Constitutional Law Prof Blog

Does the Superseding Assange Indictment Implicate the First Amendment?

Professor Ruthann Robson, City University of New York (CUNY) School of Law

As anticipated, the Department of Justice has filed a superseding indictment  against WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange.

The 18 count indictment charges 17 violations of the Espionage Act, 18 U.S.C. §793, as well as one count of conspiracy to commit computer intrusion. The factual recitations revolve around Chelsea Manning occurring in 2010; other highly publicized allegations involving President Trump and Hillary Clinton do not make an appearance (and their names are not mentioned in the indictment).

The charges of unauthorized obtaining and receiving of "National Defense Information" (counts 1-8) and unauthorized disclosure of that same national defense information (counts 9-17) raise First Amendment issues. 

The argument is — quite simply — that Assange has done nothing different than other journalists who have published government information and should be covered by the same constitutional protections afforded the New York Times in The New York Times v. United States (1971), "The Pentagon Papers" Case. 

In Assange's situation, the issue is not prior restraint but criminal liability, but certainly the same principles apply as we previously discussed. (Also consider the documentary on Daniel Ellsburg).

This issue has been brewing for a while. A good primer on the intersection between the Espionage Act and First Amendment protections of a free press, is Stephen Vladeck's 2007 article, Inchoate Liability and the Espionage Act: The Statutory Framework and the Freedom of the Press, 1 Harvard Law & Policy Review 219, available here.

 

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AG Barr Invokes States Secrets Privileges in Twitter Suit

Steven D. Schwinn, John Marshall Law School

Attorney General Barr invoked the state secrets privilege to protect material in Twitter's suit against the Justice Department for forbidding it from publishing information on National Security Letters and  surveillance orders that it received from the government. 

The case, Twitter v. Barr, arose when Twitter sought to publish a Transparency Report describing the amount of national security legal process that the firm received in the second half of 2013. Twitter sought to publish this information because it said that the government wasn't completely forthcoming in its public comments about the extent of national security legal process served on it. DOJ declined Twitter's request to publish the information, citing national security concerns, and Twitter sued under the First Amendment. Here's Twitter's Second Amended Complaint.

DOJ now asserts the state secrets privilege in order to protect certain information in the pending case. But there are two things that make the assertion a little unusual. First, DOJ asserts the privilege not against the Transparency Report itself or the information contained in it, but instead against a confidential submission (the "Steinbach Declaration") that explains why Twitter's request to publish this information could harm national security. In other words, DOJ says that the explanation why the underlying information could harm national security itself could harm national security. 

Next, Twitter's attorney now has a security clearance to view the material, yet DOJ argues that the privilege should still protect the material--even from Twitter's security-cleared attorney. (DOJ's position has been that the court could review material in camera and ex parte and make a determination as to whether it could come in.) In fact, much of the government's submission is dedicated to arguing why privileged material can't be released to a security-cleared plaintiff's attorney. (In short: It would increase the risk of disclosure.)

The government argues that the privileged material is such an important part of Twitter's suit that, without it, the court must dismiss the case.

DOJ cites four categories of privilege-protected classified national security information that appear in the Steinbach Declaration: (1) information regarding national security legal process that has been served on Twitter; (2) information regarding how adversaries may seek to exploit information reflecting the government's use of national security legal process; (3) information regarding the government's investigative and intelligence collection capabilities; and (4) information concerning the FBI's investigation of adversaries and awareness of their activities.

The government's submission is supported by declarations of AG Barr and Acting Executive Assistant Director of the National Security Branch of the FBI Michael McGarrity. The government separately submitted a confidential version of McGarrity's declaration.

Importantly, AG Barr's declaration draws on the Attorney General's Policies and Procedures Governing Invocation of the State Secrets Privilege, adopted in the Obama Administration as a response to the widely regarded overly aggressive assertions of the privilege during the Bush Administration. AG Barr's references to this document suggest that the current DOJ will respect the principles stated in it. 

Daily Read: The Pentagon Papers Case, Prior Restraint, and Fire and Fury

Professor Ruthann Robson, City University of New York (CUNY) School of Law

Today brings the news that the President is contemplating litigation to halt the publication of Fire and Fury:Inside the Trump White House by Michael Wolff.  This followed a reported cease and desist letter to former White House "chief strategist" and insider Steve Bannon for talking with Wolff in alleged violation of a nondisclosure agreement.

The letter to the book's publisher is reportedly based on a claim of defamation:

“Actual malice (reckless disregard for the truth) can be proven by the fact that the Book admits in the Introduction that it contains untrue statements. Moreover, the Book appears to cite to no sources for many of its most damaging statements about Mr. Trump. Also, many of your so-called ‘sources’ have stated publicly that they never spoke to Mr. Wolff and/or never made the statements that are being attributed to them. Other alleged ‘sources’ of statements about Mr. Trump are believed to have no personal knowledge of the facts upon which they are making statements or are known to be unreliable and/or strongly biased against Mr. Trump.” 

