Tag Archives: CIA

Election, Featured, Government Accountability, Hot, Podcast

President Trump: “Total Declassification” of Any/All Documents Related To Russia Investigation

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Handwritten notes from former CIA Director John Brennan prove that the Trump/Russia connection appears to have been approved first by the Hillary Clinton campaign and dreamed up by an advisor Jake Sullivan, who is now a major Biden advisor.

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Featured, International, Opinion, US

Dr. Ron Paul: Haspel is Not the Problem. The CIA is the Problem.

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(RPI) As a general rule, when Dick Cheney favors a foreign policy position it’s best to be on the opposite side if you value liberty over war and authoritarianism. The former vice president’s enthusiastic endorsement of not only Gina Haspel as CIA director but of the torture program she oversaw should tell us all we need to know about Haspel.

Saying that Haspel would make a great CIA director, Cheney dismissed concerns over the CIA’s torture program. Asked in a television interview last week about the program, Cheney said, “if it were my call, I’d do it again.”

Sadly, the majority of the US Senate agreed with Cheney that putting a torturer in charge of the CIA was a good idea. Only two Republicans – Senators Paul and Flake – voted against Haspel. And just to confirm that there really is only one political party in Washington, it was the “yes” vote of crossover Democrats that provided the margin of victory. Americans should really be ashamed of those sent to Washington to represent us.

Just this month, the New York Times featured an article written by a woman who was kidnapped and send to the secret CIA facility in Thailand that Haspel was said to have overseen. The woman was pregnant at the time and she recounted in the article how her CIA torturers would repeatedly punch her in the stomach. She was not convicted or even accused of a crime. She was innocent. But she was tortured on Haspel’s watch.

Is this really what we are as a country? Do we really want to elevate such people to the highest levels of government where they can do more damage to the United States at home and overseas?

Watch Related:
https://youtu.be/cQPazZ1FxkQ

As the news comes out that Obama holdovers in the FBI and CIA infiltrated the Trump campaign to try and elect Hillary Clinton, President Trump’s seeming lack of understanding of how the deep state operates is truly bewildering. The US increasingly looks like a banana republic, where the permanent state and not the people get to decide who’s in charge.

But instead of condemning the CIA’s role in an attempted coup against his own administration, Trump condemned former CIA director John Brennan for “undermining confidence” in the CIA. Well, the CIA didn’t need John Brennan to undermine our confidence in the CIA. The Agency itself long ago undermined the confidence of any patriotic American. Not only has the CIA been involved in torture, it has manipulated at least 100 elections overseas since its founding after WWII.

As President Trump watched Gina Haspel being sworn in as CIA director, he praised her: “You live the CIA. You breathe the CIA. And now you will lead the CIA,” he said. Yes, Mr. president, we understand that. But that’s the problem!

The problem is not Haspel, it’s not John Brennan, it’s not our lack of confidence. The problem is the CIA itself. If the president really cared about our peace, prosperity, and security, he would take steps to end this national disgrace. It’s time to abolish the CIA!

Reality Check

Reality Check: Will Haspel Stick to Her Word on Torture?

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It has been a heated fight for the nomination of Gina Haspel as the new CIA director. Some have nicknamed her the “Queen of Torture.”

Haspel, now confirmed as our next CIA director, said in her bid to head the agency that the torture program shouldn’t have happened. But should we believe her?

Let’s give it a Reality Check.

Before CIA Director Gina Haspel was confirmed on Thursday, she had written a letter saying that the CIA should not have carried out the post- 9/11 torture and rendition program.

According to the letter, sent to Virginia Sen. Mark Warner and obtained by CNN, Haspel now says that the torture program, “is not one the CIA should have undertaken.”

Haspel went on to say that the program had “ultimately done damage” to CIA officers and the U.S.’s “standing in the world.”

But she still claimed that the U.S. has gathered valuable intelligence from the program.

Keep in mind, as I have told you before, Gina Haspel didn’t just oversee a black site prison. She helped to destroy evidence of the program she now says did damage to the U.S. standing in the world.

But this isn’t the first CIA director to be exposed for their support of the torture program, and then to claim their opinion has changed.

Former CIA Director John Brennan defended the usefulness of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation tactics after the CIA torture report was released.

In a 2014 press conference, Brennan stated that the CIA’s actions resulted in “useful” intelligence despite them being “abhorrent” and even exceeding what’s legal.

And yet, during his confirmation hearings in 2013, Brennan expressed doubts that the CIA enhanced interrogation program had resulted in valuable intelligence.

So once he was confirmed, he shed those doubts and concluded that the agency was in the right to torture.

What you need to know is that Haspel could do exactly what Brennan did once confirmed as the new head of the CIA – backtrack on comments in the confirmation hearing and stand firm with the agency’s torture and rendition actions.

Remember, during the hearings Haspel offered her “personal commitment” to not restart such a detention and interrogation program with the CIA.

Can we trust Haspel? NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden tweeted about Gina Haspel’s nomination to the CIA director position, saying, “If the congress confirms Gina Haspel, who admitted to participating in a torture program and personally writing the order to destroy evidence of that crime, is “qualified” to head the CIA, it says more about our government than it does about her.”

That’s Reality Check. Let’s talk about that, right now, on Facebook and Twitter.

Featured, Foreign Policy, Government Accountability, International, US

White House Prepares to Defend CIA Nomination of Torture Authority Gina Haspel

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Gina Haspel, current Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency and nominee to lead the agency, is facing a wave of resistance from civil liberties advocates, Senators, and physicians who say her connection to past torture programs make her unfit to head the CIA. Haspel was involved in CIA “black site” prisons in Thailand and other foreign nations, and is known to have supported the use of torture. Further, Haspel is accused of destroying taped evidence of waterboarding and other forms of torture.

On Thursday, The Hill reported that the Trump Administration drafted a 27-page memo full of “talking points” meant to bolster the standing of Gina Haspel during her nomination hearing with the Senate Intelligence Committee on May 9. According to The Hill, the five main talking points highlight Haspel’s “experience and ‘common-sense’ leadership and note that she would be the first woman to lead the intelligence agency.” If her supporters are pressed about certain issues, including Haspel’s role in past torture incidents, they are encouraged to emphasize that “she is an ‘intelligence and national security expert’ who follows the law as written, and has demonstrated strong and clear leadership in very challenging positions.”

In a Reality Check last month, Ben Swann examined why Haspel’s nomination has come under scrutiny, detailing her past at the CIA including her supervision of “Cat’s Eye,” a CIA “black site” prison in Thailand.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkHJXaGv2b4

The American Civil Liberties Union condemned the administration and the CIA for supporting Haspel’s history of involvement in torture programs. “While the CIA has said that it is “committed to transparency,” it has so far only granted senators — and not the public — access to some classified information about Haspel,” the ACLU wrote.

“Last week, the CIA disclosed a 2011 memo — written by a former CIA official with a record of excusing torture — which supposedly cleared Haspel of responsibility for the destruction of evidence documenting the brutal torture of a man in CIA custody in 2002. But the CIA shouldn’t get to cherry-pick which documents it will declassify — while hiding the most important torture records.”

