A recent ACLU report revealed extensive surveillance, from a variety of government organizations, of political activists in California including several instances of police infiltration into anti-war organizations. Reports on activists (engaging in entirely legal and peaceful protests) were sometimes passed on to the FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force. Based on Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, the ACLU has compiled an impressive record of government surveillance and monitoring. The report is well worth reading, especially for anyone who thinks that the government of the United $tates believes in free speech and the right to freely protest.
The ACLU summarized their report: "As this report documents, in just the last five years, multiple peaceful political organizations have been targeted for monitoring or infiltration by law enforcement agencies in Northern and Central California. Tactics have ranged from compiling and disseminating information about planned protest activities to undercover officers covertly posing as organization members, even leaders, to gather information or influence decisions.
"Political gatherings of all types.meetings, vigils, demonstrations, and speeches.have been targeted by surveillance operations. Entirely law-abiding protesters have been videotaped without cause or suspicion. Political Web sites have been monitored. Demonstrations have been called crime scenes. Undercover officers have lied to protect their covert status. Law enforcement has equated protest with terrorism. State agencies have instructed local officials to monitor and report on citizens. peaceful, lawful participation in the democratic process."
In 2003 California Attorney General Bill Lockyer instructed law enforcement agencies that it is illegal in California for police to conduct undercover operations or surveillance of political activity without reasonable suspicion of criminal activity.
The Department of Defense is also getting in on the surveillance in California. They compiled a database with information on anti-war and counter-recruitment protests. This included protests at the UC Santa Cruz and UC Berkeley campuses, both of which were deemed a "threat."
In one case detailed in the ACLUJ report, in 2003 the Oakland Police Department sent two undercover agents to infiltrate organizing meetings planning a demonstration on the Oakland docks. The demonstration was entirely legal, and intended to protest Oakland police brutality at a similar demonstration the previous month where the cops fired projectiles at the crowd, injuring over 50 people (see: Pigs open fire on protestors outside Oakland docks).
The police who infiltrated the Oakland protest organization got themselves elected to lead route planning and logistics after only one meeting. This clearly demonstrates what MIM has been saying for years - we can't just trust people because they claim to agree with us. Putting cops in a position of leadership over a political protest is not something any of the dock demonstrators would have done voluntarily. But activists who blindly trust everyone they meet should take the blame for voting pigs into leadership positions. It is one thing to have cops join an organization and do work and then gain leadership positions, but when it is possible for pigs to walk in and take over with no effort, organizers need to do some serious self-criticism.
Of course our criticism of activists who ignore the reality of Amerika's infiltration and monitoring of political organizing does not let the Amerikan government or its police off the hook. The fundamental rights that the government claims to offer are being denied to activists who oppose government policies. This has been true for years, most graphically illustrated by the COINTELPRO wars against the Black Panther Party, American Indian Movement and other revolutionary organizations in the 1960s. The Amerikan government systematically works to undermine political organizations through infiltrators, arrests, sabotage and even outright murder (as in the case of Bobby Hutton and others in the Black Panther Party).
The proletarian camp can not afford to deny that police plots exist. MIM is not paranoid, we are realistic. Activists today who have not learned these lessons from history are doing a serious disservice to their political organizing and are also responsible for misleading youth new to political activism. The Amerikan government is very strong and has vast resources at its disposal. There is no excuse for blindly ignoring this and pretending that activist organizations can do what they like without fear.
Notes: The State of Surveillance: Government monitoring of political activity in northern and central California, Report by the ACLU, July 2006, http://aclunc.org/surveillance_report/state_of_surveillance.pdf