But behind the obvious relevance of New York Times v. Sullivan (1964) which set the doctrine of actual malice for defamation under the First Amendment, lurks another case involving the New York Times: New York Times v. United States (1971), often called the "Pentagon Papers Case." 

It is the Pentagon Papers Case that solidified the disfavor for prior restraint. 

The brief per curiam opinion in the 6-3 decision stated that there is "a heavy presumption against its constitutional validity," and the government "thus carries a heavy burden of showing justification for the imposition of such a restraint."  While it is certainly the United States government that is a party to the Pentagon Papers Case, most commentators and scholars believe that it was President Nixon who was at the forefront of the attempt to stop publication of the papers. Arguably, the Pentagon Papers involved "state secrets," but President Trump, like Nixon, has been criticized as conflating his own interests with that of the government.

It's thus a good time to reconsider the continuing relevance of the case and its litigation. One perspective is available in the movie The Post involving the Pentagon Papers and starring Meryl Streep as Katharine Graham, the publisher of The Washington Post.

Another good perspective is a recent conversation between James C. Goodale, author of Fighting for the Press: the Inside Story of the Pentagon Papers and Other Battles and Jeremy Scahill, one of the founders of The Intercept and author of Dirty Wars: The World Is a Battlefield, which I moderated at CUNY School of Law. 

Here's the video:

 

 

Second Circuit Finds NSA's Bulk Telephony Metadata Collection Not Authorized by Congress

Professor Ruthann Robson, City University of New York (CUNY) School of Law

In its lengthy, well-reasoned, and unanimous opinion in American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) v. Clapper, the Second Circuit today concluded that NSA's bulk telephony metadata collection is not authorized by §215 of the PATRIOT Act, 50 USC §1861(b)(2)(A).   After hearing oral arguments last September, the panel reversed the district court's opinion that had rejected both the statutory and constitutional challenges to the scheme.  Recall that this widespread collection has been controversial since the program was first revealed through information obtained by Edward Snowden; we've additionally discussed the issues here, here, and here.

The Second Circuit, in the opinion authored by Gerard Lynch, did agree with the district judge that the ACLU plaintiffs had standing to challenge the collection of call records.  The court stated that "the government’s own orders demonstrate that appellants’ call records are indeed among those collected as part of the telephone metadata program."  The court rejected the government's contention that any alleged injuries depend on the government's reviewing the information collected rather than simply collecting it: the collection is [challenged as] a seizure and the Fourth Amendment prohibits both searches and seizures.  The court distinguished Amnesty International v. Clapper in which the United States Supreme Court's closely divided opinion concluded that the alleged standing was based on a "speculative chain of possibilities."  Instead:

appellants’ alleged injury requires no speculation whatsoever as to how events will unfold under § 215 – appellants’ records (among those of numerous others) have been targeted for seizure by the government; the government has used the challenged statute to effect that seizure; the orders have been approved by the FISC; and the records have been collected.

The panel likewise held that the ACLU organizations have standing to assert a First Amendment violation regarding its own and its members' rights of association.

However, the court did not rule on the Fourth and First Amendment claims explicitly, although its conclusion regarding §215 occurs in the shadow of the constitutional issues, or as the court phrases it: "The seriousness of the constitutional concerns" has "some bearing on what we hold today, and on the consequences of that holding." 

What the court does hold is that "the telephone metadata program exceeds the scope of what Congress has authorized and there violates §215."  After a discussion of the program and §215, it first considers the government's arguments that the judiciary is precluded from considering the issue.  The court interestingly observes that judicial preclusion here would "fly in the face of the doctrine of constitutional avoidance."

[I]t would seem odd that Congress would preclude challenges to executive actions that allegedly violate Congress’s own commands, and thereby channel the complaints of those aggrieved by such actions into constitutional challenges that threaten Congress’s own authority. There may be arguments in favor of such an unlikely scheme, but it cannot be said that any such reasons are so patent and indisputable that Congress can be assumed, in the face of the strong presumption in favor of APA review, to have adopted them without having said a word about them.

The court likewise held that there was no implicit preclusion.  

On the merits of the §215 challenge, the court essentially found that the government's interpretation of "relevant" was too broad.  The court noted that both parties relied on the grand jury analogy, supported by the statute's language and legislative history.  Yet for the court, the government's argument faltered on this very ground:

Search warrants and document subpoenas typically seek the records of a particular individual or corporation under investigation, and cover particular time periods when the events under investigation occurred. The orders at issue here contain no such limits. The metadata concerning every telephone call made or received in the United States using the services of the recipient service provider are demanded, for an indefinite period extending into the future. The records demanded are not those of suspects under investigation, or of people or businesses that have contact with such subjects, or of people or businesses that have contact with others who are in contact with the subjects – they extend to every record that exists, and indeed to records that do not yet exist, as they impose a continuing obligation on the recipient of the subpoena to provide such records on an ongoing basis as they are created. The government can point to no grand jury subpoena that is remotely comparable to the real‐time data collection undertaken under this program.

