As one might expect, the FBI proposes a common-sense procedure — spend more time looking for terror activity among Muslims than among Methodist grandmothers — and CAIR, an unindicted co-conspirator in a terror funding case, cries foul.
“FBI eyes profiling in terrorist inquiries: Race could be weighed to justify investigations,” by Lara Jakes Jordan for Associated Press, July 3 (thanks to all who sent this in):
WASHINGTON “” The Justice Department is considering letting the FBI investigate Americans without any evidence of wrongdoing, relying instead on a terrorist profile that could single out Muslims, Arabs or other racial and ethnic groups.
Law enforcement officials say the proposed policy would help them do what Congress demanded after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks: root out terrorists before they strike.
Although President Bush has disavowed targeting suspects based on their race or ethnicity, the new rules would allow the FBI to consider those factors among a number of traits that could trigger a national security investigation. […]
“We don’t know what we don’t know. And the object is to cut down on that,” said one FBI official who defended the plans. […]
The changes would allow FBI agents to ask open-ended questions about activities of Muslim- or Arab-Americans, or investigate them if their jobs and backgrounds match trends that analysts deem suspect.
FBI agents would not be allowed to eavesdrop on phone calls or dig deeply into personal data until a full investigation was opened. […]
Justice spokesman Brian Roehrkasse said the guidelines governing when to open a national security investigation are part of a “harmonizing” process that will not give the FBI any more authority than it already has. He declined further comment, but he and two other senior Justice officials would not deny the changes as they were described to AP by others familiar with the guidelines.
“Any review and change to the guidelines will reflect our traditional concerns for civil liberties and First Amendment liberties and our traditional investigative emphasis on using the least intrusive means feasible,” Roehrkasse said Wednesday….
“FBI terrorism profiling proposal ‘un-American’: Muslim rights group,” by Mike Rosen-Molina in Jurist, July 3 (thanks to Writer Mom):
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) Thursday blasted a proposed plan that would allow Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents to consider a person’s race, religion, or ethnicity in deciding whether to open a terrorism investigation. CAIR decried the plan as “unconstitutional and un-American,” saying that it could allow security agents to target Muslims and Arab-Americans for harassment….
True to its pattern, CAIR demonstrates no concern whatsoever for protecting Americans from terror attacks.