What is the USA PATRIOT Act?

The name is an acronym for the full name of the Act: Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism. It was enacted as Public Law 107-56 on October 26, 2001.

In the aftermath of September 11, 2001, the legislation was prepared in secrecy (and with astonishing speed) by the US Department of Justice and a few members of the Bush Administration. It was submitted to Congress with intense pressure from the Administration to get it passed immediately. Copies of the law were unavailable to members of Congress for some time, and even when they were finally distributed few members bothered to read it. The law was passed in a single marathon session at a time when the Capitol was under attack with a strain of anthrax originally developed by the US military.

What does the PATRIOT Act do?

What does it not? The PATRIOT Act is the single most invasive law ever passed in the entire history of the United States. It stripped away almost all of the hard-won protections that followed the Watergate and COINTELPRO scandals of the 1970s, and created powers that J. Edgar Hoover (and Ronald Reagan) only dreamed of. Not even the McCarthy era saw laws like this one.

The PATRIOT Act made sweeping and unprecedented changes to civil liberties, habeas corpus, Federal powers of surveillance, and many other facets of US law. It also granted new powers to the Justice Dept., allowing it to order massive surveillance, break-ins, and even secret detentions with almost zero judicial oversight of any kind. The PATRIOT Act empowers the FBI to seize "any tangible thing", including books, letters, diaries, library records, medical and psychiatric records, financial information, membership lists of religious institutions, and even – as Attorney General Ashcroft himself conceded in testimony before Congress – genetic information.

In many case they do not even need a warrant – all they have to do is (secretly) proclaim someone a terrorist. They can even secretly review your library and credit records and never tell you. They can even "wire tap" all of your Internet activity and your ISP is legally barred from ever telling you. Just a few of the provisions of the PATRIOT Act are explained here and here.

In other words: there is no real system of checks and balances, portions of the US Constitution have essentially been suspended, and all bets are off.

Why should I care? I'm not an immigrant (or a terrorist)!

The simple fact is, the PATRIOT Act affects every American regardless of their citizenship or political affiliation. For one, the law drastically redfines what is considered "terrorism" to the point where many normal political expressions or affiliations can be deemed "terrorism" by fiat of the Attorney General. Even knowing someone who engages in such acts – whether you know it or not – could mean your being subjected to surveillance or worse. They can now even secretly surveil "privileged" communications between attorneys and their clients.

Even our freedom to travel is affected: under the new CAPPS II program, anyone matching a top-secret "profile" (which even includes your financial records!) can be barred from flying at any time and with no explanation. In some circumstances, you could be immediately arrested and taken to a secret location. Still more invasive is the now-infamous Total Information Awareness (TIA) program (renamed the Terrorist Information Awareness in a propaganda ploy) which is designed to scour government and commercial databases for supposedly "suspicious" activity by anyone. The man who created the project – convicted Iran-Contra perjurer John Poindexter – has resigned amidst scandal. But the program is currently still underway despite efforts by some in Congress to stop it. Meanwhile, the Dept. of Defense (which is in charge of the operation) is lobbying heavily to keep it alive.

And it's not just "liberals" who are worried about the PATRIOT Act. The Inspector General of the Dept. of Justice recently released a report which proved that people "detained" under its provisions have been beaten and otherwise abused while in Federal custody. Even some of the most conservative members of Congress are publicly concerned about the effects of the PATRIOT Act.

What's this 'PATRIOT II' thing I've heard about?

In late 2002, rumors that the Justice Dept. was secretly creating even more draconian legislation had been circulating for some time, but Atty. Gen. Ashcroft and other spokespersons vehemently denied it, even in Congressional testimony. Then in early 2003 the Center for Public Integrity (CPI) managed to obtain a copy of the "nonexistent" draft legislation, releasing the text in full to the public. (Read a Bill Moyers interview with Chuck Lewis of CPI about PATRIOT II.)

Dubbed by the press as "PATRIOT Act II," the official name is the Domestic Security Enhancement Act (DSEA). The proposed legislation would not only make permanent key provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act, it would add all new powers that would drastically expand the already dreadful provisions of the first law, and decrease judicial oversight powers even further. (Read an ACLU analysis of "PATRIOT Act II".)

Now I hear there's something called the 'VICTORY Act'. What the heck is that?

Once again we have a propagandistic acronym: the Vital Interdiction of Criminal Terrorist Organizations Act of 2003. It is essentially a re-packaged version of PATRIOT II, with some new provisions and "refinements". It would also effectively combine the "War in Drugs" and the "War on Terrorism", further blurring the line between national security and ordinary law enforcement and potentially classifying even minor drug offenses as "terrorism".

A recent draft of the VICTORY Act has been posted on the Internet. There are now also a number of summaries of its potential impacts, including this one. At this writing, Atty. Gen. Ashcroft is on a coast-to-coast "road show" supporting the PATRIOT Act and advocating passage of the VICTORY Act, something many consider to be lobbying – an activity which the Attorney General is prohibited by law from engaging in. Even the DOJ web site is promoting outright falsehoods about the effects of the PATRIOT and VICTORY Acts.

Prepared by Spencer Sundell, September 2003