That was the word from Attorney General John Ashcroft late Monday night as he announced that a man identified as Santa Claus was arrested on Christmas Eve as he attempted to cross into the United States from Canada.
Claus, along with several elves, was wrapped up in a wide-ranging FBI sweep and would be detained “indefinitely,” Ashcroft said.
The attorney general, who said that Claus attempted to enter the country on a long-expired student visa, declined to divulge the identities of the elves.
“I don’t want to give out any information at this time that may be helpful to our enemies,” Ashcroft said. “There may be other elves still at large.”
While President Bush and members of Congress praised the arrest and detention of Santa Claus, others, most notably the American Civil Liberties Union, cried foul.
“Clearly, Mr. Claus was picked up by the FBI because he is a foreigner with a beard,” said Kevin Tompkins, an ACLU spokesman. “This is ethnic profiling at its most insidious.”
“Tough,” Ashcroft said.
In a related story, an American Airlines flight heading from Paris to Miami on Christmas Eve made an emergency landing in Boston when one of the passengers exhibited what the airlines termed “suspicious behavior.”
The passenger, a reindeer, was subdued by flight attendants and fellow passengers after attempting to light its nose.