Haspel’s nomination has also been opposed by a coalition of physicians and health professionals who say she is unfit to be in a position of authority. On May 3, The Physicians for Humans Rights wrote a public letter noting that Haspel supervised the first “black site” in Thailand, “where agency personnel tortured detainees using waterboarding and other long-outlawed techniques.”

The letter states:

“As health experts who understand the profound mental, physical, and societal effects of torture, we oppose the selection of a nominee who helped conceal the use of torture and held a leadership position at a “black site” where it occurred. She was in a position to know about and influence aspects of a program that purposefully inflicted severe suffering and harm on individuals, to whom the United States has yet to provide rehabilitation or redress as required under the UN Convention Against Torture, a treaty ratified by the United States. Moreover, the program enlisted health professionals to inflict this harm, a grave breach of medical ethics. In Thailand, Haspel worked with contract psychologists James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen, who developed the experimental torture methods used on Abu Zubaydah, Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, and many others.”

The ACLU notes that “one former CIA official told The Daily Beast that Haspel ‘ran the interrogation program.'” The Daily Beast has previously confirmed that Haspel “was in a position of responsibility” during the interrogations of Abu Zubaydah, a Saudi Citizen who has been held in Guantanamo Bay due to accusations of terrorism. The Senate report on CIA torture examined the treatment of Zubaydah and found that the CIA’s own emails described his torture:

“In at least one waterboarding session, Abu Zubaydah ‘became completely unresponsive, with bubbles rising through his open, full mouth. According to CIA records, Abu Zubaydah remained unresponsive until medical intervention, when he regained consciousness and expelled ‘copious amounts of liquid.’”

In addition, Joseph Margulies, attorney for Zubaydah, recently filed a motion in court requesting a federal judge order the Office of the Director of National Intelligence to conduct a search for reportedly destroyed tapes which document the torture of Zubaydah and others. Courthouse News noted that “the motion also included a sworn declaration from Gail Helt, who said she believes some of the tapes still exist”. Helt told Courthouse News she believes Haspel’s “confirmation would send the message to subordinates that there are no consequences for anything, raising the likelihood that this happens again. I hope senators keep that in mind as they cast their votes.”

The destruction of these torture tapes is a significant part of why the public is largely still in the dark about torture. Haspel and her supporters have said she was simply following orders when she ordered her subordinates to destroy documentation of torture. The destruction of these torture tapes was reportedly ordered by Jose Rodriguez, former director of the CIA’s Counterterrorism Center. In 2005 he ordered the destruction of more than 90 videotapes that showed detainees undergoing waterboarding and other torture methods. When he was finally questioned under oath regarding why he ordered the videos destroyed, Rodriguez acknowledged that “it would make the CIA look bad, and almost, in my view, destroy the clandestine service because of it.”

In August 2017, a confidential agreement was reached between two psychologists tasked with designing and implementing the CIA’s torture program and the American Civil Liberties Union. The ACLU originally filed suit against James Mitchell and John Bruce Jessen in October 2015, accusing them of operating a “joint criminal enterprise” via their creation and promotion of violent torture methods. After the ACLU consistently overcame every legal barrier, the trial was scheduled to begin in June 2017. However, due to the Trump administration’s attempts to stop officials from testifying, U.S. District Court Judge Justin Quackenbush set a new date before a settlement was eventually reached. The settlement allowed Mitchell, Jessen, and the CIA to avoid the release of more damaging information related to the controversial torture program.

During the trial, the defense asked the judge to order Haspel “to provide a deposition discussing her allegedly pivotal involvement in an episode the CIA has tried repeatedly to put behind it.” However, the Trump administration and then-CIA Director Mike Pompeo asserted “state secrets” and kept Haspel from being questioned.

The continued secrecy surrounding Haspel’s true role in implementing the CIA’s torture program signals that the federal government seeks to conceal the actions taken by the latest nominee to head the world’s largest spy agency. A Washington Post article published May 6 has reported that Haspel “sought to withdraw her nomination Friday” in light of concern from White House officials that her background in torturing terrorism suspects might prevent her confirmation, according to four senior U.S. officials. “Haspel told the White House she was interested in stepping aside if it avoided the spectacle of a brutal confirmation hearing on Wednesday and potential damage to the CIA’s reputation and her own, the officials said.”

Civil Liberties, Foreign Policy, International, Politics, US

Rand Paul Grills State Sec. Nominee Pompeo on Foreign Policy

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Washington, D.C. — During the nomination hearing for Mike Pompeo as Secretary of State, on April 12, Senator Rand Paul (R-KY), who is the only Republican senator that has publicly announced opposition to President Trump’s nomination of CIA director Mike Pompeo to become Secretary of State, told Pompeo that his nomination doesn’t appear to align with the foreign policy view that Trump outlined during his presidential campaign.

“[Trump] says the Iraq war was the single worst decision ever made. So, once again, I’m concerned that you won’t be supporting the president,” Paul said to Pompeo. “That you will be influencing him in a way that I think his inclinations are actually better than many of his advisors. That the Iraq war was a mistake that we need to come home from Afghanistan.”

“He was against being involved in Syria at many times in his career,” Paul said, noting Trump’s previous public statements that implied opposition to “another Iraq war, bombing Syria without permission.”

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/375609403376144384

“So, these are the advice you will give and I guess that’s my biggest concern with your nomination is that I don’t think it reflects the millions of people who voted for President Trump who actually voted for him because they thought it’d be different. That it wouldn’t be the traditional bipartisan consensus to bomb everywhere and be everywhere around the world. So, that’s my main concern and I just want to make sure that that’s loud and clear to everyone that is my concern,” Paul repeated.

Paul also took issue with Pompeo’s belief that the President has the authority to bomb Assad’s forces or installations without congressional approval.

“Thanks for your testimony and thanks for going through this grueling enterprise and your willingness to serve the country. You discussed with Senator Kaine a little bit about whether or not the President has the authority to bomb Assad’s forces or installations in Syria and you mention historically, well we have done it in the past,” Paul said.

“I don’t think that’s a complete enough answer,” the senator added. “I mean my question would be do you think it’s constitutional? Does the President have the constitutional authority to bomb Assad’s forces? Does he have the authority absent congressional action to bomb Assad’s forces or installations?” Paul asked.

“Senator, as I — I think I said this to Senator Kaine, I’m happy to repeat my view on this. Those decisions are weighted. Every place we can, we should work alongside Congress to get that, but yes, I believe the President has the domestic authority to do that. I don’t think — I don’t think that has been disputed by Republicans or Democrats throughout an extended period of time,” Pompeo asserted.

Paul argued against Pompeo’s assertion, stating, “Actually it was disputed mostly by our founding fathers who believed they gave that authority to Congress and actually they’re uniformly opposed to the executive branch having that power. In fact, Madison wrote very specifically.”

“The executive branch is the branch most prone to war. Therefore, we have with studied care vested that authority into the legislature,” Paul added. “So, the fact that we have in the past done this doesn’t make it constitutional and I would say that I take objection to the idea that the president can go to war when he wants, where he wants.”

Paul’s continued his questioning of Pompeo by asking, “With regard to Afghanistan, some have argued that it’s time to get out of Afghanistan. What do you think?”

