Judge Orders White House to Release Wiretapping Memos
U.S. District Judge Henry Kennedy Jr. signed an order Friday requiring the White House to release its memos forming the legal basis for the (illegal) wiretapping program of American citizens.
The program was ordered by U.S. President George W. Bush years ago in order to fight terrorism more effectively. He and his councellors decided to side-step the court because going to court would take too much time. Additionally, the White House said, the president did not needto get anyone’s permission to wiretap calls between U.S. citizens in America and foreign terrorism suspects.
Releasing the memos, the White House argued, would jeopardize national security.
The court accepted the administration’s reasoning, until Friday, when the judge said he had to read the memos himself to determine if the administration’s reasoning was correct. If not (entirely), Judge Kennedy could decide to force the White House to publish the memos for civil rights groups who sued the administration over its wiretapping program.
The administration responded by saying that they would review the order, and decide what steps to take later on.
The decision is the umptiest time that Bush’s views on his own powers and of the rights of terrorism suspects has been rebuked. It seems that many of Bush’s decisions will be overturned, possibly resulting in more checks on the president in the coming years than Bush was willing to allow.
This website uses IntenseDebate comments, but they are not currently loaded because either your browser doesn't support JavaScript, or they didn't load fast enough.
Comments are closed.
PoliGazette Comments Policy
PoliGazette encourages comments from all viewpoints, especially those that disagree.
Comments submitted must, however, adhere to the following standards. Comments that violate
these standards may be edited or deleted without notice at the sole discretion of the editors.
Commenters who repeatedly or egregiously violate these standards or who attempt to argue
publicly with editors regarding the comments policy may be banned from commenting further.
(1) Comments should address the substantive content of the post. Comments that repeatedly
or blatantly misrepresent the content of the post or of others' comments are not welcome. Comments that
respond to something other than which the contributor or commenter may have said are irrelevant and should
not be posted.
(2) Comments should avoid vulgarity as well as racial, ethnic, religious, or sexual bigotry.
(3) Comments should not personally attack the character, personal integrity, or professional
reputation of any PoliGazette contributor or of other commenters.
(4) Comments should reflect the contributions of the commenters themselves and should not
include extensive cut-and-paste reproductions of others' words except insofar as necessary to supplement
the commenter's own arguments. Link spam, trackback spam, and propaganda spam will be instantly deleted.
(5) Public figures are considered open to all substantive criticism of their policies and statements.
Comments that present objectively false factual information about public figures (i.e. "Obama is a Muslim") or
that attack public figures by attacking their families are not welcome. Comments that merely repeat
slogans for or against a candidate without engaging in substantive comment are not welcome.
Questions or challenges to these policies or their application should be directed to the editors
by email only.