Moreover, the court relies on the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (PLCOB) Report regarding the overbreadth, noting that "counterterrorism in general" is not sufficiently narrow.  Further, the court states that the government's interpretation reads the "investigation" language of §215 out of the statute, and even more specifically, §215's language "relevant to an authorized investigation (other than a threat assessment)."

 

Again, the court squarely rests its conclusion on §215 and avoids the constitutional issues.  Nevertheless, it does discuss them.  It largely relegates the First Amendment issue to a footnote (footnote 12).  Its discussion of the Fourth Amendment issue is more robust, including a discussion of  Smith v. Maryland, the 1979 pen register case, and United States v. Jones, the 2012 GPS case.

 

These constitutional issues would - - - should? - - - shape any understanding by Congress according to the court.

 

Concurring, Judge Robert Sack, emphasizes that the role of the courts should not be minimized.  Judge Sack's concurrence is also worth reading its more robust discussion of the First Amendment issues.

 

Perhaps unexpectedly, the court does not enjoin the metadata collection program.  The court notes that §215 is set to expire and that it is "prudent to pause to allow an opportunity for debate in Congress that may (or may not) profoundly alter the legal landscape."   Yet, it strongly implies, it remains ready and able to reach the constitutional issues if necessary.

 

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Court Dismisses Defamation Case on Government State Secret Assertion

Steven D. Schwinn, John Marshall Law School

Judge Edgardo Ramos (SDNY) dismissed a private defamation case this week after the government moved to intervene and asserted the state secrets privilege. Judge Ramos ruled that moving forward with the case at all (even excluding privileged evidence) would "impose an unjustifiable risk of disclosing state secrets." The ruling thus puts an end to the case, unless and until appealed. It is not a ruling on the merits, however.

The case, Restis v. American Coalition Against Nuclear Iran, involves Greek shipping magnate Victor Restis's defamation claim against the group United Against Nuclear Iran for claiming, as part of its "name and shame" campaign, that Restis was involved in the illegal exportation of Iranian oil in violation of international sanctions. Restis sued UANI, and the government intervened and moved to dismiss on state secrets grounds, filing a classified declaration by the head of the government department that has control over the matter in support. (The government asserted, and the court apparently accepted, that the government couldn't even reveal "the department that has control over the matter" without risking the disclosure of secret information.)

Judge Ramos reviewed the declaration in camera and held two ex parte, in camera meetings with the government before determining that the state secrets privilege applied. "Having carefully reviewed the classified declarations and documents submitted by the Government ex parte, and being cognizant of a district court's obligation to grant 'utmost deference' to the executive's determination of the likely import of disclosure of the information on military or diplomatic security, the Court is satisfied that there is a reasonable danger that disclosure of the facts underlying the Government's assertion would in fact jeopardize national security."

Judge Ramos went on to say that "further litigation of this action would impose an unjustifiable risk of disclosing state secrets" and dismissed the case entirely. (Under the state secrets privilege, Judge Ramos might have allowed the case to move forward without the privileged evidence. But here, he said, any further litigation would risk disclosure.)

Notably absent from the ruling was any discussion of the state secrets privilege as a separation-of-powers principle. (Treating the privilege as a separation-of-powers principle has in the past led to a much more robust privilege, as in the Fourth Circuit's ruling in El-Masri.) Instead, Judge Ramos treated the privilege as it was designed and as the government apparently asserted it--as an evidentiary privilege. Even so, the government's assertion of the privilege resulted in the dismissal of the entire case.

Judge Ramos rejected the plaintiff's arguments that the government shouldn't be able to rely only on ex parte submissions for its assertion and that the case could be litigated in an in camera trial--because the evidence was apparently too secret even to tell the lawyers. Judge Ramos wrote, "The nature of the information here requires that counsel not be granted access."

Judge Ramos gave a hat tip--but only a hat tip--to the plaintiff's interest in access to justice:

The Court recognizes that dismissal is a "harsh sanction." It is particularly so in this case because Plaintiffs not only do not get their day in court, but cannot be told why.

Still, he said that "dismissal is nonetheless appropriate," because "there is no intermediate solution that would allow this litigation to proceed while also safeguarding the secrets at issue."

Daily Read (and Videos): James Risen on James Risen

With the denial of certiorari in James Risen's case by the United States Supreme Court in June 2014, from the Fourth Circuit's divided opinion in United States v. Sterling, the situation of James Risen is in limbo.  In large part, it was Risen's book, State of War that led to his current difficulties because he will not reveal a source. 

Now Risen has a new book, Pay Any Price: Greed, Power, and Endless War, just reviewed in the NYT.  As part of the book promotion - - - but also quite relevant to the case against Risen - - - Risen has made several media appearances of note, with the twist on the book title being that it's James Risen who is prepared to "pay any price" to protect his journalistic integrity (and by implication resist governmental power).

