From the WaPo, late tonight…
ACLU calls on Obama, Congress to rein in power of the FBI
Sari Horwitz
Washington Post
September 16th, 2013 9:00 PM
As James Comey takes over as the new FBI director, the American Civil Liberties Union is calling on the Obama administration and Congress to rein in the increasing power of the agency.
In a critical 63-page report that will be issued Tuesday, the ACLU says the powers of the FBI have expanded too dramatically over the past 12 years, transforming the Bureau into a “secret domestic intelligence agency.”
“The excessive secrecy with which it cloaks these domestic intelligence gathering operations has crippled constitutional oversight mechanisms,” the report says. “Courts have been reticent to challenge government secrecy demands and, despite years of debate in Congress . . . it took unauthorized leaks by a whistleblower to finally reveal the government’s secret interpretation of these laws and the Orwellian scope of its domestic surveillance programs.”
The ACLU report, entitled “Unleashed and Unaccountable: The FBI’s Unchecked Abuse of Authority,” compiles examples of the changes of law and policy since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States, which the group says “unleashed the FBI from its traditional restraints and opened the door to abuse…”
The article continues on to note that the FBI is withholding comment, because they haven’t read the ACLU’s report yet. (Kevin Gosztola, over at FireDogLake, did receive an early copy of it, and his commentary's excerpted below.) It’s due to be released at 10AM, Tuesday morning, via THIS LINK at the ACLU’s website.
In its document, the ACLU “…asks Congress, the president and the attorney general to conduct a comprehensive evaluation of the FBI’s policies and programs, and makes 15 recommendations for reform of the agency.”
…“The list of abuses is long and demonstrates that Congress must do a top-to-bottom review of FBI politics and practices to identify and curtail any activities that are unconstitutional or easily misused,” said Hina Shamsi, director of the ACLU’s National Security Project. “The time for wholesale reform has come.”
The ACLU report lists examples of the FBI conducting surveillance on protesters and religious groups with “aggressive tactics that infringe on their free speech, religion and associational rights…”
If you’re already agitated by what you’ve just read, Kevin Gosztola's report is not going to calm you down; it’s stunning (and that
is an understatement)…
ACLU Releases Report on FBI’s Development Into Abusive Domestic Intelligence Enterprise
By: Kevin Gosztola
FireDogLake
Monday September 16, 2013 9:55 pm
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has produced a report that fully outlines how the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has developed into an expansive domestic intelligence enterprise over the past ten to fifteen years, which has little regard for the rights of Americans and targets or undermines those rights in order to advance operations.
James Comey is now FBI director, but from September 2001 to September 4, 2013, Robert Mueller served as director. He sought a term extension to stay on past the 10-year-limit and, despite presiding over a warrantless wiretapping scandal under the administration of President George W. Bush, he was given a two-year extension and neo-COINTELPRO operations at the FBI continued to develop unchecked…
Compared to what we’re now learning about the FBI’s tactics, nationally, that organization makes the NYPD’s notorious “Stop and Frisk” program look second-rate.
Per Gosztola…
Racial and Ethnic Profiling
The FBI is engaged in the mapping of communities in a fashion not unlike the New York Police Department. The ACLU finds, “FBI analysts make judgments based on crude stereotypes about the types of crimes different racial and ethnic groups commit, which they then use to justify collecting demographic data to map where people with that racial or ethnic makeup live…”
The paragraph, above, just scratches the surface. Gosztola gets into details of the ACLU document that’ll make your jaw drop. He provides extensive commentary with subheads such as: “Targeting First Amendment-Protected Activities,” “Overzealously Applying Authorities to Manipulate Minorities into Becoming Informants,” and “Using the No Fly List to Force Individuals to Become Informants.”
It is a must-read!
# # #
Reiterating, the ACLU’s latest report will be released at 10:00 AM, Tuesday, via THIS LINK.
Here’s A LINK to the ACLU's announcement regarding the upcoming release of their report.
And, here’s a link to DONATE to the ACLU.
