On November 1, 2018 then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced the launch of the "China Initiative" – a whole-of-government effort ostensibly designed to thwart espionage and technology theft by the People's Republic of China (PRC). Chinese American groups and...
Does the Government Classification System Need Reform?
For decades, presidents and their appointees have misused the classification system to conceal waste, fraud, abuse, and even criminal conduct, failing to properly manage classified federal records generally. That is why a new bipartisan effort to deal with this major...
The Quaint FISA Surveillance Debate
Before leaving town for the 2023 end-of-year holidays, Congress managed to avoid a 12:01am January 1, 2024 expiration of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). It began life in a totally unregulated form as a component of President George W....
When Speech Is ‘Terrorism’: The Legal and Political Assault on Stop Cop City
The multi-year battle by local Atlanta and national activists to stop construction of the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center – labeled "Cop City" by opponents – has entered a new phase. On August 14, ABC News reported that "#StopCopCity protesters had collected...
It Was All in Vain: Edward Snowden’s Sacrifice 10 Years On
This week marks the 10th anniversary of the first story featuring National Security Agency (NSA) contractor-turned-whistleblower Edward Snowden's initial revelation: the role of Verizon in aiding NSA's telephone metadata mass surveillance program. As the Guardian...
Time To End the FBI’s FISA Follies
This is reprinted from the Orange County Register with permission. Late last Friday, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) released a heavily redacted April 2022 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) opinion and order dealing with the...
Is the FBI’s ‘Black Identity Extremist’ Label Still in Use?
It's been over five years since the Federal Bureau of Investigation's (FBI) "Black Identity Extremist" (BIE) report was leaked to Foreign Policy magazine in early October 2017. The August 3, 2017, report – which alleged that "perceptions of police brutality against...
Is the UK’s Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament a US Government Surveillance Target?
According to a recent document obtained by the Cato Institute, the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation suggests that the State Department, and possibly the FBI, maintain an interest in the United Kingdom-based Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. As part of a multi-year...
Domestic Political Surveillance: How Deep Is DoD Involvement?
In the wake of George Floyd's murder and the nationwide protests it sparked over two years ago, among the other alarming developments that eventually came to light was the level of government surveillance of Americans protesting Floyd's death at the hands of the...
Is DoJ’s ‘China Initiative’ Going Away? Don’t Bet on It
February 2022 marks the 50th anniversary of then-President Richard Nixon's historic trip to the People's Republic of China (PRC), the initial step on the path to the normalization of relations between the two countries after decades of animosity, and even military...