Perhaps the most populist of Risen's appearances is in an extended segment of the television show "60 minutes" including not only James Risen but others.  The segment explains and situates the controversy, including its current status under President Obama.  It also includes statements by General Mike Hayden that he is at least "conflicted" about whether Risen should be pursued for not divulging his source(s), even as Hayden expresses his view that NSA surveillance is "warantless but not unwarranted." 

The entire segment is definitely worth watching:

 

 

 

Springboarding to some extent from General Hayden's remarks is Risen's extensive interview with Amy Goodman on Democracy Now (full video and the helpful transcript is here), in which Risen talks about his arguments in the book and a bit about his own predictament, concluding by saying:

AMY GOODMAN: So, you’re covering the very people who could put you in jail.

JAMES RISEN: Yeah, sometimes, yes. As I said earlier, that’s the only way to deal with this, is to keep going and to keep—the only thing that the government respects is staying aggressive and continuing to investigate what the government is doing. And that’s the only way that we in the journalism industry can kind of force—you know, push the government back against the—to maintain press freedom in the United States.

A third noteworthy appearance by Risen is his interview by Terry Gross on NPR's Fresh Air (audio and transcript available here).  One of the most interesting portions is near the end, with the discussion of the contrast to the celebrated Watergate investigation of Woodward and Bernstein and Risen's solution of a federal shield law for reporters.

For ConLawProfs teaching First Amendment, these "sources" could be well-used.

CFP: The Snowden Effect

The Law Review at Lincoln Memorial University in Knoxville, Tennessee is soliciting papers for its January Symposium "The Snowden Effect."

Here's the call for what looks like an important conference:

 

Call for Papers

The staff of the Lincoln Memorial University Law Review invites submissions related to its Spring 2015 Symposium entitled “The Snowden Effect: The Impact of Spilling National Secrets.” The Symposium will be held on Friday, January 30, 2015 at the LMU-Duncan School of Law in downtown Knoxville, Tennessee. 

The LMU Law Review’s goal for the Symposium is to facilitate discussion among scholars and practitioners regarding the implications of the national security disclosures by former government contractor Edward Snowden. Topics will include, but not necessarily be limited to: the protection of government sources and methods; Fourth Amendment and privacy issues; the effect of the Snowden disclosures and other such security leaks on U.S. foreign policy, particularly or relationships with our allies; surveillance state concerns; and the classification of government material.

The LMU Law Review will publish a dedicated symposium issue related to the Symposium’s theme. The Law Review welcomes submissions for this specially-themed issue, which will be comprised of several articles, notes, and essays bringing together leading experts on the theory, application, and scholarly analysis of these contemporary national security issues.

To be considered for publication in the symposium issue, please submit by October 15, 2014: (1) an abstract or a draft article; and (2) a curriculum vitae (CV). Participation in the Symposium is not a requirement for publication in the symposium issue. All materials should be submitted through the LMU Law Review’s website.

For more information contact the Editor in Chief of the law review at jacob.baggett (AT)lmunet.edu.

 

Federal Judge Declares No-Fly List Process Unconstitutional

Professor Ruthann Robson, City University of New York (CUNY) School of Law

In her  opinion in Latif v. Holder, Judge Anna Brown of the District of Oregon concluded that the "no-fly list" violates the Fifth Amendment's guarantee of due process.

Judge Brown's well-crafted 65 page opinion applies the well-established "balancing test" for  procedural due process first articulated by the United States Supreme Court in 1976 in Mathews v. Eldridge.  Under this test, a court weighs several factors to determine "how much process is due":

• the interests of the individual and the injury threatened by the official action;
• the risk of error through the procedures used and probable value, if any, of additional or substitute procedural safeguards;
• the costs and administrative burden of the additional process, and the interests of the government in efficient adjudication

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After analyzing the factors and weighing the government's interest in preventing terrorism heavily, Judge Brown considered similar "terrorism" cases and noted that the

Plaintiffs in this case were not given any notice of the reasons for their placement on the No—Fly List nor any evidence to support their inclusion on the No—Fly List. Indeed, the procedural protections provided to Plaintiffs through the DHS TRIP process fall substantially short of even the notice that the courts found insufficient [in another case].

Moreover, the government's failure to provide any notice of the reasons for Plaintiffs’ placement on the No—Fly List

is especially important in light of the low evidentiary standard required to place an individual in the TSDB in the first place. When only an ex parte showing of  reasonable suspicion supported by "articulable facts . . . taken together with  rational inferences” is necessary to place an individual in the TSDB, it is certainly possible, and probably likely, that “simple factual errors” with “potentially easy, ready, and persuasive explanations” could go uncorrected.

[ellipses in original].  Thus, she concludes that "without proper notice and an opportunity to be heard, an individual could be doomed to indefinite placement on the no-fly list."

