Secret spy court orders Bush to respond to request for information on secret ruling

[mikelgb]

Source: Raw Story

In an unprecedented order, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court ordered the Bush Administration to respond to a request it received last week by the American Civil Liberties Union for orders and legal papers discussing the scope of the government's authority to engage in the secret wiretapping of Americans, according to an ACLU press release late Friday.

The release follows.

...

According to the FISC’s order, the ACLU’s request “warrants further briefing,” and the government must respond to it by August 31. The court has said that any reply by the ACLU must be filed by September 14.

"Disclosure of these court orders and legal papers is essential to the ongoing debate about government surveillance," said Anthony D. Romero, Executive Director of the ACLU. "We desperately need greater transparency and public scrutiny. We're extremely encouraged by today's development because it means that, at long last, the government will be required to defend its contention that the orders should not be released."

Read more: http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Secret_spy_court_orders_Bush_to_0817.html

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wow

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

1. "Wow!" is right.

Wunner what it means... :freak:

[snappyturtle]

2. And if * doesn't respond? What will they do then? Nothing? n/t

[VaYallaDawg]

3. I wouldn't be surprised to see the WH response being a

demand for an apology. Just call me a cynic.

[snappyturtle]

5. You gave me a little chuckle......a cynical chuckle! I wouldn't

doubt the WH might ask for an apology; they're arrogant enough.

[pdefalla]

8. What will they do?

Sounds to me like the FISA court is saying, "We will release the information if we don't get a good reason from the White House". Of course, Bush is likely to play the "Executive Privilege" card and order the court to simply refuse to release the documents.

[redirish28]

4. Looks like this is the dump story of the night. Sounds to me FISC

Has a lot more threatening power and power to do things than we are aware of...

[Trillo]

6. K&R n/t

[kestrel91316]

7. Bush to FISA Court: GFY.

And the Dems will give him a pass on this, too.

[bluesmail]

10. Big-Ass K & R eom

[Igel]

9. The ACLU made a motion.

The FISC is ordering the US government to respond to that motion. The "briefing" is to be done by the US government and the recipient will be the FISC (of course, it'll probably just be written). The best that the ACLU gets out of this--pending a resolution of the motion--is a copy of the US government's response to their motion. And that might be redacted.

The FISC could quite easily decide that the US government's yet-to-be-announced reasoning as to why no further information should be released is correct. It might decide that the US government's reasoning isn't correct, but that the ACLU's is. Or it may decide something completely different. But that's a DU post we'll be seeing, probably, in September.

[deacon]

11. k + r