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Mukasey's 9/11 Bombshell
This story has been getting some play at DailyKos here and here. Glenn Greenwald has also blogged extensively about it at Salon.com.
Keith Olbermann also picked up on this and featured it prominently on Countdown with Rachel Maddow here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fh98duokAco&eurl=http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/4/2/04611/36358/501/488678
Attorney General Mukasey, at a speech to a public affairs forum at the Commonwealth Club said in an appeal for warrantless wiretapping:
Officials "shouldn't need a warrant when somebody with a phone in Iraq picks up a phone and calls somebody in the United States because that's the call that we may really want to know about. And before 9/11, that's the call that we didn't know about. We knew that there has been a call from someplace that was known to be a safe house in Afghanistan and we knew that it came to the United States. We didn't know precisely where it went."After which he got teary-eyed and choked up and while struggling to maintain his composure followed up with:
"We got three thousand. . . . We've got three thousand people who went to work that day and didn't come home to show for that"As Glenn and Rachel note, even before 9/11 FISA allowed for warrantless wiretapping of calls coming from outside the U.S. into the country. The very idea that the Bush administration knew about but was unable to tap a call from Al Qaeda because their hands were tied by FISA is, as Rachel Maddow exclaims: "bull puck".
If what Mukasey says is true, then this could very well be gross negligence and criminal malfeasance on the part of the Bush Admin. Otherwise, if he is lying, he is obstensibly completely fabricated a 9/11 event in order to fear-monger the country into supporting Bush's FISA Bill agenda.
As Glenn Greenwald notes, the 9/11 Commission Report makes completely no mention of this story and he actually followed-up by actually trying to contact members of the 9/11 Commission. 9/11 Commission Executive Director, Philip Zelikow unsurprisingly has no idea what Mukasey is talking about:
"Not sure of course what the AG had in mind, although the most importantIf you watch that Olbermann video, you can see that both he and Rachel Maddow are astounded by this whole event. The implications if what Mukasey says is true are unfathomable. I doubt the Bush administration would want to try and defend what Mukasey said, so I would assume that they will claim that Mukasey "misspoke" or was speaking figuratively in a particularly emotional moment. But at the very least the press should be questioning the validity and ramifications of this statement and echoing Olbermann's sentiment that Mukasey should be dragged in front of Congress and forced to testify about this under oath. If the Bush Administration is brazen and unscrupulous enough to use this line of fear-mongering to push telecom immunity then let them feel the edge of the double-edged sword. At the very least, the Democratic Party should be able to make some serious political hay from this in their battle against the FISA Bill and the General Election.
signals intelligence leads related to our report -- that related to the
Hazmi-Mihdhar issues of January 2000 or to al Qaeda activities or
transits connected to Iran -- was not of this character. If, as he
says, the USG didn't know where the call went in the US, neither did
we."
Although I am not surprised the MSM has I am curious as to why TPM hasn't pursued this potentially explosive story yet. I was completely floored by this when I saw it. Time has dulled the pain of 9/11, and perhaps this allows for small nuggets of the truth about the event to leak out inadvertently. But that statement and the implications it holds rips that wound back open viscerally. That the press and the Dem Party might let this drift downstream and out of the public discourse would be just as grossly negligent and outrageous as the statement itself.
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Comments (15)
Sorry the Keith Olbermann youtube link came out all funky. Here it is again:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fh98duokAco
April 3, 2008 1:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
Wonder when and if this story ever gets any traction in the mainstream press.
How can Brian Williams, Anderson Cooper, Wolf Blitzer et al be so feckless as to ignore this story after completely abdicating their roles during the run-up to the war, invasion, and occupation through 2006?
Absent the unescapable full sensory assault of a catastrophic hurricane, do they ever intend to apply curiosity, concern, wonder, analysis and judgment, or will they permanently content themselves as stenographers until the next Act of God?
April 3, 2008 1:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
One reason we're not hearing more about this is because Mukasey wouldn't even be AG if it weren't for Schumer shilling for him. Democratic "leaders" continually shoot themselves in the foot by playing ball with the Big Boys while claiming they are speaking on behalf of the Little Guy. Somebody needs to ask Schumer and Feinstein why they wanted Mukasey confirmed so badly. I'm sick of being sold out by people who speak in our names.
