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U.S. Beefed-up Internal Security Raises Civil Liberties Concerns
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Ashcroft’s
fingerprinting plans angered Arab and immigration groups
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WASHINGTON,
June 6 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) – A new plan announced by
U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft Wednesday, June 5, said that the
U.S. government was planning to fingerprint, photograph and register
all foreign visitors from specific countries.
Ashcroft
said that “This system will expand substantially America’s
scrutiny of those foreign visitors who may pose a national security
concern and enter our country. And it will provide a vital line of
defense in the war against terrorism.”
The
nationalities which will be targeted will be countries that the U.S.
considers as so-called “sponsors of terrorism.” Critics of this
new plan are worried that this plan will be racially profiling
visitors to the U.S., daily newspaper, the New York Times reported.
This
concern echoes others of decreased civil liberties in the wake of new
measures that are supposedly aimed at beefing up the internal security
of a post-September 11 United States.
On
Thursday, May 30, the Federal Bureau of Investigation gained
additional powers to conduct domestic “counter-terrorism
surveillance” in public places with Ashcroft’s announcement of new
guidelines. These rules lift FBI restrictions on conducting
surveillance at public gatherings, on religious and political
organizations, and even on the internet.
Under
previous guidelines, FBI agents had to offer evidence of criminal
activity to get approval for such surveillance.
CNS
news reported Tuesday, June 4, that civil libertarians believe the FBI
probably could have done more to uncover and disrupt September 11,
they say that increasing the potential for civil rights abuses is not
the way to make the agency more effective.
“Taken
as a whole, all the various changes that we’ve seen coming out of
Congress and the Justice Department are very much moving in that
direction of giving government too much, far more power than it need
to actually carry out the legitimate function of trying to prevent
terrorism,” executive directory of the Libertarian Party, Steve
Dasbach, said.
Dasbach
believes that the USA Patriot Act, passed on October 26, 2001, which
gave federal law enforcement sweeping new authorities to conduct
wiretapping, surveillance, and searches is an example of moving in the
wrong direction.
“The
government is rewarding failure,” Laura Murphy, director of the
Washington office of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) said
regarding the new FBI guidelines.
“When
the government fails – as it increasingly appears to have done
before September 11 – the Bush Administration’s response is to
give itself new powers rather than seriously investigating why the
failures occurred,” Murphy said.
“They
are taking advantage of the public’s concern about 9/11… and they
are rushing in a whole new set of powers.”
“Apparently
Attorney General Ashcroft wants to get the FBI back in the business of
spying on religious and political organizations,” said Margaret
Ratner of the Center for Constitutional Rights. “That alone would be
unconstitutional but history suggest the FBI won’t stop at passive
information gathering. We fear a return to the days of Cointelpro.”
Cointelpro
was a widespread domestic surveillance program run by the late J.
Edgar Hoover, previous head of the FBI, and used to spy on civil
rights activists such as Martin Luther King, the Black Panthers,
opponents of the Vietnam War and others.
Civil
liberties concerns were also raised as New York Police Department
officials held a briefing for landlords on how to spot “terrorist
tenants”, the New York Times reported Tuesday, June 4.
Landlords
were told to be wary of tenants who insist on first-floor apartments,
have little furniture, use cash, prefer pay phones, and “try to hide
their identities,” the Times said.
Other
recommendations included that the landlords “perform thorough
background checks and insist on seeing original documents, not
photocopies, to establish identities of potential tenants.”
Donna
Lieberman, executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union,
said she was worried that landlords might ignore people’s rights in
the name of security.
“Since
Sept. 11, the government has intruded on individual privacy rights in
areas beyond the war on terrorism. We hate to see the same thing
happen with regard to landlords and tenants, and we hope that this
does not turn into a situation where landlords engage in illegal
spying, harassment or discrimination.”
Meanwhile,
the monetary toll that this increased surveillance has taken on the
FBI has also raised concerns.
FBI
Director Robert S. Mueller III said Wednesday, June 5, that the bureau
has been “pushed, really pushed” to keep up with a
“substantial” number of people who are allegedly suspected of ties
to terrorists, U.S. daily newspaper, the Washington Post reported.
Mueller
admitted that this surveillance and beefed-up security measures are
“seriously taxing the agency’s resources,” the Post reported.
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