In granting partial summary judgment in favor of the Plaintiffs, Judge Brown directed the government defendants to "fashion new procedures" that provide the Plaintiffs with the requisite due process "without jeopardizing national security."

Certainly this litigation, which already has an extensive history, is far from over, but Judge Brown's finding of a lack of procedural due process in the government's no-fly lists is exceedingly important.

 

Court Denies Certiorari in James Risen's "Reporter's Privilege" Case

The United States Supreme Court denied certiorari in the closely watched case of Risen v. United States (13-1009).

NYT Reporter James Risen via

Recall our analysis of the sharply divided Fourth Circuit panel opinion in United States v. Sterling, with James Risen as Intervernor, that declared there was no First Amendment right - - - or common law privilege - - - for a reporter to resist a subpoena to reveal the identity of a source. 

 

NSA Documents Database

Need to find a particular document or search for a particular name in the trove of items made available from the National Security Agency?  Or just want to look around?

The ACLU now has a handy database, available here.

As the announcement explains:

This tool will be an up-to-date, complete collection of previously secret NSA documents made public since last June. The database is designed to be easily searchable – by title, category, or content – so that the public, researchers, and journalists can readily home in on the information they are looking for.

We have made all of the documents text-searchable to allow users to investigate particular key words or phrases. Alternatively, the filter function allows users to sort based on the type of surveillance involved, the specific legal authorities implicated, the purpose of the surveillance, or the source of the disclosure. For example, you can have the database return all documents that both pertain to "Section 215" and "Internal NSA/DOJ Legal Analysis."

An important tool for scholars and advocates. 

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Disparate Views of the Secret Service: The Court and the Realities?

Professor Ruthann Robson, City University of New York (CUNY) School of Law

In the oral arguments last week in Wood v. Moss and the Court's 2012 decision in Reichle v. Howards, the Secret Service was center stage.  Recall that both cases involve qualified immunity for Secret Service agents against constitutional claims and raise the specter that the individual agents acted inappropriately.  And in both cases, there is some valorization of the agents and their difficult task of protecting the President (in Wood) and the Vice-President (in Reichle). 

Arguing for the United States Government in Wood v. Moss, the Deputy Solicitor General expressed the fear that not upholding qualified immunity would lead to a "demoralization of the service leaning in the direction of being overly careful and therefore risking the life of the President" and that allowing discovery is "exactly the nightmare scenario that the Secret Service fears" including "
discovery into what the agents were thinking" and "what the Secret Service's policies were." 

And in Reichle, Justice Ginsburg concurring in the unanimous opinion, discusses the difficult facts in the case as well as deference to the agents' role:

Officers assigned to protect public officials must make singularly swift, on the spot, decisions whether the safety of the person they are guarding is in jeopardy. In performing that protective function, they rightly take into account words spoken to, or in the proximity of, the person whose safety is their charge. Whatever the views of Secret Service Agents Reichle and Doyle on the administration’s policies in Iraq, they were duty bound to take the content of Howards’ statements into account in determining whether he posed an immediate threat to the Vice President’s physical security. Retaliatory animus cannot be inferred from the assessment they made in that regard.

But one wonders how positive views of the Secret Service suffer given recurrent scandals involving the Secret Service.  As the United States Supreme Court was considering Reichle, there was the scandal in Colombia involving more than a dozen agents, but a later Homeland Security report (official synposis here) found that there was not "widespread sexual misconduct."  Most recently, at least one agent assigned to protect the President was reportedly "found drunk and passed out in a hotel hallway."  This latest scandal was reportedly not good news for the Secret Service's first woman director who has "tried to implement reforms."  One former Secret Service agent writes in a WaPo op-ed that the problem is not bad agents but bad leadership." 

But whether attributed to bad leadership or what might be called "bad apples," should these revelations about the bad judgments of secret service agents influence the Court's own judgments?  Doctrines such as qualified immunity and strict pleading requirements that prevent discovery serve to protect Secret Service agents from their "nightmares" (as the Deputy Solicitor General phrased it), but might they also insulate the Secret Service from responsibility for the nightmares they cause others. 

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Calls for Congressional Action on Surveillance: "The Day We Fight Back"

Professor Ruthann Robson, City University of New York (CUNY) School of Law

Labeled "The Day We Fight Back Against Mass Surveillance," February 11, 2014 has been designated as a day to "make calls and drive emails to lawmakers" regarding two pieces of legislation.

The activists support the USA Freedom Act, S 1599 ("Uniting and Strengthening America by Fulfilling Rights and Ending Eavesdropping, Dragnet-collection, and Online Monitoring Act).  The Electronic Frontier Foundation supports the bill, but considers it a "floor not a ceiling" and discusses its limitations including not covering persons outside the US, encryption, and standing issues.  The ACLU legislative counsel "strongly supports" the legislation, noting that while it is not perfect, it is an "important first step," and highlights the fact that one of the sponsors in the House of Representatives is Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner (R-WI), who "was the lead author of the Patriot Act and now is the chair of the House's Subcommittee on Terrorism and Crime."