Watch below:

h/t RCP

Reality Check

Reality Check: Would Trump’s New CIA Director Reinstate Torture Program?

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The next director of the CIA might be one of the most controversial picks ever.

Gina Haspel not only helped to oversee the CIA’s torture program, but may have also destroyed evidence in an effort to hide torture techniques. And one CIA whistleblower says Haspel and those around her “tortured for the sake of torture.”

Is this really the person who should run the Central Intelligence Agency?

Let’s give it a Reality Check you won’t get anywhere else.

Gina Haspel is making headlines as the newly nominated director of the Central Intelligence Agency. She’s been chosen to step in for outgoing CIA Director Mike Pompeo, who President Trump chose to become Secretary of State in place of outgoing Rex Tillerson.

Some of those headlines are for her being the first woman nominated to the top CIA post. But others are rightfully questioning her connections to the CIA’s failed torture program.

So who is Haspel?

Well, we know she’s been with the CIA since 1985 and was assigned to the Central European Division.

According to the New York Times, Haspel served “in Turkey and Central Asia, before ascending to station chief in New York, where she was posted when Osama bin Laden was killed and worked closely with the F.B.I. as the agencies combed through files taken from his compound.”

In her career, she’s also headed up the CIA station in London — twice — and served as the acting director of the CIA’s National Clandestine Service in 2013.

But what’s troubling is her role in torture, and destruction of evidence of torture, dating back to 2002.

In October 2002, Haspel was placed in charge of the CIA “black site” prison named “Cat’s Eye” in Thailand. She arrived after Al Qaeda terror suspect Abu Zubaydah was waterboarded and tortured at the cite.

But, under her watch, another Al Qaeda suspect, Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, was waterboarded three times.

I’m sure you know what waterboarding is… it’s a torture technique that simulates a drowning sensation.

The CIA doesn’t like the word torture… instead, they call waterboarding one of 13 “enhanced interrogation techniques” used on detainees dating back to 2001.

Former CIA officer John Kiriakou, who blew the whistle on the agency’s torture practices and went to prison for it, knew Haspel personally. Kiriakou had this to say about her in an interview on Democracy Now.

After the “Cat’s Eye” black site was closed in December 2002, Haspel went to work in the CIA’s National Clandestine Service in Washington, D.C under former director Jose Rodriguez.

This is where Haspel’s background becomes even more troubling.

According to the New York Times, Haspel encouraged her bosses at the CIA in 2005 to destroy video recordings of “enhanced interrogation,” including the tapes of Zubaydah’s waterboarding. Her direct boss, the head of the agency’s Counterterrorism Center, ultimately signed the order to feed the 92 tapes into a shredder.

The videotapes were destroyed just as debates heated up around the globe as to whether these techniques were illegal under U.S. and international laws. And yet, no one was charged in the destruction of what may have been evidence of illegal activity.

At the time the public did not know the extent to which these techniques were being used by our government on suspected terrorists. Candidly, we still don’t, but we did get a glimpse of the CIA torture and rendition program, and its failures, in 2014.

Back in 2012, the Senate Committee on Intelligence voted 9-6 to approve a 6,000 page report on a study of the CIA’s Detention and Interrogation Program.

Just 525 pages of the full report have been declassified since December 2014, but it’s enough to show how mismanaged and ineffective the enhanced interrogation or torture program was in protecting Americans.

Ultimately the report found that the CIA’s torture techniques conducted at black sites did not help the agency get the cooperation of detainees or result in any actionable intelligence.

We know from the report that these CIA black sites were hotbeds for torture. Torture, including stress positions to sleep deprivation to waterboarding.

So why would Trump appoint someone with extensive connections to a secret torture program that failed to protect Americans?

Because Trump believes that the torture program wasn’t “tough enough.” He explained on the campaign trail.

And in an interview with CBS News, Trump further explained that he would want waterboarding to be the “minimum” when fighting terrorism.

What you need to know is that President Trump’s effort to bring waterboarding back to the CIA —if it ever actually ended—might backfire, because he’s putting Gina Haspel in the hot seat.

You see, Haspel’s hearing presents the first time the Senate has had an opportunity to question, under oath, someone directly involved in the CIA torture program. But it’s not just the program the public needs to know more about.

It’s the decision to act and then to destroy evidence of those actions that Haspel and others must be held accountable for.

If no illegal acts were committed, why destroy the evidence?

Reality Check here: Among senior officials, Gina Haspel’s acts are likely not the most egregious in the CIA when it comes to torture. In fact, her actions to carry out the CIA’s torture program, and her actions to help hide evidence of that program, again, among senior officials, is likely not unique. What is unique, is that we know about it.

That’s Reality Check. Let’s talk about that, right now, on Twitter and Facebook.

Civil Liberties, Foreign Policy, Politics, US

Ex-FBI Asst. Director: “High-Ranking” Officials Conspired to Protect Clinton

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Washington, D.C.— Former FBI assistant director James Kallstrom said that he believes there was an internal plot among “high-ranking people throughout government, not just the FBI,” to exonerate Hillary Clinton for political purposes during the 2016 presidential election.

While appearing on “Sunday Morning Futures” on Fox News with Maria Bartiromo, Kallstrom, a 27-year veteran of the FBI, was asked: “Do you think somebody was directing them or do you think they just came to the conclusion on their own, this leadership at the FBI and the Department of Justice, that they wanted to change the outcome of the election?”

“I think we have ample facts revealed to us during this last year and a half that high-ranking people throughout government, not just the FBI, high-ranking people had a plot to not have Hillary Clinton, you know, indicted,” Kallstrom responded.

“I think it goes right to the top,” Kallstrom continued. “And it involves that whole strategy – they were gonna win, nobody would have known any of this stuff, and they just unleashed the intelligence community. Look at the unmaskings. We haven’t heard anything about that yet. Look at the way they violated the rights of all those American citizens.”

Kallstrom claimed the Trump-Russia story was essentially a “back-up plan.”

“They had a backup plan to basically frame Donald Trump and that’s what’s been going,” Kallstrom said.

[RELATED: Reality Check: GOP Memo and FISA Problems]

Kallstrom discussed other “high-ranking” individuals he believed to be involved in a conspiracy to insulate Hillary Clinton and damage Donald Trump.

“Jim Comey is not a stupid individual. I think he’s naive and has an ego the size of the Empire State Building, and he has a lot of other faults, that got him into this trouble,” said Kallstrom. “But I could be wrong, they could have been in lockstep. But there is no question that he, and McCabe others in the FBI, and we’ll find out the State Dept., and the National Security Advisors to the president, and John Brennan. Did you see John Brennan’s remarks?”

In a December appearance on Fox Business, Kallstrom said that a “cabal” of individuals, including top FBI officials, had conducted a politicized witch hunt meant to undermine Trump’s legitimacy.

“People tweet each other and they send text messages, but they don’t plan. The FBI is not in the business of planning to destroy a President of the United States,” Kallstrom added, referring to the infamous “insurance policy” texts. “I think they were way above their capability. This guy thinks he’s the lone ranger, this Peter Strzok.”

