Thursday, August 28, 2003
Copyright © Las Vegas Mercury

Cover Story: Big Brother powwow

Public left out in rain during PATRIOT Act performance

By Heidi Walters

I don't know when I'm going to stop dreaming. I guess I had hoped, after U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft's road-polished speech Tuesday morning in Las Vegas to a roomful of local cops in which he spun a golden cocoon around the USA PATRIOT Act, that the cops would be excited afterward and ready for a collegiate discussion in the lobby with reporters. For, against--I didn't care, I just wanted some response from the people who are charged with enforcing this act, and who were Ashcroft's chosen audience (the presentation was closed to the public).

It was the least I could ask, after--along with other print media--being excluded from the post-speech news conference with Ashcroft to which only TV reporters were invited. No Q&A for the pesky print crowd.

But in an impressive mass of green, white and blue uniforms, the state, federal, county and city cops, along with the local U.S. attorney's office's large dark-suited contingent, flowed quickly out the doors of the conference room in the Lloyd D. George Federal Courthouse. One North Las Vegas policewoman, responding to a plea for an interview, said she had to get back to work--which apparently doesn't involve interfacing with citizens. A group of S.W.A.T.-green-clad Metro cops standing outside the building said I'd have to follow protocol and call their communications office if I wanted "to get a soundbite."

I said I wanted more, I wanted to talk to individual officers fresh from the presentation--which Ashcroft has been delivering repeatedly on his whirlwind tour around the country. I wanted to know if they're on board with this act, and if they have any qualms about roving wiretaps or sneak-and-peeks or searching their neighbors' library records and book-buying habits or bypassing "probable cause" for searches or detaining people for days without charging them. Surely they must know that in some communities in this country, law enforcement agencies are balking at having to, under the act, become extensions of the feds and snoop broadly on people if asked. I also wanted to know if, in light of recent major intelligence bloopers committed by our Washington team, they actually trust that they'll be getting good guidance from these guys.

The Metro officers apologized for not talking, but said they sit behind desks and weren't the ones who'd take part in any PATRIOT Act-related investigations anyway.

Inside the building, waiting for his chief, Nye County Assistant Sheriff Rick Marshall, in charge of administrative services, was amiable to an interview but said he wasn't "familiar enough" with the PATRIOT Act to comment on Ashcroft's speech.

I was starting to wonder just who Ashcroft was talking to when he said, "In the days after Sept. 11, we vowed to do everything within the law to prevent additional attacks. We talked to individuals like you: law enforcement officers, investigators and prosecutors. We asked you what tools you needed to preserve life and liberty."

The only interview nabbed, in the end, was with new Nye County Sheriff Tony DeMeo. DeMeo was involved in investigating the first World Trade Center attack, in 1993--his team, from Jersey City, found the second bomb. He said he's not worried about the PATRIOT Act and said Ashcroft's speech was simply a clarification of the act.

"Some people think it's a trampling of their rights," DeMeo said. "I don't think so. I just think it gives us an opportunity to fight a covert war. The judicial process is still in place. It's not a shotgun approach. Investigations are very focused. É This is a war. As police officers, we're used to fighting a different type of war. Now, we are soldiers, we're part of protecting Americans. So our duties have expanded. It's something we have to do."

DeMeo took his cue directly from Ashcroft, who moments before had exhorted his audience with smoldering praise: "You are the doers. You are the soldiers on the ground and in the trenches who put your lives on the line to defend Americans' lives and liberties." In essence, this is true, especially in the context of the Sept. 11 heroics displayed by police and firefighters. But the military allusions...

DeMeo said the fact that the Nevada Test Site, the Tonopah Test Range and the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump site are in Nye County gives him a sense of extra diligence in terms of security. He also said the act "is supported throughout the country," apparently missing the irony of his words. If everyone's for the act, then why did Ashcroft feel the need to travel the country pumping it up?

The American Civil Liberties Union and others concerned about the expanded surveillance capabilities in the act suggest that Ashcroft's roadshow is a political stunt to woo the swing states where Democrats could take hold. (The fact Ashcroft came to Nevada must mean we're a player.) And if this is the case, the ACLU questions such use of taxpayer money. And, suggest critics, the road show might be intended to calm the dissent that's been festering and spreading across the United States and even in Congress in reaction to some of the more egregious aspects of the act. (More than 150 communities, including three states--Hawaii, Vermont and Alaska--have passed resolutions to uphold their citizens' civil liberties and, in some cases, to not assist federal law enforcement in investigations that violate those liberties.) So, it's time to rally the armed troops--er, local cops.

Except Ashcroft's speech was more like a commercial: On the lectern was a banner with www.lifeandliberty.gov printed on it, and several times Ashcroft announced the DOJ's website on the PATRIOT Act and other security measures. And his speech, delivered in a reasonable tone, had just the right mix of jingoistic war talk and righteousness tempered with poignant memory blips of the devastations of 9/11. Perhaps the essence was this: "The information-sharing that the PATRIOT Act allows has enhanced our capabilities of our terrorism task force to protect local communities. And this has allowed federal, state and local law enforcement officers to create a seamless anti-terror team with international law enforcement and intelligence agencies." Or this: "Those who challenge this long-standing, constitutional capacity to defend America would force us to tip off the terrorist" who could then blow something up.

But for those challengers standing outside the federal building in the rain, holding their protest press conference, perhaps the real essence of Ashcroft's speech was this: "To address all of the issues surrounding the PATRIOT Act would require more time than you have, and than I have."

Of course, he meant that very moment. But the fact that the presentation was closed to the public, was directed at officers who know as little about it now as many of the Congress members did when they passed it in the panic after 9/11, and that none of the attendees wanted to talk about it afterward, throws up a pretty solid wall of noncommunication. And that's just the opposite of what the PATRIOT Act purports to do.--Heidi Walters

For an overview of why some people are worried about the PATRIOT Act and other post-9/11 activity, a good place to start is at www.aclu.org.