# # #
UPDATE 9-17-13 10:45AM EDT:
The ACLU's Report Is Available Here: “Unleashed and Unaccountable: The FBI's Unchecked Abuse of Authority”
“History of the FBI Timeline”
"A Call For FBI Reform"
By Matthew Harwood, Media Relations Associate, ACLU
September 16, 2013 12:00pm
Early this summer, the Guardian published a monster story.
According to a document it obtained from a government whistleblower, later revealed as National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden, the Guardian reported that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court ordered Verizon Business Services to turn over all the records of its subscribers' telephone calls on a daily ongoing basis for 90 days to the NSA. The order covered all records of calls between "the United States and abroad" and "wholly within the United States, including local telephone calls." Soon after, it became apparent that this government demand wasn't an exception but the rule for the last seven years, with similar record requests delivered to all the major phone companies.
Three months later, there's no doubt the leak will be remembered for igniting the long overdue debate over civil liberties and security in the United States, as well as making the secretive NSA a household name. The critical role of one agency deeply involved in this scandal has not been fully examined, however, even though it requested the FISA Court order compelling companies to participate in the NSA's bulk phone records collection program.
That agency is the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Since 9/11, the FBI has once again transformed itself into a domestic intelligence agency with the unprecedented power to peer into the lives of ordinary Americans and secretly amass data about people not suspected of any wrongdoing. Through laws passed by Congress, such as the PATRIOT Act, as well as revisions to internal investigative guidelines meant to curb the abuses of the past, the FBI now has the authority to investigate and collect information on Americans without any evidence that they've committed a crime.
With so much power, the result was predictable.
Over the last 12 years, FBI agents have abused the new powers they were given to unfairly target immigrants, racial and religious minorities, and political dissidents for surveillance, infiltration, investigation, and disruption. Specifically, the ACLU has uncovered and documented persistent abuses, including warrantless wiretapping, racial and religious profiling, biased counterterrorism training materials, politically motivated investigations, abusive detention and interrogation practices, and misuse of the No-Fly List to recruit informants…
Map and Timeline Key Issues
ACLU Affiliates and the Occupy Movement
Anti-Mosque Activity in the US
Bans on Insurance Coverage of Abortion
Cell Phone Location Tracking
Civil Liberties Under Attack
• Abortion Access
• Immigrants' Rights
• Voting Rights
Death Penalty in the United States
Equal Educational Opportunity - Map
FISA Timeline
Ideological Exclusion - Timeline
LA County Jails
LGBT Non-Discrimination Laws
Mapping the FBI
Post-9/11 Surveillance
Same-Sex Relationship Recognition
Same-Sex Relationship Restrictions
Schools and Web Filtering
Sexual Abuse in Immigration Detention
Spying on First Amendment Activity
Title IX
Torture Tapes Timeline
Voter Suppression
Voting Rights Act Timeline
END OF UPDATE 9-17-13 10:45AM EDT
# # #
I touched upon some of the ACLU's virtual bullet points from their website’s overview of the FBI's egregious actions in my post here on July 20th...
One of my more recent themes, as far as the far-gone condition of our surveillance state is concerned, is the greater truth that our nation’s highly-propagandized “war on terror” is quickly morphing into what’s now being referenced by many as a “war on crime.” (And, if those reading this think “the war on crime” is not an institutionally racist issue, as it’s being defined by the actions of the FBI, and their profiling of entire communities in urban areas -- and their blatantly racist data manipulation efforts, described herein -- I would strongly recommend that you checkout “3,” below, and click upon the links in that paragraph, in particular.)
As with all things surveilled in our country these days, the proper organizations to facilitate that falsely-labelled effort are our local law enforcement authorities and, on the federal and local levels, the FBI. Here’s a piece that I’m taking the time to republish from over at the American Civil Liberties (ACLU) website, if for nothing else than as a reminder of the organization that’s leading this effort, domestically…
The Ten Most Disturbing Things You Should Know About the FBI Since 9/11
American Civili Liberties Union
ACLU
July 5th, 2013
As Congress considers the nomination of James B. Comey to lead the FBI for the next ten years, lawmakers should examine measures to rein in a bureau that has undermined civil liberties in the name of fighting terrorism. This is a false trade off: we can be both safe and free.
