U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker of San Francisco ruled this week that federal agents eavesdropped illegally on the Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation, based in Oregon.
The ruling struck a blow to the George W. Bush administration’s justifications for secretly bypassing warrants to wiretap people suspected of terrorism, following the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center.
In 2005, the Bush administration publicly acknowledged the surveillance, claiming presidential authority to step over 1978 Congressional legislation requiring the government to obtain advance court approval for each act of eavesdropping, passed after controversy over wiretapping of political dissidents during the Watergate era.
In 2006, then vice president Dick Cheney defended the warrantless wiretapping in a speech in front of the Heritage Foundation, as reported by CNN. Cheney said, “The activities conducted under this authorization have helped to detect and prevent possible terrorist attacks against the American people. As such, this program is critical to the national security of the United States.”
But Walker said Wednesday that Bush lacked that authority, The San Francisco Chronicle reported.
Walker said the “theory of unfettered executive-branch discretion” holds an “obvious potential for governmental abuse and overreaching.”
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9/11, Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation, Bush Administration, Dick Cheney, eavesdropping, federal judge, George W Bush, Islam, Patriot Act, post-9/11, san francisco, secret wiretapping, U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker, Vaughn Walker, warrantless wiretapping, wiretapping
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