Sep 23 2010
Inspector General Whitewashes Bush-era FBI Surveillance
On Monday the Justice Department’s Inspector General released a report finding that the FBI improperly conducted surveillance on activist groups between 2001 and 2006. The Inspector General wrote that extensive investigations into members of the environmental group Greenpeace had “little or no basis,” and he called the FBI’s actions under President Bush “troubling.” The Washington Post reports that the FBI was not found to be guilty of violating the first amendment rights of individuals, a serious charge. The Thomas Merton Center, an interfaith organization in Pittsburg, was also targeted. In 2006 FBI Director Robert Mueller was called before Congress and specifically asked about the motive for the FBI’s anti-terrorism investigation into the Merton Center. At the hearing Director Mueller said an FBI agent attended an anti-war rally connected to the Merton Center to identify a person with possible links to terrorism. The Inspector General determined that “this version of events was not true, and stated the Merton rally assignment was “an ill-conceived project on a slow work day”. The report stated that the inaccurate domestic terrorism classification put individuals at risk for placement on terrorism watchlists. In a separate case extensive FBI surveillance of activists in Iowa made news this week. The Des Moines Register reports that twenty-nine year old activist David Goodner received 300 pages of heavily redacted FBI records through a Freedom of Information Act request. Goodner discovered that he and other activists had been spied on for nine months prior to the Republican and Democratic national conventions in 2008. The Register reports that the FBI staked out activists’ homes and followed them as they traveled to the Iowa Public Library, a natural food store, and a United Methodist Church, among other places.
GUEST: Shahid Buttar, Executive Director Bill of Rights Defense Committee, Constitutional Lawyer, sued the FBI two years ago to for greater transparency
For more information on the Bill of Rights Defense Committee visit: www.bordc.org
One Response to “Inspector General Whitewashes Bush-era FBI Surveillance”
It seems as though no matter who wins the presidency, the underlying fascism that surfaced with the assassination of JFK is alive and well. It would be easy for that element to threaten our leaders and/or enlist them. Your program is vital to keep the light of enquiry on them, lest they become even more blatant.