Bush's wiretapping goes to court in San Francisco

[Kadie]

Bush's wiretapping goes to court in S.F.
Bob Egelko, Chronicle Staff Writer

Wednesday, September 23, 2009


(09-23) 17:26 PDT SAN FRANCISCO -- After years of wrangling over legal procedures, the lawyer for a defunct Islamic charity laid out his case Wednesday that former President George W. Bush's secret wiretapping program was illegal - an argument that an Obama administration attorney refused to discuss.

"May the president of the United States break the law in the name of national security? ... We're asking this court to say, 'no,' " Jon Eisenberg, lawyer for the Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation, told a federal judge in San Francisco.

Neither the president's constitutional powers as commander-in-chief nor Congress' authorization to use military force against terrorists after Sept. 11, 2001, entitled Bush to override a 1978 law requiring court approval for electronic surveillance of suspected terrorists, Eisenberg argued.

He cited presidential candidate Barack Obama's declaration in 2007 that "warrantless surveillance of American citizens in defiance of (the 1978 law) is unlawful and unconstitutional."

Al Haramain, an Oregon group that the government declared to be a terrorist organization in 2004, and which has since gone out of business, sued the Bush administration in 2006. It claimed that federal authorities had illegally listened in on its lawyers' phone calls and is seeking damages. Its officials denied the group was a terrorist outfit.

Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker, who has rebuffed Bush and Obama administration requests to dismiss the suit, did not reveal his views on the legality of the program. But he told a government lawyer that Al-Haramain had presented strong evidence that it had been wiretapped and had the right to sue.


Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/09/23/MNQB19RL8R.DTL&type=politics&tsp=1#ixzz0RysRGeLc

[armyowalgreens]

1. I have a feeling that this case will end up at the SCOTUS.