Documents: DHS passed protest info to Md. police

[underpants]

Source: Fox News

SILVER SPRING, Md. — The U.S. Department of Homeland Security tracked an anti-war group's plans for peaceful protests and passed the information on to the Maryland State Police, according to documents released to The Washington Post and reported in Tuesday's editions.

The documents are the first indication that the state police had federal partners during their widely condemned spying on activist groups, which went on in 2005 and 2006. The revelation has alarmed Maryland's U.S. senators, who are asking DHS for more details about how it obtained the information it shared.

State police have apologized for spying on peaceful activists and for classifying 53 people as terrorists in an internal database. Police have said the names were not put on federal anti-terrorism lists.

The DHS link was found in the state police file on the DC Anti-War Network, or DAWN, which The Post obtained under Maryland's public information law. According to the file, the federal agency obtained two e-mails about plans for demonstrations by the group at a military recruiting center in Silver Spring and forwarded the e-mails to state police. The protests were peaceful, the file noted

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2009Feb17/0,4670,MarylandPoliceSurveillance,00.html

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But Pat Elder, the organizer of the protests, said federal agents could not have accessed the e-mails without infiltrating the group's e-mail lists.

[ConcernedCanuk]

1. "State police have apologized for spying " - well then - it's all OK then

.
.
.

THEY SAID THEY ARE SORRY!

But

They don't really get it do they? - spying on your own citizens is not quite the same as knocking over someone's sand castle on the beach ..

Sorry is not enough

They should resign and never hold public office again

Betraying the public's trust to UPHOLD the law

Shouldn't get second chances

That's just my opinion

[midnight]

4. That's why we need to repeal this FISA immunity stuff.

[Leopolds Ghost]

17. Too late -- and who's gonna do it? The new Admin supports FISA, right?

They apparently have no problem with the allegations of spying on journalists, since he's failed to "dignify these allegations with a response."

[wroberts189]

8. Yep all is forgotten ..it will never happen again :)

/sarcasm

[Piewhacket]

22. well... all i can say is.. they didn't apologize sufficiently to ME.

OBAMA is racking up some serious baggage with this
move-on shit.

[LiberalEsto]

2. They absolutely did this

I went to a small anti-war protest at the corner of Hungerford Drive (Rt. 355) and College Parkway in Rockville a few years ago. I just heard about it from somewhere on-line and decided to go.

There might have been about a dozen of us, mostly aging hippies like myself.

No sooner had we set up, than a white, official looking car pulled up and parked nearby. Out popped some kind of crew-cut law enforcement guy wearing a white sweatshirt. On the upper left part of the sweatshirt were the words "Montgomery County Department of Homeland Security" and some kind of logo.

He just stood there and watched us like a hawk from the moment he arrived, until the time we left. A couple of his buddies joined him for a while. Other cops in regular police cars drove by frequently, eyeing us each time.

You'd think from all this police attention that we were some kind of huge threat to the civilized world. A dozen old hippies holding peace signs. Like, wow. God forbid we might drop a candy wrapper -- we would have been arrested as dangerous littering terrorists.

The Montgomery County Homeland Security agency was set up with funds from DHS, the way they funded other local "homeland security" agencies throughout the country. I'm sure they funneled all the vital information they gathered on us (including our various political bumper stickers) right back to DHS and the Maryland State Police for their double-secret files. I hope they have been disbanded.

Talk about a waste of taxpayers' money, and a potential violation of our rights.

[underpants]

3. He was most assuredly there for YOUR security

:sarcasm:

That is a great but terrible story, thanks.

[LiberalEsto]

5. That's RIGHT!

I'll bet he was there to protect us from the terrarists! :think:

[wroberts189]

10. It can be good to pick someone to go chat with them..someone smart

Make conversation... see what on earth is the issue they have. Sense their attitude ..most important.

Sometimes its good to be ready to run as well. Fast...

I have no experience ... just a lot of youtube of the RNC protests.

[LiberalEsto]

29. I tried to talk with him

He was not communicative.

[Leopolds Ghost]

20. My phone started clicking recently

After I called and met with a controversial public-housing (!!) activist whose group is labeled "radical elements" -- the sort of terms which will continue to be used by the new Administration, I'm sure, as they are under O'Malley.

[ixion]

6. Disband DHS and TSA and restore our republic

this domestic spying BS needs to stop now.

[HowHasItComeToThis]

7. NOW IS THE LAST CHANCE FOR FREEDOM

REC NUMBER SIX

[wroberts189]

9. Now I wonder why they would be so interested in these groups....

hmmm.... What could it mean?


I guess it was just a test ...yea that's it ...a test. :)

[Seldona]

11. Sorry isn't going to cut it for labeling 53 people terrorists!

I hope every last one sues. We cannot let this garbage stand. Every time they get away with something a precedent is set, leading to even worse abuses.