 

Opinion

Judge Napolitano: March Madness, Washington-Style

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For the past few days, the nation’s media and political class have been fixated on the firing of the No. 2 person in the FBI, Deputy Director Andrew McCabe. McCabe became embroiled in the investigation of President Donald Trump because of his alleged approval of the use of a political dossier, written about Trump and paid for by the Democrats and not entirely substantiated, as a basis to secure a search warrant for surveillance of a former Trump campaign adviser who once boasted that he worked for the Kremlin at the same time that he was advising candidate Trump.

The dossier itself and whatever was learned from the surveillance formed the basis for commencing the investigation of the Trump campaign’s alleged ties to Russia by the Obama Department of Justice, which is now being run by special counsel Robert Mueller and has been expanded into other areas. The surveillance of the Trump campaign based on arguably flimsy evidence put McCabe into President Trump’s crosshairs. Indeed, Trump attacked McCabe many times on social media and even rejoiced when Attorney General Jeff Sessions fired him at 10 p.m. last Friday, just 26 hours before his retirement was to have begun.

Why the fixation on this? Here is the back story.

After the unlawful use of the FBI and CIA by the Nixon administration to spy on President Nixon’s domestic political opponents, Congress passed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act in 1978. This statute outlawed all domestic surveillance except that which is authorized by the Constitution or by the new Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.

That court, the statute declared, could authorize surveillance of foreigners physically located in the United States on a legal standard lesser than that which the Constitution requires. Even though this meant Congress could avoid the Constitution — an event that every high school social studies student knows is unconstitutional — the FISC enthusiastically embraced its protocol.

That protocol was a recipe for the constitutional crisis that is now approaching. The recipe consists of a secret court whose records and rulings are not available to the public. It’s a court where only the government’s lawyers appear; hence there is no challenge to the government’s submissions. And it’s a court that applies a legal standard profoundly at odds with the Constitution. The Constitution requires the presentation of evidence of probable cause of a crime as the trigger for a search warrant, yet FISA requires only probable cause of a relationship to a foreign power.

In the years in which the FISC authorized spying only on foreigners, few Americans complained. Some of us warned at FISA’s inception that this system violates the Constitution and is ripe for abuse, yet we did not know then how corrupt the system would become. The corruption was subtle, as it consisted of government lawyers, in secret and without opposition, persuading the FISC to permit spying on Americans.

The logic was laughable, but it went like this: We need to spy on all foreigners, whether they’re working for a foreign government or not; we need to spy on anyone who communicates with a foreigner; and we need to spy on anyone who has communicated with anyone else who has ever communicated with a foreigner.

These absurd extrapolations, pressed on the FISC and accepted by it in secret, turned FISA — a statute written to prevent spying on Americans — into a tool that facilitates it. Now, back to McCabe.

Though the use of FISA for domestic spying on ordinary Americans came about gradually and was generally known only to those in the federal intelligence and law enforcement communities and to members of the Senate and House intelligence committees, by the time McCabe became deputy director of the FBI, this spying was commonplace. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (is it really a court, given that its rulings are secret and it hears only the government and it rejects the constraints of the Constitution?) has granted 99.9 percent of government surveillance requests.

So when McCabe and his colleagues went to the FISC in October 2016 looking for a search warrant to conduct surveillance of officials in the Trump campaign, they knew that their request would be granted, but they never expected that their application, their work and the purpose of their request — as far removed as it was from the original purpose of FISA — would come under public scrutiny.

Indeed, it was not until the surveillance of Trump and his colleagues in the campaign and the transition came to light — with McCabe as the poster boy for it — that most Americans even knew how insidiously governmental powers are being abused.

The stated reason for McCabe’s firing was not his abuse of FISA but his absence of candor to FBI investigators about his use of FISA. I don’t know whether those allegations are the true reasons for his firing or McCabe was sacrificed at the altar of government abuse — because those who fired him also have abused FISA.

But I do know that there are lessons to learn in all this. Courts are bound by the Constitution, just as are Congress and the president. Just because Congress says something is lawful does not mean it is constitutional. Secret courts are the tools of tyrants and lead to the corruption of the judicial process and the erosion of freedom.

And courts that hear no challenge to the government and grant whatever it wants are not courts as we understand them; they are government hacks. They and the folks who have facilitated all this have undermined personal liberty in our once free society.

The whole purpose of the Constitution is to restrain the government and to protect personal liberty. FISA and its enablers in both major political parties have done the opposite. They have infused government with corruption and have assaulted the privacy of us all.

Civil Liberties, Government Accountability, Politics, Privacy, US

Rand Paul: Deep State Exists, Uses Intelligence for Political Purposes

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Washington, D.C.— Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) said Tuesday during an appearance on The Laura Ingraham Show podcast that the term “deep state” accurately describes how an unelected bureaucracy of national security officials in positions of power exert influence without Congressional oversight.

“Absolutely, there is a deep state, because the deep state is the intelligence agencies that do not have oversight,” he said. “Only eight people in Congress know what they’re doing, and traditionally, those eight people have been a rubber stamp to let the intelligence communities do whatever they want. There is no skeptic among the eight people that are supposedly overseeing the intelligence community.”

The “Gang of Eight”  that Paul referenced is made up of the majority and minority leaders of the House of Representatives and Senate, along with the chairmen and ranking members of the two intelligence committees, and are the select few members of Congress with real-time access to America’s most sensitive intelligence.

[RELATED: Reality Check: Ex CIA Director Says U.S. Meddles for a ‘Good Cause’]

Paul pointed out that he believed Obama-era CIA Director John Brennan, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and others used intelligence collected “without any judicial warrants” for political purposes, in addition to “try to bring Trump down.”

“John Brennan and James Clapper were doing whatever the hell they wanted, without any judicial warrants, and I think there were numerous people in the Obama administration who were using intelligence — one, to try to bring Trump down; but two, also, they were using it for political purposes,” he said. “And this is very, very worrisome.”

Paul evidenced his point by noting Brennan’s politicized tweet over the weekend calling Trump a corrupt demagogue, and promising that America would “triumph” over him.

“This is the real problem,” Paul said. “And [founding father James] Madison warned about this from the beginning. Madison said that men are not angels. And all you gotta do is look at John Brennan’s tweet to know that he’s not an angel. And listen to James Clapper lying to the Senate about whether they were spying on Americans.”

Paul previously tweeted that Brennan’s attacks on the “Bill of Rights” and “freedoms of every American” while running the CIA were “disgraceful.”

Further solidifying Paul’s point about “men are not angels,” Samantha Power, former UN Ambassador under President Obama, issued an ominous tweet: “Not a good idea to piss off John Brennan.”

Many took this tweet by Powers as an implicit threat on behalf of Brennan. After strong social media backlash following her tweet, Powers sent a follow-up tweet that aimed to walk back the implied threat she had first issued.

Rand Paul’s commentary starts at roughly 21:30 in the podcast below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3E7BPxqTitg

Foreign Policy, Government Accountability, Politics, US

Rand Paul Labels ex-CIA Director Brennan “Disgraceful” for Politicized Tirade

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Washington, D.C. – Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) on Sunday took aim at former CIA Director John Brennan, who on Friday night stated that Trump will go down in history as a “disgraced demagogue.” Paul responded that Brennan’s attacks on the “Bill of Rights” and “freedoms of every American” while running the agency were “disgraceful.”

