Rosenberg Fund for Children

"War on Terror" Morphs into Attack on Dissent

I read a newspaper article (L.A. Times, June 18, 2009) two weeks ago that reminded me of a recent comment to this blog.

This person wrote: “I am very grateful for the Rosenberg Fund. I visit the family of an innocent man, incarcerated for being a Muslim.* The Rosenberg Fund pays for their [children’s] school tuition. In the case of my friend, their father's sentence is 15 years. He will only miss their childhoods. But, fifteen years is a long time when you are only 3.” (*The RFC provided a grant to this family after determining that the man in question was targeted for his anti-war activities.)

I was very disturbed to learn that this activist has been transferred to what the Federal Bureau of Prisons calls a “Communication Management Unit,” more colorfully labeled by some inmates “Little Guantanamo.” This transfer also put a special burden on this large family and the RFC’s prison visit travel program (Attica Fund) because this new location is far away from where the family lives.

The article I read addressed these new control units, the lawsuits they are generating and the inmates who populate them. It reported on a suit filed by the ACLU on behalf of a similarly situated Muslim alleging that such transfers violate prisoners’ rights by transferring them with neither hearings, nor opportunity to contest the transfer. It also questions the legality of the units themselves.

The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) is about to file a similar suit. The article notes, “Inmates in the unit get one 15-minute phone call a week and two two-hour visits a month.” It goes on to quote someone I know quite well: “‘These are political prisons,’ says Rachel Meeropol, a staff attorney at the [CCR]. ‘These people are being targeted to limit their ability to communicate with the outside world, and to limit their ability to be political people.’”

The article concluded by discussing the case of Daniel McGowan, who recently was transferred to a similar unit. Although not an RFC beneficiary, Daniel was swept up in a wave of “Green Scare” cases that have generated a number of new RFC beneficiary families. He was convicted of burning a lumber company’s empty office and given a “terrorist enhancement” to his seven-year sentence because of the political nature of his crime. Daniel believes he was transferred because he remained politically active in prison and published a blog. Lauren Regan, his attorney, with whom I toured the Pacific Northwest in the fall of 2007, noted that the only difference between Daniel and other Green Scare defendants who were not transferred was “the outreach that he was doing and the voice that he had behind bars.”

This convergence of circumstances between religious and racially profiled Muslim anti-war activists, and those fighting the corporate destruction of our environment, is one of the clearest demonstrations I’ve seen of using draconian post-9/11 laws and procedures to expand the “war on terror” into a more general attack on dissenting movements throughout the nation.

And the fact that this is taking place months after Bush left office provides a stark warning for all those who do not question the human rights and civil liberties intentions of the Obama administration.

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If An Agent Knocks

I recently received a notice from one of my favorite organizations, The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR). (Full disclosure, my younger daughter, Rachel Meeropol, works as an attorney there so I may not be entirely objective.) The CCR has reissued its pamphlet, “If An Agent Knocks” as a public service. Since this pamphlet is designed as an aid for targeted activists, and the RFC’s mission is to provide for the educational and emotional needs of the children of targeted activists, I am reproducing the CCR’s information about their pamphlet here as a service to the RFC community:

"If An Agent Knocks," [provides] advice to activists likely to be targeted by FBI agents or other federal investigators, in Pittsburgh and beyond. This booklet is a resource to protect activists from government investigation. [The CCR] also want[s] to support the power you show when you exercise this fundamental right of dissent.

Since its original release in 1989, CCR's "If An Agent Knocks" has been widely circulated in progressive activist communities across the country. This guide includes both the timeless advice included in the original version and extensive updates to reflect the current state of the law and law enforcement tools. It also includes a comprehensive discussion of today's technology, including cell phones, e-mail and Web browsing.

"If An Agent Knocks" is an invaluable tool for activists in a time when efforts to repress expressions of opposition are intensified. We want to get this publication into as many hands as possible. To obtain a free copy, please email iaak@ccrjustice.org . You can also download it in pdf form here. Tell your friends and fellow activists about "If An Agent Knocks," and urge them to place an order too. [The CCR is] giving away a special edition of "If An Agent Knocks" posters to the first 500 people who order the booklet.

