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Committee and Chapter UpdatesPortland sees huge turnout at civil liberties forumby Mark KramerOn June 17, an overflow crowd of100 attended a forum—Civil LibertiesUnder Obama: Are We Still At Risk?—at Portland State University. The eventwas organized by the Portland Chapterof NLG, the ACLU of Oregon, Peaceand Justice Works, the American ConstitutionSociety, and others.Participants included Steve Wilker(ACLU cooperating attorney), TomNelson (NLG attorney), Jo Ann Bowman(Executive Director of OregonAction), Steven Wax (Federal PublicDefender), Ashlee Albies (NLG attorney,Portland NLG Co-Chair) andDavid Fidanque (Executive Director- Oregon ACLU). Although organizersinvited current and former U.S. Attorneysto participate on the panel, thoseoffers were refused.Moderator and former U.S. SenateCandidate Steve Novick opened with achallenge to the panelists, questioningwhether President Bush was as much ofa threat to civil liberties as we believed,whether President Obama had decisivelyturned the page on Bush’s abuses,or whether Obama is as bad as Bush.While the speakers reached no unanimousagreement, there was consensusthat Bush had fundamentally underminedcivil liberties and that Obamahas made some substantial progress incurbing the abuses of the Bush regime,including a commitment to close downGuantanamo, reversing reactionaryexecutive orders, ceasing reference tothe “War on Terror,” and committingto better respect the due process rightsof detainees. However, all agreed thatPresident Obama had not gone farenough and was continuing a number oftroubling Bush policies.Wilker reminded us that Americanhistory is littered with numerousdegradations to our civil liberties, theresponsibility for which lies with bothpolitical parties. Bowman spoke aboutthe parallels between racial profiling inPortland (against Blacks and Hispanics)and the preventive detention ofMuslims and non-whites on sometimesbogus and flimsy or unreasonablegrounds. She critiqued Oregon’s newAttorney General for refusing to considera class action suit to challengeracial profiling in Portland. Nelsonspoke about a number of travesties ofjustice in which innocent people werewrongfully arrested, subject to secretrendition, and, in some cases tortured,including one of his clients who stillawaits justice in the courts. For Nelson,the critical inquiry is whether wewill ever find out what was done in ourAll agreed that PresidentObama had not gonefar enough and wascontinuing a number oftroubling Bush policies.names under the Bush regime. Untilwe find that out, he said, we are still atrisk.Wax spoke of his experience representingGuantanamo detainees withthe Oregon Federal Public Defender’sOffice. He noted that Guantanamowas just the tip of the iceberg; therewere thousands of detainees across theworld languishing, many innocent, andheld on exaggerated charges or noneat all, with little or no prospect of adue process trial. Wax challenged theObama administration’s oppositionto releasing evidence explaining thedetention, even to the detainees or theirattorneys, and the claim that courtsare unable to handle alleged terrorists.He noted a number of cases in whichthe courts have adjudicated claimsinvolving terrorism, mass murder,war crimes, etc. Wax was open to usingmilitary commissions for certainindividuals accused of war crimes, butonly under the due process affordedby the Uniform Code of Justice, ratherthan the commissions set up by Congress,which still hid evidence from theaccused.Albies spoke of the state secretsprivilege, used in the Al Haramain case,in which a Muslim charity is suing thegovernment for the NSA’s warrantlesswiretaps in violation of the law. Despitevociferous attempts by the BushAdministration to dismiss the case, thejudiciary has kept it alive while maintainingthe secrecy of the documentdiscovered by the charity, which allegedlydemonstrates the government’sillegal wiretaps. Albies emphasized thatthe Obama Administration maintainsthe same position as its predecessor onthe use of the privilege, thus maintainingthe shield against transparency andaccountability.Fidanque criticized both theBush and Obama Administrations andmembers of Congress for thwartingattempts at transparency and accountabilityregarding government use oftorture and secret rendition. He calledfor a special prosecutor and independentinquiry to look into the policyorigins to explore the justifications forsuch policies so we can avoid abusesin the future.All speakers agreed that civilliberties are still at risk and will remainso until the history of recent abuses isbrought to light and the architects ofthose abuses are held accountable. Theneed for vigilance has not been reducedby Obama’s election. □▪ 21 ▪