One News Now (Link) (April 20 2009)
A Texas congressman is calling on Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano to fully apologize to Americans who were "politically profiled" in her department's controversial report on "rightwing extremists." A legal firm in Michigan wants to go even further.
The intelligence assessment from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) warns, among other things, that "disgruntled" military veterans, as well as people who oppose abortion and illegal immigration pose a potential threat of domestic terrorism (see earlier story). Secretary Napolitano, who has strongly defended the report, did issue an apology to offended veterans, saying: "We do not mean to suggest that veterans as a whole are at risk of becoming violent extremists." Read the unclassified nine-page report from DHS
But Congressman Lamar Smith (R-Texas), a member of House Judiciary Committee, says the report is ideologically driven and "insulting beyond words."
"I think Janet Napolitano...and perhaps others in the administration owe the majority of the American people a direct apology," states Smith, "and that apology should go not just to veterans. It should to go to people who think pro-life is a legitimate part of the abortion debate. It should go to people who rightly think we ought to be enforcing immigration laws. It ought to go to people who think it's perfectly acceptable -- and, in fact, protected by the Second Amendment of the Constitution -- to own weapons, whether it be for personal defense or whether it be for hunting."
Smith says Napolitano has so far refused to apologize to the more than 50 percent of Americans she tried to "marginalize" and "stereotype" in her report.
Janice Crouse with Concerned Women for America had similar concerns last week, asserting that the report "demonizes" people who hold to traditional and biblical values.
Lawsuit filed
A legal firm wants more than an apology from the Homeland Security secretary and has filed a lawsuit asking a federal court to declare that the DHS policy outlined in the report violates the First and Fifth Amendments of the Constitution. (Listen to audio report)
The Thomas More Law Center filed the lawsuit on Thursday after learning that returning veterans of both current foreign wars, those who speak out on immigration issues, pro-lifers, and people against homosexual activism are declared as "potential risks" for extremism. Law Center president Richard Thompson wants to know what criteria Homeland Security used.
"There is no factual basis, no specific information that so-called 'right-wing terrorists' are currently planning any acts of violence. In fact, the report says that," he acknowledges. "This report is just filled with rhetoric. It has no specific, factual basis for any of the conclusions they arrive at."
The report reminds Thompson of some dictatorships the world has experienced that went to extremes to silence the opposition.
"It is totally un-American," he argues. "It violates the Constitution of the United States, and it enables law-enforcement agencies to use this report as a pretext to investigate and harass individuals who have these kinds of beliefs -- and that's why it is so insidious."
Thompson believes Americans ought to be so upset that they demand the report be withdrawn and call for the resignation of Secretary Napolitano.
Recent Comments