They were pulling this crap in the 60's and 70's, which is why they had their toys taken away. They use 9/11 to get them back under the guise of 'The War On Terror,' and start the same crap all over again, only much worse.

I hope the Democratic Party takes a look at this supposed anti-terrorism legislation and sees it for the monster it has become. It is not that I don't want terrorists held accountable, I just don't think we have to compromise our rights away in the process.

[defendandprotect]

12. However "widely condemned," not necessarily stopped . . . !!!

As we can see "terror" is being used to end civil liberties ---

[iconicgnom]

13. From what I'm reading, Obama appears poised to cement the Bush legacy as permanent status quo.

[truth2power]

14. So when are the trials of Bush and his buddies going to start?..

Just one more egregious assault on our rights by those vermin. And Obama wants to move on.

[Leopolds Ghost]

15. An organization I worked with is a direct victim of this spying campaign, which is probably ongoing.

I have no doubt they are still being spied on and interfered with even though they engage in no political activity and merely provide a venue for community activists.

It is no wonder I am jaded and unenthusiastic about the prospects for change in Washington.

Then I come on DU and complain about how the more things change, the more they remain the same --
and get called a plant for criticising the new Administration. Ironic isn't it? I actually KNOW
people who turned out to be investigators.

And these were NON-political community organizations that were being spied on for "potentially radical" elements.

I thought to bring it up when the story first broke, since we made the front page, but I thought, why draw unwanted attention? Google is permanent. It's not like we have any allies among the local Democratic political community where I live, so why ask fellow DUers for support? We don't have any allies. Except maybe ACLU (and then, not really -- they prefer to represent more photogenic clients such as actual antiwar and anti-death penalty groups).

MD "Democratic" Governor Martin O'Malley, in between campaigns to use Federal Stimulus money to build 8-lane freeways and gambling casinos, is a big advocate of Big Brother in Baltimore. (They even have special slogans on their Police Cameras monitoring intersections that say "report suspicious behavior" or some such, like in the movie Brazil).

He's trying to water down a bill in the MD legislature to allow the spying on groups to continue.

Did I mention O'Malley and the rest of these Maryland "Democrats" are hugely popular
with the Montgomery County crowd, many of whom work for the Federal government? All
the new policymakers just LOVE to live in suburban MD.

They LOVE the MD State Democratic Party.

[bonito]

16. Bush scroll

Major neocon takeover these last eight years, Jerkoff, Lieberman were in control like a hemorrhoid that won't go away still.

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

18. Lawd ha' mercy! I live in Silver Spring, MD. It was our *FORMER* Repuke governor Erhlich

who commanded the DHS to spy. He started that shit!!! :puke::puke::puke:

[Leopolds Ghost]

19. According to ACLU (our group was "mentioned" and I gets the emails) O'Malley backs cops on spying.

Our heroes in the MD Democratic State House (O'Malley et al) are pushing for a bill that would allow continued spying of groups like the one I volunteer at. The spying is ongoing of course. Thanks to FISA, they don't even need this bill -- FISA allows them to do it all electronically! But they're still fighting for the right to do human spying on antiwar and NON-antiwar groups (post-Katrina, death penalty, you name it.)

DEMOCRATIC Gov. O'Malley made it quite clear that he refused to commit to saying these groups (including the one I volunteered for) are not in fact terrorists or other threat.

So where does that leave actual progressive people in MD? The MD Democratic party activists are too busy rallying around the victors in the past election (and passing gambling and highway construction bills).

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

30. He's been a pathetic governor, too. I don't think he'll win reelection. Abysmal!

This doesn't surprise me at all. I'd better watch my back. I'm an activist, too!

[tooeyeten]

21. Is this 1969?

How far we haven't come.

[meuniermr]

23. This is REALLY OLD news.

[TheWatcher]

24. You mean we DON'T live in an actual Free Country that doesn't spy on it's Citizens?

Who knew?

[dcindian]

25. Why do they get to appologize?

Shouldn't the lot of them be headed for jail? WTF is wrong with our justice system?

[Optical.Catalyst]

26. The Bush Administration used Government agencies to harass Republican opposition

The right wing mastered this technique years ago. Nixon took it to an art form.

[Hubert Flottz]

27. Back in the USSA!

REPEAL the Patriot Acts I and II...we don't need no stinkin' KGB.

[Wizard777]

28. O' how quickly a sword in defense can become a sword at the throat.

[suegeo]

31. How's 'bout watching them there investment bankers a bit more?

Maybe if the spying maroons and keystone cops had monitored the really big criminals in the "investment" banks instead of peaceful protesters...

[BR_Parkway]

32. Just think if they'd used those resources on Madoff, Stanford and the

others?