Anwar Al-Awlaki (a.k.a. Anwar Al-Aulaqi) was an American-born Muslim cleric who was killed by U.S. forces in a targeted drone strike. Al-Awlaki was never charged of a crime. In 2010, the ACLU and the Center for Constitutional Rights brought a lawsuit on behalf of Al-Awlaki's father, challenging the government's asserted authority to carry out "targeted killings" of U.S. citizens located far from any armed conflict zone. We argued that such killings violate the Constitution and international law. The case was dismissed in federal district court in December 2011.
By Brett Kaufman, Legal Fellow, ACLU National Security Project at 3:59pm
Today, ProPublica published an important and illuminating news article and accompanying interactive web feature that demonstrates just how duplicitous the government is being regarding the CIA’s targeted killing program.
As we’ve argued in our Freedom of Information Act lawsuit seeking records about the CIA’s use of drones to carry out targeted killings around the world, the government continues to claim that it can neither confirm nor deny whether it even has a drone-strike program at all, despite the numerous public statements of government officials discussing the CIA’s drone program. This is an untenable position, and next Thursday, we will be making that argument before the federal appeals court in Washington, D.C.
By Nathan Freed Wessler, Staff Attorney, ACLU Speech, Privacy & Technology Project at 11:59am
Just before a midnight deadline on Wednesday, the government filed its legal brief responding to the ACLU’s Freedom of Information Act lawsuit seeking information about the legal and factual basis for the deaths of three U.S. citizens in targeted killing drone strikes last fall. Our initial reaction to the brief is here, but the government’s position is so remarkable that it warrants further comment.