Brennan’s tweet exposed the politicized nature of the former CIA Director:

“This man had the power to search every American’s records without a warrant,” Paul tweeted Sunday. “What’s disgraceful is attacking the Bill of Rights and the freedom of every American.”

As Fox News reported, this is not the first time Paul has called Brennan out for his lack of respect for the rule of law; in 2013, the Kentucky senator undertook a 13-hour filibuster on the floor of the Senate to block Brennan’s nomination by President Obama to head the CIA, questioning whether the administration believed it was legal to launch a drone strike on an American citizen on U.S. soil.

Then, only 18 months later, Paul was part of a bipartisan effort to remove Brennan as CIA Director in the wake of revelations that the agency had spied on Senate Intelligence Committee staffers and lied to Congress about it.

Paul’s recent criticism of Brennan comes in response to Brennan’s tweet about Trump, which was likely prompted by Attorney General Jeff Sessions firing FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe two days before his retirement and eligibility for a full pension.

Despite the suggestion of impropriety in the firing of McCabe, Sessions issued a statement that noted the firing of McCabe was based upon a report regarding McCabe’s conduct from the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) that was sent to the FBI’s Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR).

“The FBI’s OPR then reviewed the report and underlying documents and issued a disciplinary proposal recommending the dismissal of Mr. McCabe. Both the OIG and FBI OPR reports concluded that Mr. McCabe had made an unauthorized disclosure to the news media and lacked candor − including under oath − on multiple occasions,” read Sessions’ statement.

Perhaps even more revealing was former UN Ambassador Samantha Power’s tweet in regards to Brennan’s tweet, where she claimed, “it’s not a good idea to piss off John Brennan.”

Some social media users took the opportunity to remind the public that investigative journalist Michael Hastings was working on a piece about then-CIA Director Brennan when he died under suspicious circumstances.

https://twitter.com/Cernovich/status/975421322732847104

After backlash followed her commentary, Powers sent a follow-up tweet that aimed to spin the authoritarian nature of her initial tweet.

In an interview with Fox News, former Secret Service agent Dan Bongino took issue with Brennan’s overwhelming hubris.

“Brennan’s worried about how he claimed— under oath, by the way— that he had no information about the [Trump] dossier, yet went up and briefed people on Capitol Hill,” he said.

“Stay off the air, go get a lawyer and pipe down. You’re in a lot more trouble than you think you are. You’re hubris is overwhelming right now,” Bongino said, noting the unmaskings reportedly undertaken by Power and claiming that the two participated “in the largest government conspiracy to spy on a presidential candidate in modern American history.”

Featured, Government Accountability, Politics, US

Rand Paul Announces He’ll Oppose Trump’s State Dept. & CIA Nominees

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Washington, D.C.— Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), who sits on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, announced on Wednesday that he would oppose President Trump’s nominees to head the State Department and CIA, potentially impeding their path to Senate confirmation.

“I will oppose both Pompeo’s nomination and Haspel’s nomination,” Paul said.

Trump announced the firing of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson on Tuesday, and nominated CIA Director Mike Pompeo, an aggressive foreign policy hawk, to serve as his new Secretary of State – while nominating Gina Haspel, the CIA’s deputy director, to serve as the new head of the CIA after Pompeo moves to the State Department.

Paul said he was “perplexed” how Trump could nominate Pompeo given his support for regime change in Iraq as well as support and advocacy for regime change in Iran. The libertarian leaning Republican senator said Pompeo’s support of regime change contradicts the skepticism Trump expressed on the campaign trail toward foreign interventions and regime change.

“It perplexes me that he is now nominating someone for secretary of State who has advocated and pushed for regime change in Iran,” Paul said.

Haspel, who oversaw the U.S. torture program at a secret CIA prison and later destroyed the recorded evidence, is a lighting rod for controversy given her intimate participation in the torture of individuals suspected by the US of being connected to terrorism. Paul noted his opposition for Haspel’s nomination due to her role in the Bush-era CIA torture program at black site prisons.

“My opposition to her is over her direct participation in interrogation and her gleeful enjoyment of someone being tortured,” said Paul.

“I find it just amazing that anyone would consider having this woman as the head of the CIA,” Paul said. “Certainly, there is a career officer at the CIA who did not directly participate in waterboarding that we can nominate,” he continued. “Rewarding someone who was in charge of something so heinous is a really big mistake.”

CBS News reports that Paul’s opposition to Haspel’s nomination could put her potential confirmation as head of the CIA in jeopardy if all 49 Democratic Senators voted against Haspel – with only one other Republican, aside from Paul, needing to vote no to block her nomination. Paul did not rule out a filibuster to prevent Pompeo from being confirmed.

Featured, Foreign Policy, Government Accountability, International, Politics, US

Trump’s New CIA Director Gina Haspel Oversaw US Torture Program

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Washington, D.C.— After announcing Tuesday that CIA Director Mike Pompeo had been selected to replace outgoing Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, President Donald Trump named Deputy CIA Director Gina Haspel as his choice to become the intelligence agency’s new Director.

Haspel is intimately connected to one of the CIA’s most controversial programs in recent memory, as she was in charge of the U.S. torture of terror suspects. The newly named CIA director was reportedly involved in the torture and interrogation of two suspected members of al-Qaeda, Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, while working as a clandestine officer in Thailand in 2002.

According to a report in The New Yorker:

From 2003 to 2005, Gina Haspel was a senior official overseeing a top-secret C.I.A. program that subjected dozens of suspected terrorists to savage interrogations, which included depriving them of sleep, squeezing them into coffins, and forcing water down their throats. In 2002, Haspel was among the C.I.A. officers present at the interrogation of Abu Zubaydah, an Al Qaeda suspect who was tortured so brutally that at one point he appeared to be dead.

Not only did Haspel oversee the controversial torture program, but in 2005 she also took part in the coverup of the evidence in relation to the torture program by destroying recordings of the torture of Zubaydah and al-Nashiri at which she was present.

[RELATED: ACLU, Human Rights Watch Call for Criminal Investigation into CIA Torture Tactics]

Until 2009, CIA operatives were able to legally torture suspected terrorists in “black sites” across the world until then-President Barack Obama ended the practice via executive order. The secret CIA program, known as R.D.I.— rendition, detention, and interrogation— involved kidnapping terror suspects from across the world and delivering them to third party countries to be tortured.

John Sifton, a senior official at Human Rights Watch, said that Haspel’s extensive connection to the secret CIA program is significant.

“You are putting a person in a leadership position who was centrally involved in an illegal program,” Sifton told The New Yorker.

The promotion of Haspel is a reflection of Trump and Pompeo’s proclivity to accept torture as legitimate. Trump has previously stated that he would like to reinstate waterboarding, with Pompeo previously on record noting that he would consider reinstating it. Trump’s own Secretary of Secretary of Defense, James Mattis, told him that torture was ineffective, and that a pack of cigarettes and a couple of beers would elicit more intelligence than torture.

Sen. Ron Wyden weighed in on the announcement, noting that the “government can no longer cover up disturbing facts from her past.”

