TRUMP'S DHS IS TREATING JOURNALISTS LIKE TERRORISTS
Earlier this week, the New York Times’ Mike Baker tweeted out the image of a Department of Homeland Security memo that had formed the basis of a report he had just co-authored. “We have low confidence,” the memo read, “in our assessment that sustained violence against government personnel and facilities in Portland, Oregon, since May reflects the enduring threat environment in the region because we lack insight into the motives for the most recent attacks.” That memo, and an internal FBI document also obtained by the Times, gave a glimpse into federal law enforcement’s view of the racial justice protests in the city: The feds didn’t seem to understand the nature of the demonstrations, but regarded them as a threat warranting aggressive force.
The documents were not classified. Baker and his colleagues were guilty only of practicing journalism. But in reporting the leaked documents, Baker and another journalist—Lawfare editor Benjamin Wittes, who had also published internal Homeland Security documents—became the subject of government “intelligence reports,” the kind typically used to collect information about “suspected terrorists and violent actors,” the Washington Post reported Thursday.
According to the Post, the DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis distributed Open Source Intelligence Reports about Baker and Wittes to federal law enforcement agencies in recent days. Such dossiers, current and former officials told the Post, are ordinarily compiled about suspected terrorists and the like, and are not meant to be used to put out information about American citizens unconnected to terrorism or violent actions. Using them to disseminate information about journalists represents a chilling threat to First Amendment rights.
Chad Wolf, the acting DHS secretary who has overseen the deployment of secret police in Portland, said after the Post report that the department would immediately stop producing dossiers about journalists. “In no way does the Acting Secretary condone this practice and he has immediately ordered an inquiry into the matter,” a spokesperson said in a statement. “The Acting Secretary is committed to ensuring that all DHS personnel uphold the principles of professionalism, impartiality and respect for civil rights and civil liberties, particularly as it relates to the exercise of First Amendment rights.” But Wolf’s blatant lack of “respect for the civil rights and civil liberties” of protesters in Portland, who have been shot at with impact munitions and taken off the streets in unmarked vans, raises significant questions about his sincerity. The dossiers have “no operational value whatsoever,” John Sandweg, a former DHS acting general counsel, told the Post. “This will just damage the intelligence office’s reputation.”
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/07/trumps-dhs-is-treating-journalists-like-terrorists
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