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Another Meeropol sues Attorney General & FBI

Actually, I fudged this post’s title a bit. It’s true that my brother’s and my precedent-setting Freedom of Information Act lawsuit in the 1970’s was against the FBI, the Attorney General and other government agencies. However the “other Meeropol” I mention is my daughter Rachel, and the fudge is that she isn’t a plaintiff against the government. Instead, she is the lead attorney for the Center for Constitutional Rights’ case on behalf of a group of Muslim men detained for months, treated as terrorists and brutalized by federal prison guards in the wake of the September 11th attacks. The men, who ultimately were deported, were only guilty of immigration violations.

Last Friday my wife Elli and I watched Rachel argue her case in the Federal District Court in Brooklyn. Her opposition - six attorneys representing former Attorney General Ashcroft, FBI Director Mueller, the Superintendent for the Bureau of Prisons, the Warden of the prison where the abuse took place, and two prison guards - argued that the case against their clients should be dismissed. It was six against one, but Rachel, in my unbiased opinion, held the advantage. All the officials’ attorneys from Ashcroft to the Warden stated that the case against their clients should be dismissed because they had no direct or personal knowledge of any abuse. Rachel had documentary evidence that Ashcroft and Mueller emailed that the guards were to use “all means necessary” to extract information from the prisoners, and it was not contested that the abuse took place.

Despite the strength of the CCR’s case, the Judge, relying on recent Supreme Court decisions insulating government officials from liability, may still lean toward granting the government’s request concerning Ashcroft and Mueller. Whether the prisons are in Brooklyn or Bagdad, the Supreme Court apparently wants to ensure that only those at the bottom of the chain of command be held responsible for post-9/11 abuses, and Federal District Court Judges usually abide by the rulings of their superiors.

The Warden, however, may not fare as well. Perhaps the most interesting interchange of the morning came when the judge posed a hypothetical question for the government attorneys. “Are you saying” he asked “that if the Warden comes upon a guard beating a prisoner, and he has the ability and authority to stop the beating, but does nothing, that the Warden can’t be held liable?” When the government attorney said that was his position, the Judge responded, “That can’t be right.”

I felt very proud of Rachel’s excellent performance. Elli heard one of the opposing attorneys in the hall after the hearing say of Rachel, “She really knows her stuff.” But I also couldn’t help but share her frustration at how unlikely it is that the CCR’s case will result in those most responsible being found personally liable. That does not mean, however, that all is in vain. Rachel’s already won damages of over $1,000,000 for several of the original clients in the suit, and remains quite hopeful that many others will receive compensation for the torture they suffered.

Progressive attorneys don’t have the power to prevent such atrocities, but they can, as the CCR does repeatedly, make the government pay dearly for them. And Rachel and her colleagues give me hope that someday the perpetrators will be brought to account.

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Green is the new Red?

Next Wednesday (12/7) I’m joining a panel organized by The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) entitled: Red to Green: Political Panic from McCarthyism to “Eco-Terrorism.” It will take place at the Community Church of New York, 40 East 35th Street, from 6:30 to 8:00 pm. Other panel members include journalist Will Potter, author of Green is the New Red: An Insider’s Account of a Social Movement Under Siege, and Jenny Synan, activist and partner of jailed environmental activist Daniel McGowan. The panel will be introduced and moderated by Rachel Meeropol, a staff attorney at the CCR. (Oh yes, she’s also my daughter.)

Although some in the RFC’s community are aware of the series of “Green Scare” cases from the last decade, and understand the parallels between them and the Red Scare spy cases of the 1950’s, many of our supporters give me a blank look when I talk about the Green Scare. Many others appear reluctant to equate these “violent environmental extremists” with people like my parents.

We should be wary of accepting the government’s and mainstream media’s characterization of Green Scare defendants. As far as I know none has any caused injury, let alone death, to anyone, yet some have received multi-decade sentences and been branded violent terrorists. True, some have committed property damage, but even that is not always the case.

