April 18, 2008

CIVIL LIBERTIES & NATIONAL SECURITY ISSUES TEAM

STOP BUSH SECRECY

ACTION

Contact senators Voinovich and Brown and urge them for vote FOR the Senate bill “State Secret Protection Act” (S.2533), which would stop the misuse of the “state secret privilege” by the Bush administration. Urge them also to vote AGAINST the Kyl amendment to this bill that would weaken it.

The Senate is expected to vote on this bill within the next week.

Contact Information

Sherrod Brown http://brown.senate.gov/contact/

George Voinovich http://voinovich.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Contact.ContactForm

THE ISSUE

The state secrets privilege rightfully allows the government to invoke the privilege in lawsuits or trials in order to protect classified information from being revealed during the hearing of the case. The concept is a reasonable one designed to protect our security.

However, the Bush administration has been abusing this privilege in order to deny rights to accused people and to hide its own misdeeds from the public. It was intended to be used to deny access to truly secret information, not to negate an entire trial.

For example, when several citizens filed a lawsuit complaining that they were illegally subjected to NSA wiretapping, the judge said they had to prove they had in fact been wiretapped. The government used the state secret privilege to deny them the ability to prove so. This conveniently also allowed the government to avoid having to show that it had followed the Constitution in establishing the program. In other cases the government has used the privilege to avoid court trials that would reveal its use of torture and of detaining innocent people.

The state secrets privilege was never intended to shield the government from accountability. Our civil liberties are being undermined and the government is using the privilege to protect itself instead of to protect our national security. The courts often do not even examine the government’s argument, they just take the government’s word that a state secret is involved.

S.2533 would establish a procedure that would allow a judge to consider the “state secrets” in private and them make a determination as to what evidence would be allowed and what evidence truly merited the state secrets privilege. This bill is worth our support. However, Republican Senator Jon Kyl is trying to add an amendment that would require the judge to give “utmost deference” to the government, which would in effect weaken the judicial review. The amendment should be defeated.

TALKING POINTS

This bill should be supported because it will stop the undermining of our civil liberties.
The state secret privilege was never intended to shield the government in cases where it has abused its power.
The bill provides a reasonable process to protect true state secrets while providing rights to those who have been mistreated and providing the public with the information it needs in order to understand what the government is actually doing in its name.
The bill helps restore the checks and balances intended in the Constitution.
The Kyl amendment would undermine the very purpose of the bill and should not be attached to it.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

This editorial explains the need for the bill and what it does.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/18/opinion/18fri1.html?th&emc=th

This article shows how the Bush administration has misused the privilege to escape accountability for torturing an innocent man.

http://www.slate.com/id/2142155/

This article explains how the government is using the privilege in the NSA wiretapping case and why the Bush administration loves this privilege.

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/04/building-secrecy-wall-higher-and.html

Previous Alerts:

STOP CROSS-OWNERSHIP OF TELEVISION AND NEWSPAPERS

SUPPORT LOCAL COMMUNITY RADIO

DON’T LET BUSH WIRETAP YOU

MAKE MSNBC STOP BEING SEXIST IN ITS REPORTING

GET THE FEC BACK INTO OPERATION FOR THE ELECTION

CLOSE GUANTANAMO PRISON

MUKASEY CONFIRMATION AS ATTORNEY GENERAL

STOP CORPORATE MONOPOLIES ON OUR NEWS AND INFORMATION

OPPOSE SPAKOVSKY NOMINATION TO FEDERAL ELECTIONS COMMISSION

SUPPORT THE BEST FISA REVISION
REGARDING WIRETAPS

RESTORE HABEAS CORPUS

STOP APPT. OF CIA GENERAL COUNSEL

STOP FUNDING FOR IRAQ WAR

NBC AND TUCKER CARLSON'S COMMENTS

FISA COURT REVISIONS FOR WIRETAPPING