Associated Press condemns US telephone record seizure
POSTED BY: Geezer
UPDATED: Saturday, July 19, 2025 18:53
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The Associated Press has described the US government's secret seizure of its journalists' telephone records as a "massive and unprecedented intrusion".
Chief executive Gary Pruitt said AP was told on Friday the justice department had gathered records of outgoing calls from more than 20 phone lines.
Mr Pruitt said there could be "no possible justification for such an overbroad collection".
The justice department has provided no explanation for the seizure.
However, officials have previously said the US Attorney's Office in the District of Columbia was conducting a criminal investigation into information contained in an AP story last year.
Published in May 2012, the article was about a CIA operation in Yemen that foiled an al-Qaeda plot to blow up a US-bound airplane.
Confidential sources
The story was embarrassing to the government, coming shortly after it had informed the public that there was nothing to suggest any such attack had been planned, says the BBC's David Willis in Washington.
Records for the phone numbers of five reporters and an editor who were involved in the AP story were among those obtained in April and May 2012.
AP said the seizure of records for general switchboard numbers and a fax line at its offices in New York, Hartford, in Connecticut, Washington DC and the House of Representatives was unusual and largely unprecedented.
"There can be no possible justification for such an overbroad collection of the telephone communications of the Associated Press and its reporters," Mr Pruitt wrote in a letter to US Attorney General Eric Holder.
"These records potentially reveal communications with confidential sources across all of the newsgathering activities undertaken by the AP during a two-month period, provide a road map to AP's newsgathering operations, and disclose information about AP's activities and operations that the government has no conceivable right to know."
It is not clear if the records seized included incoming calls or the duration of the calls. Nor is it clear whether a judge or grand jury approved the subpoenas.
News organisations are normally notified in advance if the government is seeking such information and are given time to negotiate.
The Obama administration has aggressively investigated disclosures of classified information to the media, bringing more cases against people suspected of leaking such material than any previous administration, our correspondent adds.
'Press intimidation'
Darrell Issa, the Republican chairman of the investigative House of Representatives Oversight and Government Reform Committee, criticised the seizure of records.
"They had an obligation to look for every other way to get it before they intruded on the freedom of the press," he told CNN.
Senator Patrick Leahy, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said in a statement emailed to AP: "I am very troubled by these allegations and want to hear the government's explanation."
The American Civil Liberties Union accused the Obama administration of "press intimidation".
In a statement, the US Attorney's Office in the District of Columbia insisted it took seriously its obligations to "follow all applicable laws, federal regulations, and Department of Justice policies".
"Those regulations require us to make every reasonable effort to obtain information through alternative means before even considering a subpoena for the phone records of a member of the media," it said.
"Because we value the freedom of the press, we are always careful and deliberative in seeking to strike the right balance between the public interest in the free flow of information and the public interest in the fair and effective administration of our criminal laws," it added.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-22519776
I know that this story was buried in Jong's blitz, but I think it de
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Well, thank you for starting this thread. I did have something to say about this subject, but I wasn't about to join the Jong/Rap circle jerk thread that they started. They were so busy low-fiveing each other, I didn't want to disturb them. I DO hope their courtship results in a nice marriage, now that it's becoming legal in more states...
According to the piece I heard on NPR, for the gov't to do this, they were either supposed to advise the subject in advance, or have it signed off by the Attorney General himself. If that's accurate, this one does go all the way into the Cabinet.
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"The Obama administration has aggressively investigated disclosures of classified information to the media, bringing more cases against people suspected of leaking such material than any previous administration, our correspondent adds."
It's even worse than that. The Obama administration has prosecuted whistleblowers under the 1917 Espionage Act at twice the rate of all other administrations COMBINED.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/27/business/media/white-house-uses-espi
onage-act-to-pursue-leak-cases-media-equation.html?_r=0
A large network of surveillance cameras has been installed to monitor citizens' routine comings and goings under the program name Trapwire. "Former senior intelligence officials have created a detailed surveillance system more accurate than modern facial recognition technology—and have installed it across the U.S. under the radar of most Americans, according to emails hacked by Anonymous.
