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Despite Post-Snowden Outcry, Report Details 'New Era of Secret Law'
Despite Post-Snowden Outcry, Report Details 'New Era of Secret Law'
Scores of legal memos, opinions, and letters from several agencies still being kept from public view
http://www.commondreams.org/news/2016/10/18/despite-post-snowden-outcry-report-details-new-era-secret-law
By: Nadia Prupis
Date: 2016-10-18
In the wake of 9/11, the U.S. government began creating what has now become an “unprecedented buildup” of secret laws, and even the recent public backlash against them has not stopped widespread use of covert rules that impact Americans' everyday lives without their knowledge, according to a new report from the Brennan Center for Justice.
The Department of Justice has kept classified at least 74 legal memos, opinions, and letters issued by the department's Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) from 2002 to 2009 on national security issues—from torture to mass surveillance—according to the report, The New Era of Secret Law (pdf), written by Elizabeth Gotein, co-director of the center's Liberty and National Security Program.
And the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Court, which rules on intelligence collecting activities, is also hiding 25 to 30 opinions issued between 2003 and 2013 “that were deemed significant by the Attorney General.” In fact, most of the significant case law written before National Security Agency (NSA) whistleblower Edward Snowden's 2013 revelations remains undisclosed.
Source: http://vaticproject.blogspot.com/2016/11/despite-post-snowden-outcry-report.html