For instance, six people went to prison under the Animal Enterprise Protection Act (AEPA) for organizing against Huntingdon Life Sciences. The AEPA created the new crime of “animal enterprise terrorism” to punish those who caused physical disruption. The young people who organized Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (SHAC), and who along with their organization became known as the SHAC 7 caused no physical disruption. Instead, they planned a very public and successful effort to shame and harass a large corporation, Huntingdon Life Sciences. However, in post-9/11 America, prosecutors developed a new legal theory by expanding the “physical disruption” language in AEPA to include loss of profits. The SHAC 7 were convicted of being animal enterprise terrorists under that interpretation of physical disruption. In 2006 a Judge sentenced the “conspirators” to up to six years in prison.

When people turn their backs on those they feel have been imprisoned for being too militant, it reminds me of my parents’ case. Few alive today remember that A.J. Muste, the pacifist mainstay of the War Resisters’ League, refused to get involved in the effort to save my parents’ lives because they had been accused of aiding the Soviet military. Fellow pacifist, Dave Dellinger, disagreed. He argued that regardless of what my parents might have done, all progressives should stand in solidarity with them because they were being subjected to violent, right-wing political repression.

Dellinger foresaw the long-term negative consequences of the split between leftists and liberals generated by McCarthy-era charges of communist subversion. The military industrial complex took this lesson to heart and has repeatedly driven a wedge between mainstream and militant progressive movements ever since. Those on the Left who turn their backs on Green Scare defendants, fail to see that this round of repression is another iteration of the divide and conquer strategy.

Others on the Left, although not necessary members of the RFC community, have characterized environmental and animal rights activists as self indulgent, well-off white kids who seem more concerned with trees, birds and puppies than they are with worldwide human suffering. Those who think this way appear blind to the common thread of corporate exploitation that propels environmental destruction, animal torment and abuse of workers. The successful, big business-driven legislative effort to redefine terrorism as anything that hurts commodities or profits, should set off alarm bells among all people on the Left. This is part of a larger corporate strategy to have law enforcement treat all progressive activism as a form of terrorism.

Finally, while the panel will focus on the Red and Green scares, we should never forget that attacks did not end in the 1950’s, only to resurface after September 11th, 2001. COINTELPRO took a terrible toll on many progressive movements in the 1970’s that were neither communist nor environmental. And the repression did not end with COINTELPRO’s exposure; it has had a significant negative impact on progressive activity during my entire lifetime.

This just scratches the surface of what we’ll be addressing next Wednesday. I hope to see some of you there.

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Free Pass for Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act

Federal Judge Joseph Tauro put yet another dent in our First Amendment rights two weeks ago when he dismissed a suit brought by five animal rights activists. The activists had claimed that the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act (AETA) made them fearful of protesting in public against animal abuse committed by corporations, and therefore, impinged upon their First Amendment rights. The law states that anyone can be prosecuted if their actions cause property loss to an animal-related business or laboratory, or who “intentionally places a person in reasonable fear of death or serious bodily injury through threats, vandalism, harassment or intimidation.” Judge Tauro dismissed the suit and ruled that the actions the protestors had planned were not prohibited by the law, and therefore, they had failed to demonstrate “an objectively reasonable chill on their First Amendment rights.”

First, to disclose my personal connection: the plaintiffs were represented by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), and more particularly by my daughter, Rachel Meeropol, who is a senior staff attorney there.

AETA was passed towards the end of the Bush administration. It is a sweeping federal law that brands as terrorism protests that hurt the finances of corporations that conduct animal research or deal in animal products. This is a terrible law, and can be used to attack a broad range of activists for engaging in non-violent actions that harm corporate profits. Both the Bush and Obama administrations have used this law and “terrorist enhancements” in other legislation as part of on going actions called the “Green Scare” aimed at repressing animal rights and environmental activists. The RFC has provided support for the children of several imprisoned Green Scare defendants.

If one were looking for a silver lining here, one could interpret Judge Tauro’s ruling as gutting much of the force of AETA by narrowly interpreting its expansive language to limit its impact on the First Amendment. However, my daughter pointed out the limitations of this reasoning. “While this judge reads the law narrowly in a way that is more protective of the First Amendment, there is no guarantee that other judges will agree or that prosecutors will be respectful of animal rights advocates’ freedom of expression. In fact, all the evidence we see is to the contrary, given that there’s been a national crackdown on animal rights activists for the last decade or so.”