Every few seconds, data picked up at surveillance points in major cities and landmarks across the United States are recorded digitally on the spot, then encrypted and instantaneously delivered to a fortified central database center at an undisclosed location to be aggregated with other intelligence."
http://www.businessinsider.com/trapwire-everything-you-need-to-know-20
12-8
And the government records your communication to the tune of hundreds of millions of text messages, emails, and phone communications every day.
"Meanwhile, in a 2007-era whistleblower-report supporting a lawsuit filed against the federal government by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an expert witness suggested that the surveillance efforts were alive and well. The witness in a court deposition wrote that the NSA had worked with AT&T, Inc. (T), the second largest wireless carrier in the country on a program to "vacuum up" phone traffic, internet traffic, emails, and more without warrant.
In that report, a retired 22-year AT&T technician, Mark Klein, recalls "that the NSA set up a system that vacuumed up Internet and phone-call data from ordinary Americans with the cooperation of AT&T" and that "contrary to the government's depiction of its surveillance program as aimed at overseas terrorists . . . much of the data sent through AT&T to the NSA was purely domestic.""
http://www.dailytech.com/Former+FBI+Agent+All+Your+Communications+are+
Recorded+Government+Accessible/article31486.htm
This pattern isn't about national security, this is about government being able to control --- everyone.
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Hey, we tried to warn y'all about the dangers of warrantless wiretaps and warrantless searches and seizures. "Paranoid" and "un-American" was what we got called for our troubles.
I even argued that the reason I didn't want Bush to have these unprecedented powers was that someday he would be replaced by someone else, and who knew who that guy might decide to target.
And again I was called paranoid and reactionary.
So while I think this kind of crap is terrible, nobody here really has any right to call it unexpected. Think about it next time: if you wouldn't want your political opponents to have such a power, don't grant it to your political allies.
I can't make it any clearer for you.
"I supported Bush in 2000 and 2004 and intellegence [sic] had very little to do with that decision." - Hero
"I was wrong" - Hero, 2012
Mitt Romney, introducing his running mate: "Join me in welcoming the next President of the United States, Paul Ryan!"
Rappy's response? "You're lying, gullible ( believing in some BS you heard on msnbc ) or hard of hearing."
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Quote:
Originally posted by Kwicko:
Hey, we tried to warn y'all about the dangers of warrantless wiretaps and warrantless searches and seizures. "Paranoid" and "un-American" was what we got called for our troubles.
I even argued that the reason I didn't want Bush to have these unprecedented powers was that someday he would be replaced by someone else, and who knew who that guy might decide to target.
And again I was called paranoid and reactionary.
So while I think this kind of crap is terrible, nobody here really has any right to call it unexpected. Think about it next time: if you wouldn't want your political opponents to have such a power, don't grant it to your political allies.
I can't make it any clearer for you.
So.
"But Bush..."?
"When your heart breaks, you choose what to fill the cracks with. Love or hate. But hate won't ever heal. Only love can do that."
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And...
Quote:
Investigative reporter Carl Bernstein on Tuesday called the scandal involving the Department of Justice securing telephone records of Associated Press reporters and editors a "nuclear event."
"This is outrageous," Bernstein said on MSNBC's "Morning Joe." "It is totally inexcusable. This administration has been terrible on this subject from the beginning.
"The object of it is to intimidate people who talk to reporters," he said. "This was an accident waiting to become a nuclear event, and now it's happened."
The AP reported late Monday afternoon that the "Justice Department secretly obtained two months of telephone records of reporters and editors for The Associated Press."
The organization was not told the reason for the seizure. But the timing and the specific journalistic targets strongly suggest they are related to a continuing government investigation into the leaking of information a year ago about the CIA's disruption of a Yemen-based terrorist plot to bomb an airliner, The New York Times reported.
