AMY GOODMAN: And you are listening to Democracy Now!, as we turn now to an incident that happened over the weekend in Chicago. World-renowned Irish civil rights activist Bernadette Devlin McAliskey was refused entrance into the United States over the weekend and deported. She passed through U.S. immigration in Dublin just fine. But when she arrived in Chicago, a loudspeaker called out her name. McAliskey says she was then surrounded by immigration officers. One of them told her they had received a fax from their agents in Dublin, the fax calling her a “potential or real threat to the United States.”

Bernadette Devlin McAliskey is known around the world for her rights activism. She was elected to the British Parliament from Northern Ireland in 1969, when she was just 21 years old. She was the youngest MP in history.

In August of that year, she was arrested during the Battle of the Bogside, which was an uprising that marked the beginning of 30 years of armed resistance to the British occupation of Northern Ireland. She served four months in prison for, quote, “inciting a riot.” She was still then an MP.

Over the years she has continued her activism. In 1981, she and her husband were shot by members of a Protestant paramilitary group at their farmhouse near Belfast. Bernadette was struck by nine bullets. She joins us now on the telephone.

Welcome to Democracy Now!

BERNADETTE DEVLIN McALISKEY: Hi. How are you?

AMY GOODMAN: It’s great to have you with us. Where are you now?

BERNADETTE DEVLIN McALISKEY: I am back at home, safe and sound in my house in Northern Ireland.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you describe what happened over the weekend? What day was it that you tried to come here to the United States?

BERNADETTE DEVLIN McALISKEY: Well, we arrived in Chicago on the Friday evening about 5:00. And as you said in your report, I found myself surrounded by very jumpy, very nervous immigration officials. And —

AMY GOODMAN: What did they say?

BERNADETTE DEVLIN McALISKEY: I could see that I was in — you know, I was in some kind of trouble. They were all of the opinion that they had a person in their midst, in their custody, who presented some kind of threat to the United States, who had fraudulently or by some deviant means got this far and was in the process of sneaking into their country. That’s where their heads were, and that this constituted some danger, and the upper-handed villain would have to be dealt with. And I was trying to explain to them that they had this all wrong.

AMY GOODMAN: You were with your daughter Deirdre?

BERNADETTE DEVLIN McALISKEY: I was with my daughter Deirdre, yes. And it was very bizarre, because I was talking to people who were behaving like people who were programmed. They were not open to question. They weren’t open to reason. They weren’t open to discussion. They were programmed. They were scared. And, to me, they were dangerous.

AMY GOODMAN: Did you tell them who you were?

BERNADETTE DEVLIN McALISKEY: I told them who I was, but that didn’t — you know, that didn’t register in their heads. They hadn’t looked in — you know, I know every time I go to America, you can key in my name on their computer, and up comes my name, along with hundreds and thousands of other people, and that I have a security profile. And I invited them to go into that and bring my security profile up. But they didn’t. They just kept saying to me, “Why did you — you know, why did you fraudulently fill in papers?” And I kept saying, “I did not.” “You know, why — you are not entitled the visa waiver program,” which is what visitors from Ireland — how visitors from Ireland now come into America. And I kept saying, “Yes, I am. Let me explain this.” But there was no opportunity to explain.

AMY GOODMAN: Did you tell them that you were a member of the British Parliament years ago?

BERNADETTE DEVLIN McALISKEY: No, I didn’t get that far. Every time I tried to tell them anything, I was told that, you know, I had no rights here. All they wanted to know was why I had attempted to fraudulently enter the country. And I kept saying, “Look, let me explain this, that I have not.” Very shortly into the nondiscussion, they told me — they insisted on saying, if I insisted on contradicting the men, if I insisted on saying no, insisted on saying that I had not fraudulently filled in documents, that I would be handcuffed and imprisoned, until the matter was sorted out. The only matter to be sorted out was the time of the next flight back to Dublin.

AMY GOODMAN: Now, you’ve been here dozens of times over the last 30 years.

BERNADETTE DEVLIN McALISKEY: Oh yeah. Over the last 30 years, I’ve probably been backwards and forwards to the United States about 30 times.

AMY GOODMAN: Did they threaten you with violence?

BERNADETTE DEVLIN McALISKEY: Well, it wasn’t as simple as that. What one guy said to me — the chief officer, Mr. Squires, I was dealing with mostly directly. He was the guy who said I could be handcuffed, imprisoned. He was the person who informed me I had no rights. As a non-U.S. citizen, I had no rights. And I tried to say to him, “Look, you know, the United Nations Charter gives me rights. The United States Constitution gives me rights.” And that is the point at which he said, you know, he would demonstrate the rights I had by putting me in handcuffs and putting me in jail.

Then his counterpart — his counterpart said to me, just very, very slowly and deliberately, and to my face, and softly, “Do not anger my boss.” And he said it, you know, with typical American politeness. “Ma’am” — he kept calling me “Ma’am” — “Ma’am, listen to me. Do not anger my boss, Ma’am. Do not make this man angry, Ma’am. I am telling you this in terms of your own safety and well-being. Do not make this man angry.” And then, later, he said to me, “Again, you don’t have rights, Ma’am. You keep saying you have rights. Let me assure you, you do not have any rights here. My boss has rights. My boss has power. And my boss has a revolver.” That’s what he said to me.

AMY GOODMAN: Did he say he had used it?

BERNADETTE DEVLIN McALISKEY: And then he told me that his boss had actually used his revolver over the head of a Russian gentleman in recent times. Now, I don’t know whether that was true or not, but that’s what he told me, in very, very slow and deliberate language.

AMY GOODMAN: So, you were —

BERNADETTE DEVLIN McALISKEY: And then the same officer did actually threaten my daughter.

AMY GOODMAN: What did he say? What did he say?

BERNADETTE DEVLIN McALISKEY: Well, she had been cleared, because there was no — the Mr. Squires, who was the chief guy, he said she was free to continue her travels. And I had said to her, “Go, you, on to New York.” I was also concerned that if she had agreed not to go on, that she would somehow be entering into a position where she was being denied entry. So I persuaded her to go on ahead to New York and to let people know what was happening. And Mr. Squires said that was fine, she could proceed.

But the guy who had told me about his boss having a revolver followed her out and said to her, “Don’t you try to get on another plane without contracting your embassy.” And basically, you know, “And don’t come back to this country. Don’t try and get a flight without contacting the embassy.”

So she came back in and said to Mr. Squires, you know, “You told me — am I wanted here? Am I free to travel? Am I free to continue my journey? Because this man has told me, as I go for another flight, not to attempt to get on a flight. So, am I free to go or not?” And the Mr. Squires guy then escorted her through customs and to her continuing flight, leaving me with the other guy, whose name was, I think, Fenton or Fenson or something like that.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, I want to —

BERNADETTE DEVLIN McALISKEY: And it was at that point that he said to me that his boss had a revolver.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, I want to thank you very much for being with us, Bernadette Devlin McAliskey, world-renowned civil rights activist, speaking to us from her home near Belfast. She had planned to be in the United States, was deported this weekend, excluded from this country. You are listening to Democracy Now! When we come back, Arundhati Roy. Stay with us.