April 3, 2008 1:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm so glad to see this popping up everywhere and staying in the public lexicon. Nobody had diaried this in detail on DKos until the Olbermann/Maddow segment went on the air. Apparently in election season this is difficult to keep fresh in the people's minds.
April 3, 2008 1:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
I've already emailed Rep. Conyers and Senator Leahy, asking them to invite AG Mukasey to testify under oath before the Judiciary Committees about this.
There's a stink about this whether it's true or not, and it should be aired out.
April 3, 2008 2:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
TPMmuckraker has a piece up on this just a short while ago:
April 3, 2008 7:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't think Mukasey is saying that there was an actual phone call that couldn't be tapped. I think he's saying (incorrectly and inarticulately) that if there had been one, the intelligence community didn't have the authority to listen in.
April 3, 2008 2:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
That was my reading of his lie as well.
April 3, 2008 6:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well if he had stated it hypothetically; if he had used a conditional, then I there would be no doubt, and this wouldn't be an issue. But I believe his language is vague enough to warrant(no pun intended) a definitive answer. Lets not forget, this man was a federal judge and is the attorney general. His words should rightly be more carefully constructed and carry more weight than, lets say, Dana Perino's.
If Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton have their words nit-picked over with a fine-tooth comb for completely trivial matters, then the top attorney and law enforcement officer in the land should have his words similarly treated for a subject as heavily important to our country as 9/11 and the FISA bill.
Besides, I think the Dems can use this as a chance to effectively counter the Bush Adminstrations arguments for Telecom immunity. If Mukasey can defend his remark under oath by saying he meant it hypothetically, fine, lets have him confirm it:
"Knowing that FISA laws allowed for warrantless wire-tapping for calls coming from outside the U.S. into the country even pre-9/11, what would you have done if you were actually faced with the hypothetical Afghanistan Safe-house Call?"
April 3, 2008 6:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
Why what do we have here? Why, it's a strongly worded letter!
-----
Conyers, Judiciary Members Demand Answers from Attorney General on 9/11 Surveillance
(Washington, DC)- Today, House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, Jr. (D-MI) and Subcommittee Chairmen Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) and Robert “Bobby” C. Scott (D-VA) sent a letter to United States Attorney General Michael Mukasey demanding answers about a recent public statement claiming there was a pre-9/11 call from a terrorist safe house in Afghanistan that was apparently not intercepted by federal authorities. The Members also followed up on previous requests for an October 2001 Office of Legal Counsel memo providing legal analysis about the President’s war powers. The letter notes: “The notion that the President can claim to operate under ’secret’ powers known only to the President and a select few subordinates is antithetical to the core principles of this democracy.” The full text of the letter is below and attached.
*****************
April 3, 2008
The Honorable Michael Mukasey
Attorney General of the United States
U.S. Department of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20530
Dear Mr. Attorney General:
We are writing about two disturbing recent revelations concerning the actions and inactions by the Department of Justice and the federal government to combat terrorism. These include a public statement by you that appears to suggest a fundamental misunderstanding of the federal government’s existing surveillance authority to combat terrorism, as well as possible malfeasance by the government prior to 9/11, and the partial disclosure of the contents of a secret Department memorandum concerning Executive Branch authority to combat terrorism, which has been previously requested to be provided to Congress. We ask that you promptly provide that memorandum and that you clarify your public statement in accordance with the questions below.
First, according to press reports, in response to questions at a March 27 speech, you defended Administration wiretapping programs and proposals to change the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) by referring to a pre-9/11 incident. Before the 9/11 terrorist attacks, you stated, “we knew that there had been a call from someplace that was known to be a safe house in Afghanistan and we knew that it came to the United States. We didn’t know precisely where it went. You’ve got 3,000 people who went to work that day, and didn’t come home, to show for that.”1
This statement is very disturbing for several reasons. Initially, despite extensive inquiries after 9/11, I am aware of no previous reference, in the 9/11 Commission report or elsewhere, to a call from a known terrorist safe house in Afghanistan to the United States which, if it had been intercepted, could have helped prevent the 9/11 attacks. In addition, if the Administration had known of such communications from suspected terrorists, they could and should have been intercepted based on existing FISA law. For example, even assuming that a FISA warrant was required to intercept such calls, as of 9/11 FISA specifically authorized such surveillance on an emergency basis without a warrant for a 48 hour period.2 If such calls were known about and not intercepted, serious additional concerns would be raised about the government’s failure to take appropriate action before 9/11.