1 USA Patriot Act Abuse
The recent revelation about the FBI using the Patriot Act's "business records provision" to track all U.S. telephone calls is only the latest in a long line of abuse. Five Justice Department Inspector General audits documented widespread FBI misuse of Patriot Act authorities (1,2,3,4,5), and a federal district court recently struck down the National Security Letter (NSL) statute because of its unconstitutional gag orders. The IG also revealed the FBI's unlawful use of "exigent letters" that claimed false emergencies to get private information without NSLs, but in 2009 the Justice Department secretly re-interpreted the law to allow the FBI to get this information without emergencies or legal process. Congress and the American public need to know the full scope of the FBI's spying on Americans under the Patriot Act and all other surveillance authorities enacted since 9/11, like the FISA Amendments Act that underlies the PRISM program.
2 2008 Amendments to the Attorney General's Guidelines
Attorney General Michael Mukasey re-wrote the FBI's rulebook in the final months of the Bush administration, giving FBI agents unfettered authority to investigate people without any factual basis for suspecting wrongdoing. The 2008 Attorney General's Guidelines created a new kind of intrusive investigation called an "assessment," which required no "factual predicate" before FBI agents could search through government or commercial databases, conduct overt or covert FBI interviews, and task informants to gather information about people or infiltrate lawful organizations. In a two-year period from 2009 to 2011, the FBI opened over 82,000 "assessments" of individuals or organizations, less than 3,500 of which discovered information justifying further investigation.
3 Racial and Ethnic Mapping
The 2008 Attorney General's Guidelines also authorized "domain management assessments" which allow the FBI to map American communities by race and ethnicity based on crass stereotypes about the crimes they are likely to commit. FBI documents obtained by the ACLU show the FBI mapped entire Chinese and Russian communities in San Francisco on the theory that they might commit organized crime, all Latino communities in New Jersey and Alabama because a street gang has Latino members, African Americans in Georgia to find "Black separatists," and Middle-Eastern communities in Detroit for terrorism investigations. The FBI's racial and ethnic mapping program is simply racial and religious profiling of entire communities.
4 Unrestrained Data Collection and Data Mining
The FBI has claimed the authority to secretly sweep up voluminous amounts of private information from data aggregators for data mining purposes. In 2007 the FBI said it amassed databases containing 1.5 billion records, which were predicted to grow to 6 billion records by 2012, or equal to "20 separate ‘records' for each man, woman and child in the United States." When Congress sought information about one of these programs, the FBI refused to give the Government Accountability Office access. That program was temporarily defunded, but its successor, the FBI Foreign Terrorist Tracking Task Force, currently has 360 staff members running 40 separate projects. Records show analysts are allowed to use data mining tools to establish "risk scores" for U.S. persons. A 2013 IG audit questioned the task force's effectiveness, concluding it "did not always provide FBI field offices with timely and relevant information."
5 Suppressing Internal Dissent: The FBI War on Whistleblowers
The FBI is exempt from the Whistleblower Protection Act. Though the law required it to establish internal mechanisms to protect whistleblowers, it has a long history of retaliating against them. As a result, a 2009 IG report found that 28 percent of non-supervisory FBI employees and 22 percent of FBI supervisors at the GS-14 and GS-15 levels "never" reported misconduct they have seen or heard about on the job. The FBI has also aggressively investigated whistleblowers from other agencies, leading to an unprecedented increase in Espionage Act prosecutions under the Obama administration, almost invariably targeting critics of government policies.
