ACLU: Homeland Security Gave Pentagon Information on Anti-War Student Groups in California
The Department of Homeland Security provided the Pentagon with information on anti-war protests at University of California campuses last year, according to the most recent government documents released to the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California.
“Homeland Security was created to protect the American people from terrorist activities – not monitor political dissent on college campuses,” said Mark Schlosberg, Police Practices Policy Director of the ACLU of Northern California. “These documents raise significant questions about the extent to which the Department of Homeland Security is monitoring anti-war activities.”
Students at the University of California Berkeley and Santa Cruz campuses first learned that their activities were being monitored when NBC News reported last December that a secret Pentagon database contained information on several anti-war protests across the country. On March 7, 2006 the ACLU and the San Francisco Bay Guardian filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit for documents held by the Defense Department on Santa Cruz Students Against the War and the Berkeley Stop the War Coalition, which were both listed in the portion of the database obtained by NBC. The FOIA also seeks policy information on the creation and maintenance of the database.
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