“Ms. Haspel’s background makes her unsuitable to serve as CIA director,” Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) said in a statement Tuesday. “Her nomination must include total transparency about this background, which I called for more than a year ago when she was appointed deputy director. If Ms. Haspel seeks to serve at the highest levels of U.S. intelligence, the government can no longer cover up disturbing facts from her past.”

Foreign Policy, Government Accountability, International, Politics, US

Peer Reviewed Study Asserts US History of Interfering in Foreign Elections

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Washington, D.C. — The mainstream media continues to report heavily on Russian interference in the U.S. election process narrative, but according to a peer reviewed study by Dov Levin, a fellow in the Institute for Politics and Strategy at Carnegie Mellon University, the United States is king when it comes to election meddling.

Attempts at intervening in the internal domestic politics of other countries is nothing new, and the U.S. and Russia both have a long history of spreading political propaganda, covertly supporting military coups, channeling funds and rigging polls, according to Levin’s research.

Levin’s research indicates that between 1946 and 2000 there were 117 combined “partisan electoral interventions” between the United States and the Soviet Union/Russia, or “one in every nine competitive national level executive election”; with the U.S. accounting for nearly 70 percent of the cases of election meddling.

In a brief summary of his research, Levin wrote:

In a dataset I constructed (called PEIG) the US and the USSR/Russia have intervened in this manner 117 times between 1946 and 2000–or, put another way, in about one of every nine competitive national level executive elections during this period. Both countries used a variety of methods for this purpose, including public threats or promises, the secret provision of money to the preferred party or candidate’s campaign, “dirty tricks” such as the release of true (or false) damaging information about the undesired side, or either an increase in foreign aid or other assistance before election day or a withdrawal this kind of aid.

At least 21 of the interventions reportedly took place in the post-Cold War era between 1990 and 2000, of which 18 were carried out by the United States. The cases involved varying degrees of interference, but nearly two thirds of the meddling was done covertly, with voters being completely unaware that a foreign power was attempting to influence the election process and results.

“60 different independent countries have been the targets of such interventions,” Levin noted, with 45 being allegedly targeted by the United States.  “The targets came from a large variety of sizes and populations, ranging from small states such as Iceland and Grenada to major powers such as West Germany, India, and Brazil.”

A Channel 4 News report on Levin’s research highlighted some of the specific countries that were targeted by covert electoral intervention operations:

According to Levin’s research, those countries where secret tactics have been deployed by the US include: Guatemala, Brazil, El Salvador, Haiti, Panama, Israel, Lebanon, Iran, Greece, Italy, Malta, Slovakia, Romania, Bulgaria, Albania, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, South Vietnam and Japan.

For Russia, the list of covert interventions includes: France, Denmark, Italy, Greece, West Germany, Japan, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, the Congo, Venezuela, Chile, Costa Rica, and the US.

Channel 4 also noted that “Covert interventions have been done by many countries over the years and – because they are shrouded in secrecy – it’s impossible to get a comprehensive picture of every instance across the world.”

“Although they usually get far less international attention and media coverage than various violent forms of meddling, partisan electoral interventions, or attempts by foreign powers to intervene in elections in other countries in order to help or hinder one of the candidates or parties, are actually quite common,” Levin summarized. “Such interventions can frequently have significant effects on election results in the intervened country, increasing the vote share of the assisted side by 3% on average – enough to determine the identity of the winner in many case.”

Levin’s figures do not include military coups or regime change attempts following the election of a candidate the U.S. opposed.

Featured, Foreign Policy, Government Accountability, International, US

Fmr. CIA Director Admits the U.S. Interferes in Foreign Elections

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Washington, D.C. – After the federal indictment of 13 Russian citizens accused of conspiracy to defraud the US, former Bill Clinton-era CIA director James Woolsey took to the media to criticize Russia and frame the narrative surrounding alleged Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election— but in the process, he ended up admitting that the United States meddles in foreign elections “only for good cause and in the interest of democracy.”

After Woolsey declared the dangers of an “expansionist Russia” and saying that the nation “has a larger cyber-army than its standing army,” Fox News host Laura Ingraham asked the former CIA chief:

“Have we ever tried to meddle in other countries’ elections?”

The response by the former head of the CIA was surprisingly candid:

“Oh probably, but it was for the good of the system…” said Woolsey, bringing up examples of US interference in Europe during the late 40’s to “stop the communists from taking over.”

Ingraham then questioned whether the U.S. still interferes in foreign elections, asking, “We don’t do that now though? We don’t mess around in other people’s elections?”

The response by Woolsey clearly intimated that the U.S. continues to interfere in the elections of other sovereign countries:

“Well… mmm.. only for a very good cause… only for a very good cause and in the interests of democracy.”

The Russian embassy in the UK highlighted the commentary by Woolsey, responding: “Says it all.”

[RELATED: US-Backed Secret “Cuban Twitter” Comes Under Criticism]

In fact, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), an organ of the US State Department, was kicked out of Russia in 2012 amid accusations that the organization was engaged in more than humanitarian work in Russia, and had sought to “influence the political process, including elections at various levels and civil society,” according to a Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman.

At the time, President Vladimir Putin blamed then-US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for attempting to interfere in the Russian political system through USAID and fomenting protests in Russia. Putin said Clinton “gave them a signal, they heard this signal and started active work.”

Russia is not alone in their suspicions about USAID being used as a tool to manipulate the internal political process of sovereign states, according to a report in The LA Times:

USAID “threatens our sovereignty and stability,” the eight-nation Bolivarian Alliance of the Americas fumed in June in a resolution that accused the United States of political interference, conspiracy and “looting our natural resources.”

The problem is USAID doesn’t just try to boost economies, healthcare and education in poor countries. It also spends about $2.8 billion a year teaching campaign skills to political groups, encouraging independent media, organizing fair elections and funding other grass-roots activities intended to promote democracy and human rights.

Some foreign leaders view those American efforts as thinly veiled attempts to weaken the status quo or even engineer a change of governments.

As the mainstream media vilifies Russia for election interference, which reportedly amounted to highlighting and amplifying preexisting divisions within the social structure of the United States, Woolsey’s words indicate that the United States engages in meddling in other countries’ elections as well.

Politics

CIA Argues The Public Can’t See Classified Information It Has Already Given To Favored Reporters

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(DCF) Intelligence officials can selectively release classified information to trusted journalists while withholding the same information from other citizens who request it through open records laws, CIA lawyers argued Wednesday.

In a motion filed in New York federal court, the CIA claimed that limited disclosures to reporters do not waive national security exemptions to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. Intelligence and law enforcement agencies frequently deny records requests on the basis of protecting sensitive national security information, one of nine exemptions written into the federal FOIA law.

The case stems from lawsuit against the CIA by New York-based independent journalist Adam Johnson, who had used FOIA to obtain emails between the agency’s public information office and selected reporters from the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post and The New York Times. The emails the CIA provided to Johnson were redacted, leading him to question why he was not allowed to see the same information that had been given to uncleared reporters.

Johnson challenged the redaction in court, arguing that the CIA, once it has selectively disclosed information to uncleared reporters, cannot claim the same information is protected by a FOIA exemption.

