Greenpeace joins lawsuit against Bush admin’s secret wiretap program
On Tuesday, a diverse group of individuals and organizations filed suit against the National Security Agency, asking a federal court in Detroit to declare the agency’s clandestine domestic eavesdropping program unconstitutional. The plaintiffs — ranging from Greenpeace to stalwart Iraq war booster Christopher Hitchens — have no proof that the NSA spied on them. But the ACLU, which is leading the suit, charges that simply knowing the program exists has had a “chilling effect” on their willingness to use international phone and data lines to communicate openly, violating their First Amendment and privacy rights. Greenpeace and the ACLU have felt the icy breath of the Bush administration before: The FBI has spied on both groups extensively in the past several years.