The activists urge the rejection of The FISA Improvements Act S 1631, most closely associated with the bill's sponsor, Dianne Feinstein.

While focused on legislative action, many of the materials and arguments ground themselves in the First and Fourth Amendments.  Organizers state that the day commemorates Aaron Swartz, who also invoked constitutional norms.

Daily Read: The Intercept on the NSA and Targeted Killing

Professor Ruthann Robson, City University of New York (CUNY) School of Law

A new digital publication, The Intercept, created by Glenn Greenwald, Laura Poitras, and Jeremy Scahill, launched today.  It describes itself as devoted to reporting on the documents previously provided by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, and in the longer term, to broaden its scope.

Included is the article "The NSA’s Secret Role in the U.S. Assassination Program" by Scahill and Greenwald, arguing that the NSA uses electronic surveillance, rather than human intelligence, as the primary method to locate targets for lethal drone strikes, which is "an unreliable tactic that results in the deaths of innocent or unidentified people."

The article relies on a variety of sources, confidential and not, to paint a portrait of the "targeted killing" program.  It ends by implicating President Obama:

Whether or not Obama is fully aware of the errors built into the program of targeted assassination, he and his top advisors have repeatedly made clear that the president himself directly oversees the drone operation and takes full responsibility for it.

And Obama may even think it's one a "strong suit" of his.

This will definitely be a publication to watch for anyone interested in Executive, military, and other government powers.

Obama's Speech and Directive on NSA Surveillance

Professor Ruthann Robson, City University of New York (CUNY) School of Law

In a highly anticipated event today, President Obama delivered his remarks accompanied by a directive, Presidential Policy Directive/PPD-28, on "Signals Intelligence Activities,"  regarding NSA Surveillance.   Recall that late last year a presidential advisory committee issued a report with specific recommendations, that one program has been subject to differing judicial interepretations - - - in Klayman v. Obama, Judge Richard Leon granted a preliminary injunction against NSA surveillance of telephone metadata, while in American Civil Liberties Union v. Clapper,  Judge William J. Pauley granted a motion to dismiss in favor of the government, finding the same program constitutional - - - and that the national discussion on this issue is largely attributable to Edward Snowden.

While the judicial opinions did not specifically feature in Obama's remarks, Snowden did:

Given the fact of an open investigation, I’m not going to dwell on Mr. Snowden’s actions or motivations. I will say that our nation’s defense depends in part on the fidelity of those entrusted with our nation’s secrets. If any individual who objects to government policy can take it in their own hands to publicly disclose classified information, then we will never be able to keep our people safe, or conduct foreign policy. Moreover, the sensational way in which these disclosures have come out has often shed more heat than light, while revealing methods to our adversaries that could impact our operations in ways that we may not fully understand for years to come.

As for Obama's specific reforms, critics might also argue that they are more "heat than light."  Importantly, Obama did pay more attention to "foreign" persons.  He also broadly stated:

 

In no event may signals intelligence collected in bulk be used for the purpose of suppressing or burdening criticism or dissent; disadvantaging persons based on their ethnicity, race, gender, sexual orientation, or religion; affording a competitive advantage to U.S. companies and U.S. business sectors commercially; or achieving any purpose other than those identified in this section.

But the details, as usual, can be a bit more perplexing.  For example, consider this qualification to "competitive advantage" :

Certain economic purposes, such as identifying trade or sanctions violations or government influence or direction, shall not constitute competitive advantage.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation released a "scorecard" before Obama's remarks and directive.  Afterwards, it tweeted the results of its assessment of Obama's performance:

 

New Report on the Efficacy of NSA Surveillance of Telephony Metadata

Professor Ruthann Robson, City University of New York (CUNY) School of Law

A new report from the New America Foundation is entitled with the question "Do NSA's Bulk Surveillance Programs Stop Terrorists?" 

In brief, the answer it proposes is "no."

Morton Livingston Schamberg, "Telephone" (1916)

The report is authored by Peter Bergen, David Sterman, Emily Schneider, and Bailey Cahall.  As Cyrus Farivar over at Ars Technica points out, the lead author Peter Bergen is well known as "a journalist and terrorism analyst who famously interviewed Osama bin Laden for CNN in 1997."

The report confirms federal District Judge Richard Leon's statement in his opinion in Klayman v. Obama that "the Government does not cite a single instance in which analysis of the NSA’s bulk metadata collection actually stopped an imminent attack, or otherwise aided the Government in achieving any objective that was time-sensitive in nature."   (emphasis in original).   Recall that Judge Leon issued a preliminary injunction against the surveillance, although he then stayed it.

Recall also that another federal district judge dismissed a complaint raising essentially the same issues a week later in American Civil Liberties Union v. Clapper.

With President Obama evaluating the NSA surevillance program including the Recommendations from President's NSA Surveillance Review Group and with the question of whether the NSA's surveillance extends to members of Congress being asked,  this newest report deserves to be read closely.  If there is a balance to be struck between security and liberty, the efficacy of the security measures are certainly relevant.