The judge in the case appeared to find Johnson’ argument compelling. In a court order last month, Chief Judge Colleen McMahon of the Southern District of New York said FOIA laws do not authorize limited disclosure, to favored journalists or otherwise.

“In this case, CIA voluntarily disclosed to outsiders information that it had a perfect right to keep private,” she wrote. “There is absolutely no statutory provision that authorizes limited disclosure of otherwise classified information to anyone, including ‘trusted reporters,’ for any purpose, including the protection of CIA sources and methods that might otherwise be outed.

McMahon also said it didn’t matter if the journalists in question published the information they received, only if the CIA waived its right to deny the information.

“The fact that the reporters might not have printed what was disclosed to them has no logical or legal impact on the waiver analysis, because the only fact relevant to waiver analysis is: Did the CIA do something that worked a waiver of a right it otherwise had?” she wrote, asking CIA lawyers to come up with a stronger defense for non-disclosure.

The CIA’s response on Wednesday centered on the contention that the information disclosed to favored reporters had not actually entered the public domain. As such, the limited disclosure did not constitute a waiver of the FOIA exemption, government lawyers said.

“The Court’s supposition that a limited disclosure of information to three journalists necessarily equates to a disclosure to the public at large is legally and factually mistaken,” the CIA motion stated. “The record demonstrates beyond dispute that the classified and statutorily protected information withheld from the emails has not entered the public domain.”

Selective disclosure of classified information to uncleared reporters is a fairly common practice recognized by Congress, which requires briefings by the CIA on such disclosures, according to Steven Aftergood, the director of the Federation of American Scientists’ Project on Government Secrecy. Johnson’s case, if decided in favor of the CIA, could end up ratifying the practice via the courts, Aftergood says.

Johnson has until March 1 to reply to the government’s motion, which asks for a summary judgement in favor of the CIA.

Written by: Will Racke

Follow Will on Twitter

 

 

This article was re-published with permission from the Daily Caller Foundation

Government Accountability, Politics, US

Ex-CIA Operative Declares FBI is “Ticked” in Wake of FISA Memo; Pledges “We’re Going to Win”

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Washington, D.C. –Philip Mudd, former deputy director of the CIA’s National Counterterrorism Center, said on CNN that despite the recent declassification and release of the GOP FISA memo, which alleged FBI and U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) surveillance abuse, the FBI is not worried – and is “going to win.”

Mudd, a CIA counterterrorism analyst for CNN, noted that the FBI is not concerned about the release of the memo, claiming that the recent arrival of Trump as president 13 months ago is inconsequential when compared to the 110-year history of the agency.

“I know how this game is going to be played. We’re going to win,” Mudd, who served as a analyst for the CIA before becoming the deputy national intelligence officer for the Near East and South Asia on the US National Intelligence Council, told CNN.

In spite of the declassified memo alleging abuses by the FBI and DOJ, over which Arizona Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ) has announced he will pursue criminal charges of treason, Mudd claimed that Trump will be unable to “push us off” the Russian collusion investigation.

 “They [the FBI] are going to be saying (I guarantee it): You [Trump] think you can push us off this [investigation] because you can try to intimidate the [FBI] director? You better think again, Mr. President. You have been around for 13 months. We have been around since 1908,” Mudd said.

[RELATED: 5 Critical Facts the FBI Reportedly Withheld from FISA Court About the Trump Dossier]

Mudd went on to say that “FBI people are ticked,” and ironically claiming that accusations of widespread corruption in the agency, despite being based on evidence, are “an attack on [its] ability to conduct an investigation with integrity.”

The FISA memo was written by House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes and other Republican lawmakers, and made several claims of misconduct, including how FBI and DOJ officials utilized unverified opposition research from a dossier to acquire and then renew a warrant to put a former Trump campaign official under government surveillance.

The FBI reportedly failed to inform the FISA court of Steele’s self-professed disdain for Trump, which had been previously noted in official FBI records.

As previously reported, in the wake of the release of the declassified FISA memo, Gosar  announced that he will pursue a criminal prosecution of officials in both the Justice Department and FBI for “treason.”

“House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Memorandum on the FBI abuse of FISA warrants wasn’t just evidence of incompetence but clear and convincing evidence of treason,” wrote Gosar. The congressman labeled the behavior by FBI and Justice Department officials as “third word politics where official government agencies are used as campaign attack dogs.”

Numerous Democratic politicians, mainstream media outlets, as well as current and former security service officials fiercely resisted the publication of the memo detailing FBI and DOJ abuse, claiming the release would “endanger national security.”

Election, Featured, Politics

Ex-CIA Chief: ‘American Armed Forces Would Refuse to Act’ If Trump Ordered Torture

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“I would be incredibly concerned if a President Trump governed in a way that was consistent with the language [on military tactics] that candidate Trump expressed during the campaign,” said former National Security Agency and Central Intelligence Agency director Michael Hayden.

In the above-embedded clip from Friday’s episode of Real Time with Bill Maher, Hayden specifically pointed to Trump’s advocacy of the use of enhanced interrogation techniques that he described as “worse than waterboarding” and the killing of terror suspect’s families as examples of policies that would violate international norms and drive American soldiers and intelligence agents to refuse orders.

“Look, we did tough stuff,” said Hayden. However, he said that extremes like killing terrorists’ non-combatant family members were not options that even crossed his mind as an intelligence chief.

[RELATED: Reality Check: Why Donald Trump’s South Carolina Win Was A Historic Defeat of NeoCons]

“If he were to order that once in government, the American armed forces would refuse to act,” he said.

Hayden concluded, “[U.S. military personnel] are not required — in fact you are required not to follow an unlawful order. That would be in violation of all the international laws of armed conflict.”

In an interview with CNN, Hayden said of Trump’s military tactics rhetoric and Ted Cruz’s advocacy of carpet bombing to deal with ISIS, “We have taken … very complicated, serious issues and we’ve pushed them down to the level of bumper stickers. That scares me and I’m sure it scares a lot of the rest of the world.”

[RELATED: What the Media Missed When Trump Brought Up ‘Very Secret’ Papers]

Ex-CIA attorney John Rizzo said that intelligence agents who participated in enhanced interrogation techniques have turned against using them after feeling the backlash of a shift in public opinion.

Rizzo told NBC News, “The political winds changed, they were vilified as ‘torturers’ and ‘war criminals,’ — just for doing their thankless and dangerous jobs to keep the country safe. And now, under a Trump administration, many of these same CIA career officers would be ordered to go down — perhaps double down — on that perilous path again? Who could blame for them for refusing to expose themselves and their families to a reprise someday of the ordeal they have had to endure? I hope and trust no CIA director — or its lawyer — would countenance such an order.”

For more 2016 election coverage, click here.

Follow Barry Donegan on Facebook and Twitter.

Civil Liberties, Featured, Government Accountability, Police Accountability

Records: U.S. Marshals Used Stingray Surveillance Nearly 6,000 Times

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According to newly released records, the U.S. Marshals Service has used cellphone surveillance tools, sometimes known as Stingrays, on the phones of nearly 6,000 suspects. The Marshals Service accidentally confirmed its use of the devices to USA Today during a Freedom of Information Act request for a copy of the agency’s log of cases in which agents had used stingrays.