6 Targeting Journalists
The FBI's overzealous pursuit of government whistleblowers has resulted in the inappropriate targeting of journalists for investigation, potentially chilling press freedoms. Recently, the FBI obtained records from 21 telephone lines used by over 100 Associated Press journalists, including the AP's main number in the U.S. House of Representatives' press gallery. And an FBI search warrant affidavit claimed Fox News reporter James Rosen aided, abetted, or co-conspired in criminal activity because of his news gathering activities, in an apparent attempt to circumvent legal restrictions designed to protect journalists. In 2010, the IG reported that the FBI unlawfully used an "exigent letter" to obtain the telephone records of seven New York Times and Washington Post reporters and researchers during a media leak investigation.
7 Thwarting Congressional Oversight
The FBI has thwarted congressional oversight by withholding information, limiting or delaying responses to members' inquiries, or worse, by providing false or misleading information to Congress and the American public. Examples include false information regarding FBI investigations of domestic advocacy groups, misleading information about the FBI's awareness of detainee abuse, and deceptive responses to questions about government surveillance authorities.
8 Targeting First Amendment Activity
Several ACLU Freedom of Information Act requests have uncovered significant evidence that the FBI has used its expanded authorities to target individuals and organizations because of their participation in First Amendment-protected activities. A 2010 IG report confirmed the FBI conducted inappropriate investigations of domestic advocacy groups engaged in environmental and anti-war activism, and falsified public responses to hide this fact. Other FBI documents showed FBI exploitation of community outreach programs to secretly collect information about law-abiding citizens, including a mosque outreach program specifically targeting American Muslims. Many of these abuses are likely a result of flawed FBI training materials and intelligence products that expressed anti-Muslim sentiments and falsely identified religious practices or other First Amendment activities as indicators of terrorism.
9 Proxy Detentions
The FBI increasingly operates outside the U.S., where its authorities are less clear and its activities much more difficult to monitor. Several troubling cases indicate that during the Bush administration the FBI requested, facilitated, and/or exploited the arrests and detention of U.S. citizens by foreign governments, often without charges, so they could be interrogated, sometimes tortured, then interviewed by FBI agents. The ACLU represents two victims of such activities. Amir Meshal was arrested at the Kenya border by a joint U.S., Kenyan, and Ethiopian task force in 2007, subjected to more than four months of detention, and transferred between three different East African countries without charge, access to counsel, or presentment before a judicial officer, all at the behest of the U.S. government. FBI agents interrogated Meshal more than thirty times during his detention. Similarly, Naji Hamdan, a Lebanese-American businessman, sat for interviews with the FBI several times before moving from Los Angeles to the United Arab Emirates in 2006. In 2008, he was arrested by U.A.E. security forces and held incommunicado for nearly three months, beaten, and tortured. At one point an American participated in his interrogation; Hamdan believed this person to be an FBI agent based on the interrogator's knowledge of previous FBI interviews. Another case in 2010, involving an American teenager jailed in Kuwait, may indicate this activity has continued into the Obama administration.
10 Use of No Fly List to Pressure Americans Abroad to Become Informants
The number of U.S. persons on the No Fly List has more than doubled since 2009, and people mistakenly on the list are denied their due process rights to meaningfully challenge their inclusion. In many cases Americans only find out they are on the list while they are traveling abroad, which all but forces them to interact with the U.S. government from a position of extreme vulnerability, and often without easy access to counsel. Many of those prevented from flying home have been subjected to FBI interviews while they sought assistance from U.S. Embassies to return. In those interviews, FBI agents sometimes offer to take people off the No Fly List if they agree to become an FBI informant. In 2010 the ACLU and its affiliates filed a lawsuit on behalf of 10 American citizens and permanent residents, including several U.S. military veterans, seven of whom were prevented from returning home until the suit was filed. We argue that barring them from flying without due process was unconstitutional. There are now 13 plaintiffs; none have been charged with a crime, told why they are barred from flying, or given an opportunity to challenge their inclusion on the No Fly List.
As many reading this may already be aware of it, this is an example of what happens when the full force of our nation's ubiquitous (and growing in size exponentially, as you read this) domestic and international surveillance infrastructure is used to “fight crime.”
# # #