Federal Agencies Tapped Protesters' Phones in Portland

[Nevilledog]

Link to tweet

https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/homeland-security-portland/


This summer, Portland looked like a war zone. Phalanxes of shadowy law enforcement personnel fired crowd-control munitions, as plumes of teargas billowed into the sky. Federal agents without clearly visible identification rounded up protesters and loaded them into unmarked cars, on American streets. When videos began to spread online, it was hard to tell what was going on, or how widely.

The public backlash was ferocious, spurring Congress to demand that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) disclose information about the operation. But the DHS never came clean to the public about the full extent of its intelligence operations in Portland, which consisted of clandestine activities including interceptions of protesters’ phone calls conducted by a task force that included federal agencies besides the DHS, according to two former intelligence officers familiar with the matter.

“Unidentified stormtroopers. Unmarked cars. Kidnapping protesters and causing severe injuries in response to graffiti. These are not the actions of a democratic republic. [Department of Homeland Security’s] actions in Portland undermine its mission,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi tweeted in mid-July. Later that month, The Washington Post reported that the DHS’s intelligence division, the Office of Intelligence and Analysis (I&A) had generated intelligence reports on several prominent journalists covering the Portland protests. Members of both the House and Senate intelligence committees promptly demanded to know what kinds of intelligence they had collected on both journalists and protesters. A letter from the Senate contained the suggestive admonition that the division “is obligated by statute to keep the congressional intelligence committees fully and currently informed of its operations.”

Yet, at the time of this writing, DHS has failed to respond to Congress’s questions. “Notwithstanding the selective and incomplete document production thus far, the Committee has reason to believe that DHS and I&A are withholding responsive records related to I&A’s activities in Portland and in support of DHS’ response to nationwide protests,” House Intelligence Committee Chair Adam Schiff wrote in a letter to the DHS’s intelligence branch.

*snip*

[alwaysinasnit]

1. Does this mean the 4th Amendment is dead?

[Nevilledog]

2. It's been on basic life support for a long time.

This is like someone standing on the oxygen line.

[alwaysinasnit]

3. Yes, that was my thought too. This just seems like the final strand has been cut.

[TheBlackAdder]

7. When Biden/Harris wins, I guess the same can be used against White Supremacists, QAnon & Nazis.

[LakeArenal]

4. That's some scary shit.

[flying_wahini]

5. DHS has some explaining to do.

Now or later, but We the people deserve the truth and We will get it.

[lpbk2713]

6. It shows how free and easy the feds are with tapping phones.

It's like they can tap anyone's phone on a whim.