Accordingly, we ask that you promptly answer the following questions:
1. Were you referring to an actual pre-9/11 incident in the portion of your statement quoted above? If not, what were you referring to?
2. Do you believe that a FISA warrant would have been required to intercept a telephone call from a known terrorist safe house in Afghanistan to the United States in 2001? If so, please explain.
3. Even assuming that such a warrant would have been required, do you agree that even before 9/11, FISA authorized emergency interception without a warrant for a 48-hour period of phone calls from a known terrorist safe house in Afghanistan to the United States?
4. Assuming that you were referring to an actual pre-9/11 incident in your statement, please explain why such phone calls were not intercepted and appropriately utilized by federal government authorities in seeking to prevent terrorist attacks.
Second, in the March, 2003 Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) memorandum publicly released on April 1, 2008, the contents of a secret October, 2001 OLC memorandum were partially disclosed. Specifically, the 2003 memorandum explains that in an October 23, 2001 memorandum, OLC “concluded that the Fourth Amendment had no application to domestic military operations.”3 On two prior occasions – in letters of February 12 and February 20, 2008, – Chairman Conyers requested that the Administration publicly release the October 23, 2001, memorandum .4 The memorandum has not been received despite these specific requests.
Based on the title of the October 23, 2001 memorandum, and based on what has been disclosed and the contents of similar memoranda issued at roughly the same time, it is clear that a substantial portion of this memorandum provides a legal analysis and conclusions as to the nature and scope of the Presidential Commander in Chief power to accomplish specific acts within the United States. The people of the United States are entitled to know the Justice Department’s interpretation of the President’s constitutional powers to wage war in the United States. There can be no actual basis in national security for keeping secret the remainder of a legal memorandum that addresses this issue of Constitutional interpretation. The notion that the President can claim to operate under “secret” powers known only to the President and a select few subordinates is antithetical to the core principles of this democracy. We ask that you promptly release the October 23, 2001, memorandum.
Please provide your responses and direct any questions to the Judiciary Committee office, 2138 Rayburn House Office Building, Washington, DC 20515 (tel:202-225-3951; fax: 202-225-7680). Thank you for your cooperation.
Sincerely,
John Conyers, Jr.
Chairman, Committee on the Judiciary
Jerrold Nadler
Chairman, Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties
Robert C. “Bobby” Scott
Chairman, Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security
cc: Hon. Lamar S. Smith
Hon. Trent Franks
Hon. Louie Gohmert
Hon. Brian Benczkowski
http://www.speaker.gov/blog/?p=1254
-----
It's a start. This won't be the end of it, hopefully the subpoenas wont be too far off!
April 3, 2008 5:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
Crap, I should have scrolled through the comments before posting the same letter from Conyers that went out today.
April 3, 2008 7:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
Dammit...you frame this like this:
Bush administration still doesn't understand that FISA can intercept terrorist calls without having to use a warrant! How can they protect us if they don't understand the tools they have at their disposal?!
April 3, 2008 8:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sadly, for the current government, warlike posturing has substituted for competent administration. They were asleep at the switch for 9/11, then let bin Laden escape while preparing for their misguided adventure to establish American empire via cakewalk through Iraq. Yet this is the party that positions itself as the one Americans can trust on "national security". Even more bizarrely, one of the Democratic candidates, rather than challenging this fiasco, is imitating this administration's failed tactics.
Or maybe I should say their successful tactics, since they did manage to win* re-election in 2004. And Clinton is surprised that many voters might want a change from politics as usual?
________________________________
* "Win." Well, not exactly. But the Democrats didn't get enough of a landslide that Republican cheating and real voter disenfranchisement couldn't affect the outcome.
April 4, 2008 12:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
"Bush administration still doesn't understand that FISA can intercept terrorist calls without having to use a warrant! How can they protect us if they don't understand the tools they have at their disposal?!"
This is EXACTLY right!!
April 4, 2008 12:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
TPM did follow up on this
http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2008/04/conyers_questions_mukasey_on_f.php
I do believe a subpoena is in order.
Perhaps, Congress should order permanent subpoenas to all of Bush's political appointments. These would be like the "basket subpoenas" that shrubby wants for the Destroy-FISA Law.
April 7, 2008 11:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
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