Police officer battles Chicago PD over right to redefine race on records

A 43-year-old Chicago police officer, Mohammad Yusuf, has initiated a federal civil rights lawsuit against the city seeking to amend his racial classification on official documents from “white” to match his self-identification as Egyptian and African American.

This legal action follows the police department's decision to permit officers to alter their recorded gender identity, reports the Daily Wire.

“Yusuf wishes to correct the racial designation listed on his police personnel file, which currently indicates that he is Caucasian, to accurately reflect his race, as North African,” the lawsuit reads.

Yusuf alleges that his request to change his racial designation has been denied by the Chicago Police Department. He recounts that when he first became a police officer in 2004, the options for racial identification on departmental records were restricted to Caucasian, Hispanic, and African American.

Initially, he selected Caucasian, but claims that there is now a broader range of categories available.

Despite providing evidence from his 23andMe genetic testing to support his claim of ethnicity, the request to update his racial designation has been continuously denied by the police department, he claims. The lawsuit criticizes the department for what he sees as a “double standard,” especially given that changes to an officer's gender identity on official records are permitted.

“While other CPD officers are afforded the opportunity to have their gender identity corrected to match their lived experience, Officer Yusuf and others in similar positions are barred from obtaining accurate racial designations that align with their racial identity,” the suit says.

A core grievance highlighted in the lawsuit is Yusuf's assertion that his professional advancement has been adversely affected by his identification as white.

He argues that, although the Chicago Police Department professes to uphold a promotion system that is impartial to race and based solely on merit, he has consistently been overlooked for promotions. Instead, he alleges, these opportunities have been awarded to black officers with lesser qualifications and disciplinary records.

The lawsuit states that Yusuf has yet to achieve his goal of being promoted to sergeant, even though he ranked in the “first promotional tier” on the sergeant's examination in 2019.

“We do not comment on pending litigation,” the Chicago Police Department said in a statement.

Gianna Scatchell Basile, Yusuf's lawyer who is also the spouse of a Chicago police detective, described the city's handling of the situation as “arbitrary.”

“I think the City of Chicago was on the right track when they allowed people to change their gender identity, and allowed them to identify as the proper gender, but then when it comes to race, it’s just very arbitrary,” Basile told The Daily Beast.

The lawsuit describes race as a “social construct,” challenging the notion of needing to prove one's race. “The idea of even having to prove race is wrong,” Basile said. “Race is not scientific.”