Home : National Security : Terrorism and Emergency Powers

ACLU Welcomes Senate Inquiry Into Detainees and Their Abuse, Says Outside Special Counsel Needed To Answer Questions (06/15/2005)
WASHINGTON -- The American Civil Liberties Union today applauded Senator Arlen Specter (R-PA), chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, for conducting an oversight hearing on the issue of detainees held by the federal government. Critics have long called for Congressional inquiries into the issue, noting that there continues to be gross violations of the basic protections of detainees, and that an outside special counsel is needed to investigate and prosecute any criminal acts in the torture or abuse of detainees by the U.S. Government.

Senate Intelligence Committee Considers Patriot Act Expansion Bill in Secret; ACLU Calls for Open and Public Dialogue (05/26/2005)
WASHINGTON - The American Civil Liberties Union denounced today's closed-door votes by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence of legislation designed to reauthorize - and expand - the Patriot Act. Included in the committee's deliberations are proposals to make the Patriot Act's most controversial provisions permanent, and to expand it by allowing FBI agents issue their own search orders with no advance court approval.

Army Memo Released By ACLU Suggests Perjury In Lt. Gen. Sanchez Sworn Testimony on Torture (03/31/2005)
WASHINGTON - The American Civil Liberties Union today sent a letter to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales asking him to open an investigation into possible perjury by Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the theater commander at the outset of the Iraq War. The ACLU said that a memo sent by Lt. Gen Sanchez flatly contradicts sworn testimony given by him before the Senate Armed Services Committee, in which he denied authorizing highly coercive interrogation methods.

Wolfowitz, an Architect of U.S. Torture Policies, Nominated to Lead World Bank; ACLU Notes Move is Latest to Reward Officials Implicated in Abuse of Detainees (03/18/2005)
Wolfowitz, an Architect of U.S. Torture Policies, Nominated to Lead World Bank; ACLU Notes Move is Latest to Reward Officials Implicated in Abuse of Detainees

House Includes Asylum and Privacy Assault in 'Must Pass' Funding Bill; ACLU Urges Senate to Reject Sensenbrenner Measure (03/16/2005)
WASHINGTON - The House of Representatives today attached controversial anti-immigration legislation to an emergency military funding bill. The American Civil Liberties Union urged the Senate to reject the House's efforts to evade regular legislative order, saying that the REAL ID Act would make it more difficult to seek asylum, lay the foundation for a national ID card and chill free speech.

ACLU: Bipartisan Civil Liberties Board Fix Bill Long Overdue, Measure Would Take Oversight Panel Out of the "Hip Pocket of the President" (03/15/2005)
WASHINGTON - The American Civil Liberties Union today welcomed the introduction of a bipartisan measure to strengthen the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board created by last year's intelligence reform legislation. The board currently lacks critical oversight powers.

Bush-Appointed Judge Say U.S. Citizen Cannot Be Held as "Enemy Combatant," ACLU Welcomes Decision in Padilla Case (02/28/2005)
WASHINGTON -- A federal judge today ruled that President Bush does not have the power to hold an American citizen as an enemy combatant. The decision by U.S. District Judge Henry F. Floyd, who was appointed to the federal bench by President Bush in 2003, came in the case of Jose Padilla, a U.S. citizen being held in a naval brig in Charleston, S.C.

ACLU Calls on Attorney General Gonzales to Show Commitment to Justice, Appoint Special Counsel on Torture Abuses to Uncover Truth (02/03/2005)
WASHINGTON - The newly confirmed attorney general, Alberto Gonzales, should immediately appoint an outside special counsel to investigate and prosecute any criminal acts by civilians in the torture or abuse of detainees by the U.S. government, the American Civil Liberties Union said today.

ACLU Examines Chertoff's Troubling Civil Liberties Record; Nominee Had Key Role In Controversial Post- 9/11 Policies (01/31/2005)
WASHINGTON - In anticipation of this week's confirmation hearings, the American Civil Liberties Union today released a review of the troubling civil liberties record of Michael Chertoff, who has been nominated to head the Department of Homeland Security.

