02-29-2000
ACLU Newsfeed -- ACLU News Direct to YOU!
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IN THE ACLU NEWSROOM
**The Latest News Can Always Be Found At:**
http://www.aclu.org/news/pressind.html
* ACLU Renews Calls for Congressional Hearings
Into Secret Global Surveillance System
* ACLU, Urban League Urge Support for
Racial Profiling Legislation in St. Louis
* ACLU Condemns Texas Execution of
62-Year-Old Great Grandmother
* ACLU of Illinois Calls on Legislature
To Protect Financial Privacy
* Court Blocks WA School from Suspending Student
Over Humorous Web Site
* ACLU Joins Battle Over High-Speed Access to Internet
* Other Recent ACLU Press Releases
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ACLU Renews Calls for Congressional Hearings
Into Secret Global Surveillance System
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Friday, February 25, 2000
Contact: DC Media Relations Office
media@dcaclu.org
WASHINGTON -- The American Civil Liberties Union today renewed
its call
for
Congressional hearings into the threat to the privacy and civil
liberties
of Americans from the global electronic communications
surveillance system
known as "ECHELON."
"In light of the controversy engendered by this week's hearings
before the
European Parliament, Congress must move quickly to investigate
to determine
if ECHELON is as sweeping and intrusive as has been reported,"
said Gregory
T. Nojeim, an ACLU Legislative Counsel.
The ACLU said that more than 13,000 constituent letters to
Congress calling
for oversight hearings have been sent from its special website
dedicated to
monitoring ECHELON --
http://www.echelonwatch.org -- which was
launched in
November 1999.
Given this week's heightened public interest in ECHELON, the
ACLU said it
was ratcheting up the pressure on Congress, giving users of its
website the
ability to send copies of their letters directly to the chairman
and
ranking minority member of the House Committee on Government
Reform, which
has oversight authority to call hearings.
"We need Congressional hearings now more than ever to determine
whether
ECHELON is used by the government's intelligence community to
conduct
domestic electronic surveillance to circumvent protections
Congress has
established by law," Nojeim said.
The television news program "60 Minutes" is airing a report on
Echelon this
Sunday, which, according to the CBS website will feature the
story of a
woman whose name and telephone number went into the ECHELON
database "as a
possible terrorist because she told a friend on the phone that
her son had
'bombed' in a school play."
"Congress has the authority and the responsibility to get to the
bottom of
this," said ACLU Associate Director Barry Steinhardt. "Only
Congress can
pierce the veil of secrecy of the puzzle palace."
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ACLU, Urban League Urge Support for
Racial Profiling Legislation in St. Louis
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Thursday, February 24, 2000
ST. LOUIS, MO -- At a news conference today, the American Civil
Liberties
Union, the Urban League, and other community groups joined State
