FBI Keeping Lengthy Files on Groups Opposed to Bush's Policies

[Guest guest]

d

Tue, 19 Jul 2005 09:49:31 -0700

Re: FBI Keeping Lengthy Files on Groups Opposed to Bush's

Policies

 

 

 

 

 

 

> FBI Keeping Lengthy Files on Groups Opposed to Bush's Policies

> Abid Aslam

> OneWorld US

> 19 Jul 5

> http://tinyurl.com/dto4m

>

> WASHINGTON, D.C., Jul 19 (OneWorld) - The Federal Bureau of

> Investigation (FBI) has amassed at least 3,500 pages of internal

> documents from political protest groups in what the targets say

> amounts to political surveillance of some of President George W.

> Bush's leading critics.

>

> The FBI has obtained 1,173 pages of internal documents on the American

> Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) since 2001, the rights watchdog and

> prominent administration critic said Monday. Federal agents also have

> collected some 2,383 pages from environmental group Greenpeace, a

> leading voice of anti-Bush protest, the ACLU added.

>

> The figures have emerged as part of a lawsuit under the Freedom of

> Information Act (FOIA) brought by the ACLU and other groups alleging

> that the FBI is engaging in politically motivated spying against

> law-biding organizations.

>

> ''We now know that the government is keeping documents about the ACLU

> and other peaceful groups,'' said Anthony Romero, the ACLU's executive

> director. ''The question is why.''

>

> The ACLU, in court documents, has contended that joint terrorism task

> forces set up across the country and led by the FBI are structured and

> funded in ways that facilitate violations of groups' and individuals'

> rights to assemble and speak freely.

>

> The organization said it filed its FOIA requests in response to

> widespread complaints from students and political activists who said

> FBI agents were questioning them in the months leading up to the 2004

> political conventions.

>

> The FBI and Justice Department have said that any such

> intelligence-gathering was aimed at preventing criminal activity, not

> silencing speech.

>

> Documents obtained through lawsuits also showed the FBI was monitoring

> groups' Web sites and had prepared an internal report on at least one

> anti-war protest organization, United for Peace and Justice (UFPJ),

> and its efforts to organize a demonstration in the run up to the 2004

> Republican National Convention, the ACLU said.

>

> ''The UFPJ report underscores our concern that the FBI is violating

> Americans' right to peacefully assemble and oppose government policies

> without being branded as terrorist threats,'' said Ann Beeson, the

> ACLU's associate legal director. ''There is no need to open a

> counterterrorism file when people are simply exercising their First

> Amendment rights.''

>

> The ACLU is seeking FBI surveillance files on itself, Greenpeace,

> UFPJ, Code Pink, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals,

> American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, and Muslim Public Affairs

> Council.

>

> The Justice Department has said it will take up to a year to review

> the material the ACLU seeks. The civil rights group has accused the

> government of stalling and has asked a judge to order federal agents

> to turn over the documents sooner.

>

> The FBI's ability to monitor political protest groups had been

> curtailed since the 1970s amid outrage over a decade's worth of abuses

> under then-agency director J. Edgar Hoover.

>

> Many of the restrictions were lifted or relaxed after the Sep. 11,

> 2001 terrorist attacks, however, despite some lawmakers' stated

> concerns that the expanded police powers granted under the USA Patriot

> Act, in particular, could prompt civil rights violations and result in

> the targeting of legitimate and legal dissent.

>

> Key Patriot Act provisions are scheduled to expire on Dec. 31. Bush

> was scheduled to speak about the law in Baltimore, Maryland,

> Wednesday, as part of a sustained White House campaign to make

> permanent the law's expanded powers.

>

> Critics have said the powers infringe on citizens' civil liberties but

> Bush has described the Patriot Act as ''one of the important tools

> federal agents have used to protect America.''

>

> New provisions would allow federal authorities to subpoena records

> from businesses, hospitals, and libraries.

>

> A novel coalition of conservatives and liberals normally at each

> other's throats over the nature of government and free speech have

> made common cause to oppose key parts of the antiterrorism law.

>

> The ACLU, long vilified by conservatives, has joined forces with

> right-wing groups the American Conservative Union, Americans for Tax

> Reform, and the Free Congress Foundation to spearhead the ''Patriots

> to Restore Checks and Balances'' coalition.

>

> The coalition, formed in March, has lobbied Congress to roll back

> provisions allowing law enforcement agents to look at library users'

> records and to conduct unannounced searches of homes and private

offices.

>

> Short for the ''Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing

> Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of

> 2001,'' the USA Patriot Act originally passed by 357-66 in the House

> of Representatives and 98-1 in the Senate.

>

> The Bush administration proposed the law, shepherded it through

> Congress, and enacted it in the immediate aftermath of the Sep. 11,

> 2001 terrorist attacks and the U.S. Senate's evacuation because of

> anthrax.

>

> The measure passed with neither chamber issuing the usual reviews of

> proposed legislation. ''As a result, it lacks background legislative

> history that often retrospectively provides necessary statutory

> interpretation,'' according to a detailed analysis of the law prepared

> by the Washington, D.C.-based Electronic Privacy Information Center.

>

> Grassroots opposition to the law has grown, according to the ACLU.

> Some 375 local and state governments representing more than 56 million

> Americans have passed resolutions opposing the measure or some of its

> provisions.

>

> While many of these resolutions have no practical effect, proponents

> have said the measures serve to notify federal policymakers and

> agencies of public disapproval. Most of the resolutions called upon

> Congress to bring the Patriot Act back in line with the U.S.

> constitution.

>

> 2005 OneWorld.net.

>

> +=+=+=+=+