Backroom FISA Deal in the Making?

NEW YORK — The American Civil Liberties Union and the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University today filed an amicus brief in support of foreign policy expert Dr. Sue Mi Terry in a criminal case pending in federal court. Dr. Terry has been charged with violating the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) for failing to register as an agent of the Republic of Korea. The groups argue that reading FARA broadly could chill a wide range of speech on issues of public concern and enable the government to selectively target speakers for viewpoint-based reasons in violation of the First Amendment. They call on the court to narrowly interpret the law to avoid these potential constitutional problems. “While the government has a legitimate interest in informing Americans about foreign attempts to influence domestic public discourse, interpreting FARA broadly does nothing to further that interest and raises serious First Amendment concerns,” said Xiangnong (George) Wang, staff attorney at the Knight Institute. “The court should interpret the law narrowly to avoid chilling protected speech.” Today’s brief argues that FARA’s sweeping terms could be read to apply to speakers that have only a minimal connection with foreign individuals or entities. It explains that interpreting FARA this broadly would impose serious burdens on speech protected by the First Amendment, especially because the law is backed by criminal sanctions. The brief notes that the law makes no distinction between an “agent” who acts as a mouthpiece of a foreign adversary and a journalist who works with a media organization like the British newspaper The Guardian. As a result, FARA’s burdens would fall especially heavily on media organizations, journalists, and nonprofits. “Over the last decade, the government has increasingly invoked FARA to stigmatize, stifle, and suppress viewpoints it doesn’t like,” said Aamra Ahmad, senior counsel with the ACLU’s National Security Project. “The court should take this opportunity to ensure FARA is read narrowly to protect news outlets, nonprofits, and individuals’ free speech rights.” Read today’s amicus brief here. Read more about the case here.

Immigrants’ rights advocates sued the Trump administration on Feb. 12, 2025, for access to immigrants transferred from the United States to detention at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba under President Trump’s recent order.

WASHINGTON – The American Civil Liberties Union today filed Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests with more than 40 federal agencies seeking urgent transparency about the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)’s secretive efforts to access and analyze Americans’ sensitive personal information. The ACLU also sent letters to key congressional leaders, calling on Congress to fulfill its constitutional role in conducting immediate oversight of this executive overreach and DOGE’s unchecked access to Americans’ data. The move comes amid growing concerns that DOGE—a hastily assembled office created on President Trump’s first day in office—has been infiltrating federal agencies and gaining access to databases, including Treasury and Health and Human Services (HHS) systems, that contain information on individuals’ finances, health records, and social security data. As DOGE reportedly uses AI to decide what critical public services and programs to cut, failure to protect this data not only creates the perfect storm for an unimaginable data breach or hack but also endangers the health and safety of millions of Americans. Ultimately, Trump cannot slash federal programs – including community health centers, refugee resettlement agencies, and early education programs without massive amounts of data, and DOGE is providing him with everything he needs. In its FOIA requests, the ACLU is asking for any records that reveal whether DOGE or its representatives have sought or obtained access to databases containing personally identifiable information, financial records, healthcare data, or other sensitive government-held records of Americans. The request also seeks information on DOGE’s use of artificial intelligence to analyze government data, raising alarms about the potential for mass surveillance and politically motivated misuse of that deeply personal information. The letter to congressional leaders similarly underscores that the executive branch’s flaunting of long-standing legal requirements and norms undermines Americans’ privacy and Congress’s constitutional role. “The American people deserve to know if their private financial, medical, and personal records are being illegally accessed, analyzed, or weaponized by Trump's unaccountable team of unvetted outsiders,” said Nathan Freed Wessler, deputy director of ACLU’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project. “There’s every indication that DOGE has forced its way into the government’s most tightly protected databases and systems, without consideration of longstanding privacy safeguards mandated by Congress. We need answers now.” DOGE leadership is cynically claiming that its employees and representatives, who are largely housed within government agencies, are not subject to FOIA. That is why – in addition to DOGE – the ACLU has sent FOIA requests to more than 40 agencies that maintain sensitive or personal information, including the Treasury Department, the IRS, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Social Security Administration, the FBI, and the Department of Homeland Security, among others. “DOGE's access to sensitive personal records of millions of people is deeply alarming and raises significant legal questions,” said Cody Venzke, senior policy counsel at ACLU. “Congress must step up, do its job, and check the president’s overreach.”

WASHINGTON — The American Civil Liberties Union is urging a federal court to step in after the FBI and DHS failed to produce even a single record on the use of Joint Terrorism Task Forces (JTTFs) and fusion centers to monitor and disseminate information on protestors and communities of color. This comes eight months after the ACLU filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for these documents, and six months after we sued for them. JTTFs and fusion centers are core components of the U.S. government’s massive domestic intelligence apparatus, serving as nexus points for information sharing among federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies. There are nearly 200 JTTFs and 80 fusion centers around the country. They operate with minimal oversight and scant accountability, and have long histories of wrongly targeting activists and communities of color, often associating protest with “terrorism,” without any evidence of wrongdoing. The ACLU’s FOIA request seeks to shed light on JTTF and fusion center surveillance during both the Biden administration and the first Trump administration to assess their impact on privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties. These documents are especially timely given the recent order by the Trump administration that, pending the creation of “Homeland Security Task Forces,” the JTTFs are to directly coordinate with DHS, as well as all state and local agencies, “to assist in the execution of President Trump’s immigration-related initiatives.” “As Donald Trump ramps up his abhorrent mass deportation regime and pressures government agencies and officials to follow his reckless orders, it’s more important than ever for the American people to know what guardrails, if any, the FBI and DHS have in place to protect the privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties of our communities,” said Aamra Ahmad, senior staff attorney with the ACLU’s National Security Project. During the first Trump administration, then-Attorney General Barr deployed JTTFs to surveil racial justice activists protesting the police killings of George Floyd and other Black people. And, around the country, fusion centers have similarly targeted political, religious, and social justice activists, disseminating intelligence reports that warn law enforcement to surveil and report on protestors and protest activity. For example, in 2019, the Virginia Fusion Center sensationalized environmental activists’ protests against gas pipeline construction, equating a boycott threat and ignoring police commands with designated foreign terrorist organizations’ bombings and violence.