. Prior to ALC, Sanjana worked as a community organizer in the Seattle area with college students, immigrant rights and racial justice organizations, and community members focusing on anti-imperialist, surveillance, and racial justice work through community teach-ins, coalition building, and advocacy.

Sanjana graduated from the University of Washington, Seattle, with a B.A in International Studies and Law, Societies, & Justice with a specialization in South Asia. As an undergraduate, she took an interest in studying criminal justice, researching post-colonial legal systems, migration patterns, and the politics of spiritual-artistic traditions in South Asia. In her free time she enjoys writing, photography, practicing Hindustani classical music, and reading film reviews on Letterboxd.

Our Focus

We strive to undo hate and violence against those impacted by unjust national security policies and build a more just and inclusive country where everyone can live safely and with dignity. After 9/11, U.S. politicians and agencies exploited public fears and created profiling, surveillance, and discriminatory immigration policies that targeted Muslims and people believed to be Muslim. Our communities continue to be affected by these programs, which criminalize people without any evidence of wrongdoing. With civil rights partners across the country, we stand up for communities’ constitutional freedoms and liberties, particularly Arab, Middle Eastern, Muslim, and South Asian (AMEMSA) and immigrant communities who have been harmed by local, state, and federal national security policies rooted in white supremacy and racism.

  • As a core member of the No Muslim Ban Ever coalition, we’re mobilizing to pass the NO BAN Act and prevent any future president from barring immigrants and refugees based on their religion or national origin.
  • In California, we’re disentangling local law enforcement from the FBI’s surveillance programs and working to defund the state’s own programs including the Joint Terrorism Task Force that wrongly stereotype Muslim, Black, and other communities as inherently suspicious.
  • At mosques across the Bay Area, we’re helping thousands of community members learn and defend their civil rights on free speech, immigration, travel, privacy, and safety—and providing free legal services to help families reunite, immigrate, and find refuge in the U.S.
A crowd gathers at the foot of stone steps leading to a landing in front of San Francisco City Hall, an ornate building with neoclassical architectural features and gold-colored metal work. At the top of the stairs, in front of large doors, people stand beside a man in a suit speaking from a podum. Some of those standing hold a long banner that says, "We all saw that movie... No Killer Robots."

Get Help

If you are concerned about surveillance programs that may be harming your community and looking for more information on your rights, we’re here to help. Get help now.

Our Work

Guides & Reports

Community Education Resources: National Security & Civil Rights

We have resources from a number of different organizations available for you to better understand your rights related to immigration, travel, law enforcement, electronic privacy, and discrimination.

Learn More
Perspective

Know Your Rights Before Traveling Abroad

The National Security and Civil Rights program at ALC represents community members who are profiled and subject to discriminatory questioning, searches, or detention at airports in the Bay Area.

Learn More
Perspective

ALC @ 50: Justice is Ours to Build

Former and current ALC staff met to talk about the history of our Coram Nobis cases and work protecting the civil rights of community members targeted by national security policies.

Learn More