Rachel and the CCR plan to appeal the ruling to the First Circuit Court of Appeals.

Many within progressive movements have taken little note of this alarming law. Some in my generation don’t have much respect for the politics of animal rights activists, and so remain silent in the face of this escalating attack on First Amendment rights. One friend of mine described animal rights activists as “people who care more about animals than people.”

First, nothing could be further from the truth. Beyond that, this plays into the hands of the agents of repression whose time-worn divide and conquer tactic is to attempt to pick progressive groups off one at a time. AETA presents the same type of danger that the PATRIOT Act and a host of other post-9/11 laws pose to progressive activists of all stripes. We must resist them all with equal force.

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Imprisoned for Blogging

For the second week in a row I am compelled to write about someone represented by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), and more particularly by my daughter, Rachel Meeropol, who is a senior staff attorney there.

Daniel McGowan pleaded guilty to an environmentally motivated arson in 2006 and is now serving the last six months of his seven-year sentence at a halfway house in Brooklyn. My daughter got involved in his case when the CCR filed a suit attacking the constitutionality of his transfer to a “Communication Management Unit” (CMU) during his imprisonment. In these units, inmates’ communication with the outside world is limited to one 15-minute phone call a week and two two-hour visits a month. Rachel described the CMUs “[as] political prisons. These people are being targeted to limit their ability to communicate with the outside world, and to limit their ability to be political people.”

Daniel McGowan was swept up in a wave of “Green Scare” cases that generated a number of RFC beneficiary families. In 2010, Daniel believed he was transferred to the CMU because he remained politically active in prison and published a blog. Lauren Regan, his criminal defense attorney, with whom I toured the Pacific Northwest in the fall of 2007, noted that the only difference between Daniel and other Green Scare defendants who were not transferred was “the outreach that he was doing and the voice that he had behind bars.”

The CCR’s legal action recently forced the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) to provide McGowan with documents outlining the reasons for his transfer. On Monday, April 1st, 2013, Daniel published an article in the Huffington Post entitled: “Court Documents Prove I Was Sent to the Communications Management Unit (CMU) for My Political Speech.” On Thursday he was seized at the halfway house and confined in the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn because he’d published the blog. The BOP cited its regulation prohibiting prisoners from “publishing under a byline” to justify this action. They neglected to mention that the regulation in question was dropped in 2010, three years after a federal court had declared it unconstitutional.

This is a “let me get this straight” moment…The BOP retaliated against McGowan for writing constitutionally protected political blogs by placing him in a Communication Management Unit and then after he was released, re-imprisoned him when he exercised his free speech rights by writing an article complaining about it. Kafka is twirling in his grave.

The CCR’s lawyers scrambled, the BOP acknowledged its “mistake” and McGowan was back in the halfway house the next day.

But was this really a mistake? It could be a case of bureaucratic incompetence, but there is another more ominous possibility. Perhaps the BOP knew that the regulation was no longer in force, and that his attorneys would move quickly to obtain his release, but they decided to cite it as an excuse to put Daniel through 24 hours of hell to punish him and deter others. He won a victory, but he paid a price. Perhaps one day his attorneys will through further discovery get to the bottom of this, but who knows when, if ever, that will happen.

I suspect we’ll never know, but given the BOP’s history and its actions last Friday, I remain suspicious. The CCR’s press release states that when he was returned to the halfway house, “Daniel was provided with a list of prohibited activities by halfway house staff, which he was required to sign. The list forbids him any media contact without BOP approval, though BOP regulations only require preapproval of in-facility interviews. It also prohibits him from publishing any writing of his own without prior BOP permission. As far as we know, this is a made-up rule applied only to Daniel, in a further attempt to chill his freedom of speech.”

I can’t help but think, as we approach the 60th anniversary of my parents’ execution, how important the publication of my parents’ prison correspondence was in galvanizing the movement that fought to save them. What if the federal government had muzzled them in a Communication Management Unit? Even in the depths of the McCarthy period the government didn’t consider such an action. But today, after 60 years of “progress” thousands of federal prisoners are gagged in this manner.

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