Fwd: Lawsuit against federal government for tracking phone records
Z Alani
From: Romin Iqbal <riq...@cair.com>
Date: Wed, Jul 17, 2013 at 3:52 PM
Subject: Lawsuit against federal government for tracking phone records
To: "CAIR Columbus Professionals (caircolumbus...@googlegroups.com)" <caircolumbus...@googlegroups.com>
CAIR-OHIO JOINS LAWSUIT AGAINST SURVEILLANCE OF PHONE RECORDS BY FEDERAL GOVERNMENT
(COLUMBUS, OH, 7/17/13) – The Ohio Chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation's largest Muslim civil liberties and advocacy organization, announced it is joining other advocacy groups in a lawsuit against the National Security Agency's (NSA) warrantless surveillance program that collects, stores, searches, and analyzes the phone records of millions of innocent Americans.
SEE: NSA Collects Phone Records of Millions of Verizon Customers (Guardian)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/06/nsa-phone-records-verizon-court-order
The suit is being filed Tuesday by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) (https://www.eff.org) in Federal District Court for the Northern District of California on behalf of 18 organizations from across the political spectrum based on the First Amendment right of association. The right of association is a well-established doctrine that prevents the government from "interfering with the right to peaceably assemble or prohibit the petition for a governmental redress of grievances."
The suit outlines how the wholesale collection of the telephone records of millions of innocent Americans, and thereby the collection of their associations, is massively overbroad and has a "chilling effect" on basic constitutional rights.
SEE: First Unitarian v. NSA
https://www.eff.org/node/75009
"Massive warrantless surveillance of law-abiding Americans is an assault against the freedoms guaranteed under the Bill of Rights," said Romin Iqbal, Staff Attorney for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, Ohio (CAIR-Ohio). “When the government tracks and gathers the phone and internet records of its people in violation of the constitution, it squelches civic engagement and harms our democracy. CAIR welcomes the chance to challenge the NSA’s warrantless surveillance which negatively impacts all Americans."
The plaintiffs in the case are all associations that utilize telephones in exercising the First Amendment right to bring people together to work to change policy or laws. The plaintiffs include:
- First Unitarian Church of Los Angeles
- Bill of Rights Defense Committee
- California Association of Federal Firearms Licensees
- Council on American-Islamic Relations National, California, and Ohio
- Franklin Armory
- Free Press
- Free Software Foundation
- Greenpeace, Inc.
- Human Rights Watch
- Media Alliance
- National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, California Chapter
- Open Technology Institute
- People for the American Way
- Public Knowledge
- Students for a Sensible Drug Policy
- TechFreedom
- The Calguns Foundation
- Unitarian Universalist Service Commission
CAIR is America's largest Muslim civil liberties and advocacy organization. Its mission is to enhance the understanding of Islam, encourage dialogue, protect civil liberties, empower American Muslims, and build coalitions that promote justice and mutual understanding.
CONTACT: CAIR-Ohio Staff Attorney Romin Iqbal, 614.783.7953, E-Mail: riq...@cair.com; CAIR-Cleveland Executive Director Julia Shearson, 216.830.2247, 216.440.2247, E-Mail: jshe...@cair.com; CAIR Columbus Executive Director Hannah Tyler, 614.451.3232, E-Mail: hty...@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper, 202.744.7726, E-Mail: iho...@cair.com
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