Sikh Temple Member Tells His Story to U.S. Senate

At the start of last month, Harpreet Singh Saini couldn't have imagined he would be sitting where he was on Wednesday afternoon.

But there he was, speaking in front of a U.S. Senate hearing on violent extremism, 45 days after a gunman with white supremacist ties took the life of his mother, Paramjit Kaur, and five others inside the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin.

Saini told the committee he was there on behalf of all the children of the Sikh temple who lost parents and grandparents on Aug. 5.

"He killed my mother while she prayed," he said of Wade Michael Page. "He shot and killed five more men. All of them were fathers, and all of them had a turban like me.

"This was not supposed to be our American story. This was not my mother's dream."

In emotional testimony, Saini spoke of how his parents brought the family to the country in 2004, wanting their children to have a better life and better education in a land of diversity.

On the Tuesday after the attack, he and his brother ate leftovers from the last meal she made, realizing they would never again get a chance to eat their mother's cooking.

A little while later, he started classes at Milwaukee Area Technical College, where he is studying law enforcement.

His mother wasn't there.

"My mother was our biggest fan. Our biggest supporter. She always had a smile on her face. But now she's gone, because of a man who hated her because she wasn't his color, his religion," Saini said. "I just had my first day of college, and my mother wasn't there to send me off. She won't be there on my graduation, or my wedding day. She won't be able to meet her grandchildren.

"I want to tell the gunman who took her away from me: you may have been full of hate, but my mother was full of love."

Saini's testimony had many people in the audience near tears, said Valarie Kaur, who attended the hearing.

Saini asked the federal government to give his mother "the dignity of being a statistic." The FBI does not track hate crimes against Sikhs as it does other religious and racial groups. U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, who chaired Wednesday's hearing, and Wisconsin U.S. Sen. Herb Kohl joined national Sikh community leaders in urging the FBI to do so.

Roy Austin Jr., a deputy assistant attorney general with the U.S. Department of Justice, didn't give a firm commitment at the hearing but said officials plan to bring together people from a wide range of religious groups and backgrounds to discuss what kinds of statistics should be kept.

Historic day

Kaur, a Sikh-American filmmaker who has spent many days in Oak Creek following the shootings, said she got choked up as she walked into the committee meeting room.

The room was packed with about 400 people, and not just Sikhs — people from many different communities who have been affected by hate crimes, Kaur said. Portraits of the shooting victims, including Oak Creek Police Lt. Brian Murphy, were displayed inside the room, and an overflow room accommodated people who couldn't squeeze in.

In a phone interview from Washington, Kaur noted that dozens of hearings have been held since 9/11 regarding the threat of al-Qaeda-inspired groups, but none on domestic extremism despite a sharp increase in the number of attacks.

It was part of what made the day was a historic one for the Sikh community, which has battled hate violence often since Sept. 11, 2001.

"I'm proud that in this moment of national attention, Sikh-Americans were calling for the end of hate. Not just against Sikhs, but against all Americans," she said. "That kind of call to action is really profound."

Questions about Page

Durbin also questioned whether there was an intelligence failure with Page, who had been active for years with white supremacist groups and tracked by two groups.

The FBI's Michael Clancy said Page was known to law enforcement officials but his activities did not rise to the level where they could open an investigation. Agencies have to balance protecting citizens' free speech rights and investigating organizations with a history of inciting violence, Clancy said.

The FBI never had information that Page posed a threat to any group, particularly Sikhs, he said.

An FBI investigation is ongoing into Page and the Aug. 5 attacks.