The bill (S2311), which the Senate Law and Public Safety Committee approved 4-0 without discussion, was proposed in response to the New York Police Department’s surveillance of Muslims in the Garden State. The state Assembly passed the measure last October.
The Associated Press first reported on the NYPD spying in 2011. The AP found the department had been running an aggressive domestic intelligence operation that extended into New Jersey, targeting ethnic communities in Newark, the campus of Rutgers University and elsewhere. The operations touched off outrage in the Muslim community.