Daily Read: The Cointelpro Revelations

Professor Ruthann Robson, City University of New York (CUNY) School of Law

A new book, The Burglary: The Discovery of J. Edgar Hoover's Secret FBI by  Betty Medsger tells the "never-before-told full story of the 1971 history-changing break-in of the FBI offices in Media, Pennsylvania"  that made clear the "shocking truth"  that J. Edgar Hoover was spying on Americans and which led to the Ciontelpro scandal.

The NYT report compares the 1971 incident to contemporary events:

"Unlike Mr. Snowden, who downloaded hundreds of thousands of digital N.S.A. files onto computer hard drives, the Media burglars did their work the 20th-century way: they cased the F.B.I. office for months, wore gloves as they packed the papers into suitcases, and loaded the suitcases into getaway cars. When the operation was over, they dispersed. Some remained committed to antiwar causes, while others, like John and Bonnie Raines, decided that the risky burglary would be their final act of protest against the Vietnam War and other government actions before they moved on with their lives."

The NYT video, part of its "retro report" series is definitely worth a watch.

On NPR, one important aspect is how Betty Medsger obtained and accessed the information:

"I think most striking in the Media files at first was a statement that had to do with the philosophy, the policy of the FBI," Medsger says. "And it was a document that instructed agents to enhance paranoia, to make people feel there's an FBI agent behind every mailbox."

The NPR segment is definitely worth a listen:

20140107_me_the_secret_burglary

 

 

 

 

Reconsidering the "Pen Register": Smith v. Maryland and the Constitutionality of NSA Surveillance

As we discussed earlier this month,  two federal district judges have reached opposite conclusions regarding the constitutionality of NSA surveillance as revealed by Edward Snowden.  In Klayman v. Obama, Judge Richard Leon granted a preliminary injunction against NSA surveillance of telephone metadata, while in American Civil Liberties Union v. Clapper,  Judge William J. Pauley granted a motion to dismiss in favor of the government, finding the same program constitutional.

Both of these opinions have brought renewed attention to the 1979 “pen register” case - - - Smith v. Maryland - - - which involved the application of the Fourth Amendment’s protection against “unreasonable searches and seizures” to a then new, and now outmoded, technology that could ascertain the number a phone was dialing.  As footnote 1 of Smith explained, “A pen register is a mechanical device that records the numbers dialed on a telephone by monitoring the electrical impulses caused when the dial on the telephone is released. It does not overhear oral communications and does not indicate whether calls are actually completed.”  It is "usually installed at a central telephone facility [and] records on a paper tape all numbers dialed from [the] line" to which it is attached.” 

In Smith, the Court looked to its “lodestar” 1967 decision in Katz v. United States (involving a telephone booth) and determined that there was no “search” under the Fourth Amendment because the person invoking the constitutional protection did not have a reasonable or legitimate expectation of privacy.  For the majority in Smith this lack of an expectation of privacy was based on  a consumer’s  understanding of telephone technology: telephone subscribers know that the telephone company receives their transmitted telephone number (that is how the call is completed) and can record that number (perhaps for a long distance charge).  And even if a consumer does not subjectively understand this, any expectation of privacy that such circumstances did not occur would not be legitimate.

Now Smith v. Maryland has become a “lodestar” decision of its own.  Judge Richard Leon's decision in Klayman extensively analyzed the opinion, eventually concluding that “the Smith pen register and the ongoing NSA Bulk Telephony Metadata Program have so many significant distinctions between them that I cannot possibly navigate these uncharted Fourth Amendment waters using as my North Star a case that predates the rise of cell phones.”  To the contrary, Judge Pauley, granting the government's motion to dismiss in ACLU v. Clapper essentially used Smith as the opinion's guiding light.

But perhaps the choice is not as stark as whether Smith is steady in the Fourth Amendment skies.  Looking at Justice Blackmun’s opinion in Smith,  he illuminates the two prongs of Katz:

as Mr. Justice Harlan aptly noted in his Katz concurrence, normally embraces two discrete questions. The first is whether the individual, by his conduct, has "exhibited an actual (subjective) expectation of privacy,"  whether, in the words of the Katz majority, the individual has shown that "he seeks to preserve [something] as private." The second question is whether the individual's subjective expectation of privacy is "one that society is prepared to recognize as 'reasonable,' "—whether, in the words of the Katz majority, the individual's expectation, viewed objectively, is "justifiable" under the circumstances.⁵

[citations omitted].  Perhaps importantly, the passage ends with a footnote:

Situations can be imagined, of course, in which Katz' two-pronged inquiry would provide an inadequate index of Fourth Amendment protection. For example, if the Government were suddenly to announce on nationwide television that all homes henceforth would be subject to warrantless entry, individuals thereafter might not in fact entertain any actual expectation or privacy regarding their homes, papers, and effects. Similarly, if a refugee from a totalitarian country, unaware of this Nation's traditions, erroneously assumed that police were continuously monitoring his telephone conversations, a subjective expectation of privacy regarding the contents of his calls might be lacking as well. In such circumstances, where an individual's subjective expectations had been "conditioned" by influences alien to well-recognized Fourth Amendment freedoms, those subjective expectations obviously could play no meaningful role in ascertaining what the scope of Fourth Amendment protection was. In determining whether a "legitimate expectation of privacy" existed in such cases, a normative inquiry would be proper.