The development represents the latest collision of news organizations and federal investigators over government efforts to prevent the disclosure of national security information, and it comes against a backdrop of an aggressive policy by the Obama administration to rein in leaks, according to The New York Times.
Under President Barack Obama, six current and former government officials have been indicted in leak-related cases, twice the number brought under all previous administrations combined.
"The numerical thing doesn't matter," said Bernstein, a former Washington Post reporter who, along with Bob Woodward, broke the Watergate scandal that brought down President Richard Nixon. "What matters is, this is a matter of policy. It is known to the president of the United States that this is the policy. To say that there was no knowledge, in quotes, specifically about this in the White House is nonsense."
"This is a policy matter, and this does go to the president and the people around him," he said. "The idea is to try and make an example of those people who talk to reporters, especially on national security matters. National security is always the false claim of administrations trying to hide things that people ought to know."
That the Justice Department sought records of phone calls made over congressional phone lines could also raise a separation of powers issue between the administration and legislative branches of government.
"The First Amendment is first for a reason," House Speaker John Boehner spokesman Michael Steel tells Newsmax. "If the Obama administration is going after reporters' phone records, they better have a damned good explanation."
http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/carl-bernstein-ap-scandal/2013/05/14/
id/504370#ixzz2TMezjeVb
"When your heart breaks, you choose what to fill the cracks with. Love or hate. But hate won't ever heal. Only love can do that."
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Quote:
Originally posted by Geezer:Quote:
Originally posted by Kwicko:
Hey, we tried to warn y'all about the dangers of warrantless wiretaps and warrantless searches and seizures. "Paranoid" and "un-American" was what we got called for our troubles.
I even argued that the reason I didn't want Bush to have these unprecedented powers was that someday he would be replaced by someone else, and who knew who that guy might decide to target.
And again I was called paranoid and reactionary.
So while I think this kind of crap is terrible, nobody here really has any right to call it unexpected. Think about it next time: if you wouldn't want your political opponents to have such a power, don't grant it to your political allies.
I can't make it any clearer for you.
So.
"But Bush..."?
Care to show me where I said that?
For someone who constantly bitches about people putting words in your mouth, you sure do put words in other peoples' mouths an awful lot. Might want to see to that.
"I supported Bush in 2000 and 2004 and intellegence [sic] had very little to do with that decision." - Hero
"I was wrong" - Hero, 2012
Mitt Romney, introducing his running mate: "Join me in welcoming the next President of the United States, Paul Ryan!"
Rappy's response? "You're lying, gullible ( believing in some BS you heard on msnbc ) or hard of hearing."
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Quote:
Originally posted by Kwicko:
Care to show me where I said that?
"I even argued that the reason I didn't want Bush to have these unprecedented powers was that someday he would be replaced by someone else, and who knew who that guy might decide to target."
So.
But Bush asked for these powers that the current administration is abusing.
Actually, your referencing warrantless wiretaps and search and seizure under the Patriot Act or other such laws isn't really apt, since the opinion of pretty much everybody - Left, Right, and center - is that the seizure of the AP phone records is illegal under any present law.
"When your heart breaks, you choose what to fill the cracks with. Love or hate. But hate won't ever heal. Only love can do that."
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Quote:
Originally posted by Kwicko:
Care to show me where I said that?
For someone who constantly bitches about people putting words in your mouth, you sure do put words in other peoples' mouths an awful lot. Might want to see to that.
My dear boy... who ever said I was quoting you?
Since you're not too bright, I'll s'plain it to ya.
I was commenting on the standard, Left wing response to EVERYTHING that Obama does wrong, and some how it ends up being Bush's fault.
Fathom the hypocrisy of a government that requires every citizen to prove they are insured... but not everyone must prove they are a citizen
Resident USA Freedom Fundie
" AU, that was great, LOL!! " - Chrisisall
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