Truth In Media has written extensively about Stingrays, or cell-site simulators, and how they are being used to track suspected criminals while largely operating without oversight from local, state, or federal authorities. Exactly how the devices operate and what data they collect and/or save has been unknown because of the vast degree of secrecy surrounding the tools.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation describes the Stingray as “a brand name of an IMSI (International Mobile Subscriber Identity) Catcher targeted and sold to law enforcement. A Stingray works by masquerading as a cellphone tower– to which your mobile phone sends signals to every 7 to 15 seconds whether you are on a call or not– and tricks your phone into connecting to it.”

In a response to USA Today’s FOIA request, the Marshals Service included an “almost totally censored” spreadsheet listing its Stingray cases. Although the details of the specific cases were blacked out USA Today was able to count the number of entries the agency had made on its log of Stingray uses. The agency described the log in a letter as “a listing of IMSI catcher use.”

USA Today reported:

“The Marshals Service’s surveillance log lists 5,975 cases in which the Marshals Service used stingrays. The agency declined to say what time period the log covered, or where the suspects were arrested. It also declined to identify the suspects, to protect their privacy.”

“Just that sheer number is significant,” American Civil Liberties Union lawyer Nathan Wessler told USA Today. “That’s a lot of deployments of a very invasive surveillance tool.”

“The Marshals Service confirmed its use of the devices to USA TODAY only in the process of trying to keep it secret, rejecting a Freedom of Information Act request for a copy of its log of cases in which agents had used stingrays,” USA Today reported.

The new details make it clear that the U.S. Marshals Service has used the devices more than any other agency. It was recently reported that the New York Police Department used Stingrays about 1,000 times since 2008. It was also previously revealed that the Baltimore Police Department used the technology more than 4,300 times.

This is not the first time the public has learned details of the U.S. Marshals’ cellphone surveillance program. In late 2014, the Wall Street Journal revealed a cell-phone monitoring program operated by the U.S. Marshals Service using small planes. The program involved the Marshals using Cessna planes mounted with cell-site simulators similar to stingrays. These so-called “dirt boxes” are supposed to be used for criminal investigations, but they are capable of collecting data from tens of thousands of people on each flight.

In early March of 2015, it was also revealed that the CIA has been working with the Marshals on the program. Over the last ten years, the U.S. Marshal’s Technical Operations Group worked with the CIA’s Office of Technical Collection to develop the technology. The agencies have spent more than $1 million developing the technology. USA Today reports that the Technical Operations Group instructs agents not to reveal “sensitive or classified information or programs” without approval, unless a court orders them to do so.

“For any sensitive technique, method, source or tool, it only makes good sense that law enforcement would not divulge this information,” William Sorukas, a former supervisor of the Marshals Service’s domestic investigations, told USA Today.

The U.S. Marshals Service has not commented on the findings.

In 2015, the Department of Justice ordered federal agents to begin obtaining search warrants before using stingrays. As of February 2016, several federal agencies are known to be using the devices, including the FBI, the NSA, the U.S. Marshals, the CIA, the IRS, and the ATF.

Election, Featured, Politics

GOP Candidates Voice Support for Waterboarding, Increasing Guantanamo Detainees

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Seven of the remaining GOP candidates participated in a debate hosted by ABC News in Manchester, New Hampshire on Saturday, and when asked about waterboarding and other methods of torture used by the CIA, several candidates voiced their support.

The topic came up when moderator David Muir noted a comment Texas Sen. Ted Cruz made in Dec. 2014, when discussing the release of the Senate Intelligence Committee’s report on the forms of torture used by the CIA on suspected terrorists after 9/11.

Muir noted that at the time Cruz said, “Torture is wrong, unambiguously, period. Civilized nations do not engage in torture,” and then Muir asked if Cruz would classify waterboarding as torture.

Cruz said that “under the definition of torture,” waterboarding would be classified as “enhanced interrogation,” due to the fact that it is not “excruciating pain that is equivalent to losing organs and system.”

[pull_quote_center]Well, under the definition of torture, no, it’s not. Under the law, torture is excruciating pain that is equivalent to losing organs and systems, so under the definition of torture, it is not. It is enhanced interrogation, it is vigorous interrogation, but it does not meet the generally recognized definition of torture.[/pull_quote_center]

When asked if he would bring back waterboarding as president, Cruz said he would not bring it back “in any sort of widespread use,” but that if it were necessary to “prevent a city from facing an imminent terrorist attack,” he would “use whatever enhanced interrogation methods we could to keep this country safe.”

[pull_quote_center]I would not bring it back in any sort of widespread use. And indeed, I joined with Senator McCain in legislation that would prohibit line officers from employing it because I think bad things happen when enhanced interrogation is employed at lower levels. But when it comes to keeping this country safe, the commander in chief has inherent constitutional authority to keep this country safe. And so, if it were necessary to, say, prevent a city from facing an imminent terrorist attack, you can rest assured that as commander in chief, I would use whatever enhanced interrogation methods we could to keep this country safe.[/pull_quote_center]

Muir then turned to business mogul Donald Trump, who voiced his support for bringing back waterboarding in Nov. 2015 when he said, “I think waterboarding is peanuts compared to what they do to us.”

Trump shared a similar sentiment at the debate and said he would “bring back a hell of a lot worse than waterboarding,” because in the Middle East, “we have people chopping the heads off Christians, we have people chopping the heads off many other people.”

[pull_quote_center]We have things that we have never seen before— as a group, we have never seen before, what’s happening right now. The medieval times— I mean, we studied medieval times— not since medieval times have people seen what’s going on. I would bring back waterboarding and I’d bring back a hell of a lot worse than waterboarding.[/pull_quote_center]

While former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush said he wouldn’t bring waterboarding back, he also said he believes the United States needs to expand its “intelligence capabilities,” and he said he believes closing the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay would be a “complete disaster.”

[pull_quote_center]Congress has changed the laws, and I think where we stand is the appropriate place. But what we need to do is to make sure that we expand our intelligence capabilities. The idea that we’re going to solve this fight with predator drones, killing people somehow is more acceptable than capturing them, securing the information. This is why closing Guantanamo is a complete disaster.[/pull_quote_center]

When asked if he believes waterboarding is torture, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio said he that when people “talk about interrogating terrorists” they acts as if “this is some sort of law enforcement function,” when instead it is “anti-terrorism.”

[pull_quote_center]When people talk about interrogating terrorists, they’re acting like this is some sort of law enforcement function. Law enforcement is about gathering evidence to take someone to trial, and convict them. Anti-terrorism is about finding out information to prevent a future attack so the same tactics do not apply.[/pull_quote_center]

Rubio also said he believes they should not be discussing “in a widespread way the exact tactics that we’re going to use,” because that could allow “terrorist(s) to know to practice how to evade us,” and he went on to criticize the release of detainees from Guantanamo Bay.

[pull_quote_center]Here’s the bigger problem with all this, we’re not interrogating anybody right now. Guantanamo’s being emptied by this president. We should be putting people into Guantanamo, not emptying it out, and we shouldn’t be releasing these killers who are rejoining the battlefield against the United States.[/pull_quote_center]

For more election coverage, click here.