Law Prof Josh Blackman, over at his blog, has revealed the sources of this footnote - - - apparently necessary to address Justice Stevens’ concerns about a totalitarian regime that would make any expectation of privacy by individuals not reasonable or legitimate.  Josh Blackman reproduces the correspondence showing that Stevens asked for the footnote and got it, eliminating his need for a separate concurrence.  

Apparently, Justices Stewart, Marshall, and Brennan, who did dissent, had concerns that were not so simply assuaged.

Nevertheless, it’s interesting to deliberate footnote 5 in light of the extent to which Edward Snowden’s revelations about the extent of surveillance have been greeted as confirmatory and predictable rather than as shocking and outrageous.   And perhaps footnote 5 might become as important as other constitutional footnotes as we (re)consider what the expectations of privacy in a constitutional democracy should be.

[image: time-lapsed image of Polaris, the North Star, via]

 

DNI Releases State Secret Declarations

The Director of National Intelligence this weekend released previously classified DNI and NSA declarations in support of the government's assertions of the state secrets privilege in litigation challenge the TSP program.  We posted on the government's assertion of the state secrets privilege in Jewel v. NSA here.

The cases, Jewel v. NSA and In re National Security Agency Telecommunications Record Litigation, both in the Northern District of California, challenged the NSA's "dragnet" surveillance program.  The declarations say that no such program exists, and that to defend the cases would reveal national security secrets.  

SDS

Daily Read: Rolling Stone on Snowden and Greenwald

Janet Reitman's excellent article in Rolling Stone entitled "Snowden and Greenwald: The Men Who Leaked the Secrets" and subtitled "How two alienated, angry geeks broke the story of the year" is worth a read, nevermind the tags meant to attract Rolling Stone's target demographic.  With this past summer's  New York Time magazine article "How Laura Poitras Helped Snowden Spill His Secrets" by Peter Maas, there is much in both of these pieces that merits consideration. 

True, the articles are journalistic.  Reitman tells us that for "a man living in the middle of a John le Carre' novel, Greenwald has a pretty good life."  She then talks about his dogs (also mentioned in the article by Maas).  It's the stuff of human interest stories.  But Reitman also gives Greenwald's story of lawyering: first with a law firm and then in his own practice, "defending the First Amendment rights of neo-Nazis.":

It was one of Greenwald's prouder accomplishments as an attorney. "To me, it's a heroic attribute to be so committed to a principle that you apply it not when it's easy," he says, "not when it supports your position, not when it protects people you like, but when it defends and protects people that you hate."

As for Snowden, he's also humanized, but to her credit, Reitman quotes his ideas and motivations.  She also situates him within a "community": there's former NSA official Thomas Drake and Wikileaks Julian Assange as well as Laura Poitras and Greenwald's partner David Miranda, who was stopped by British authorities at Heathrow airport in August.  

 

And importantly, there's discussion of the rather murky legal, ethical, and journalistic landscape as it exists at the moment.  

 

ConLawProfs: this could be an excellent assignment for the first day of classes, coupled with the NYT article on Laura Poitras.

 

 

Supreme Court Refuses to Grant Extraordinary Writ to Review FISA's Verizon Surveillance Order

In its routine order list today, the Court's list of "MANDAMUS DENIED" included "13-58 - IN RE ELECTRONIC PRIVACY INFORMATION CENTER." 

The petition for writ of mandamus and prohibition or writ of certiorari was filed by the Electronic Privacy Information Center and essentially sought review of an Order from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.  The order redacts the names of the parties from whom the "tangible things" are sought, but the petition describes the order as compelling "Verizon Business Network Services to produce to the National Security Agency, on an ongoing basis, all of the call detail records of Verizon customers."

As one of its Questions Presented, the petition stated:

Whether the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court exceeded its narrow statutory authority to authorize foreign intelligence surveillance, under 50 U.S.C. § 1861, when it ordered Verizon to disclose records to the National Security Agency for all telephone communications “wholly within the United States, including local telephone calls.” 

The import of the Supreme Court's denial is both trivial and momentous.  On the one hand, there is little if anything to be read into the Court's refusal to exercise its highly discretionary power to grant a petition for a writ as it does in 1% of cases.  On the other hand, there is something to be inferred about the Court's interest in and willingness to supervise the unusual FISA given constitutional rights.

But the Court's failure to accept the case certainly does not mean the underlying issues will be so easily dispatched.