ACLU Executive Director Travels to Cuba To Observe Military Tribunals (08/19/2004)
WASHINGTON - Anthony D. Romero, Executive Director of the American Civil Liberties Union, will travel Saturday to the Guantánamo Bay Naval Base on the eastern tip of Cuba to observe the first preliminary hearings in the new system of military commissions set up by President Bush.

Through Gag Orders and Secret Evidence, Government Is Suppressing Information About Controversial Patriot Act Powers, ACLU Charges (08/19/2004)
NEW YORK - The government is using gag orders and secret evidence to keep the public in the dark about its use of the Patriot Act to investigate Americans, the American Civil Liberties Union said today.

Court Orders Feds to End Stonewalling and Immediately Process ACLU Request for Torture Records (08/18/2004)
NEW YORK -- The American Civil Liberties Union and New York Civil Liberties Union today won a significant victory in their 10-month struggle to obtain records on the abuse of prisoners held by the United States at detention facilities overseas. In a stinging rebuke, a federal judge ordered the administration to begin honoring an ACLU request under the Freedom of Information Act, saying that the government had dragged its feet for far too long.

ACLU Warns of Resurrecting 'Voluntary' Interview Program; Arab and Muslim Communities Should Not be Targets of Racial Profiling (06/22/2004)
WASHINGTON -- Saying that previous attempts by federal law enforcement officials to conduct 'voluntary' interviews of Arab and Muslim immigrants proved ineffective, the American Civil Liberties Union today called upon the FBI to give careful consideration before engaging in similar efforts.

ACLU Urges Caution Against Piecemeal Expansion of Patriot Act; Calls for Stringent Oversight of Existing Powers (06/22/2004)
WASHINGTON -- Despite bipartisan concern about how the Justice Department is using existing anti-terrorism powers, a Senate committee today considered legislation that would further compromise freedom.

ACLU Washington Director Asks Democratic Committee To Include Strong Stand for Civil Liberties in Party Platform (06/19/2004)
WASHINGTON - The American Civil Liberties Union today asked the Democratic Party Platform Committee to include strong language in its 2004 platform to protect and promote civil liberties.

Federal Court Decision Granting Guantanamo Bay Detainees Judicial Review Caps Red-Letter Day for Checks and Balances (12/18/2003)
WASHINGTON - Following an earlier federal court decision this morning rejecting the White House's assertion that the President can unilaterally detain American citizens as ""enemy combatants,"" absent any due process protections, another federal court ruled this afternoon that the non-citizen enemy combatants held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, are entitled to habeas corpus reviews to determine the propriety of their detention.

ACLU Says Skewed Statistics on Terrorism Prosecutions Show Credibility Gap (12/08/2003)
WASHINGTON - A new study examining Justice Department terrorism prosecutions since 9/11 by a university-based data analysis organization dramatically diminishes the credibility of the Bush administration's public claims of success in the war on terrorism, the American Civil Liberties Union said today.

ACLU Applauds Congressional Examination of Internal Report Critical of Justice Department's Handling of Post 9/11 Detainees (06/25/2003)
WASHINGTON - While calling for further Congressional investigation into an internal Justice Department report critical of the agency's abuse of the hundreds of domestic detainees held in the months after 9/11, the American Civil Liberties Union today praised lawmakers for holding the first Capitol Hill hearing into the detainee findings.

Former INS Commissioner Defends Civil Liberties; Says Justice Department Needs Major Reform (06/14/2003)
WASHINGTON - In a pointed defense of civil liberties, James W. Ziglar, the Bush Administration's former Commissioner of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, today criticized those who would ""toss aside"" our core freedoms in the name of security and called for a significant restructuring of the Department of Justice.

Internal Justice Department Report Details 9/11 Detainees' Plight; Arab, Muslim, South Asian Immigrants Languished in Detention for Months (06/02/2003)
WASHINGTON - In a major scandal for the Bush Administration, the Justice Department's internal oversight unit today released a report highly critical of what it shows to be the wholesale and long-term preventive detention of immigrants swept up in the months following 9/11.