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Dear Mr. President:
We write to you concerning the Department of Homeland Security and Department of Defense. Because Hank Brown did not look to the interests of Colorado when he recommended firing Ward Churchill, we are asking for your intervention.
Specifically we ask you to empower an individual to prepare a press release or "leak" in the next week by culling from FBI, CIA and DoD on Ward Churchill, especially in 2005. We ask you to admit that your agents have carried out activities undercover to embarrass the pro- Ward Churchill camp. In particular, we ask that you admit that there were various attempts to pin death threats on our organization and affiliates by undercover agents.
We have worked strenuously to bring the truth in the last few months, but two or three individuals are putting their careers first and not admitting what they have done. It is important that you grant permission for agents to speak without fear of retribution to their careers. It is possible the agents simply got carried away with a silly intoxication of power connected to intelligence files they had just examined.
Mr. President, you have the power to straighten out a few problems with the minimum fuss and the most protection of citizens' privacy. As you know, we are an organization of low public credibility and so if we have to force the truth out by our means it will be clumsy and tip more applecarts than need to be tipped. And the possibility that people should lose their jobs afterwards will increase. It is our opinion that some of the initial problem is that that was exactly what the FBI was doing--tipping some applecarts in matters that should not have been mixed together--when this problem started.
Your agents are asking us to submit to standard Cold War procedure, but they do not think small enough to give Ward Churchill the fair shot he deserves in Colorado public opinion and also protect the privacy of citizens. It is also important not to follow standard procedure, because the death threats and provocations are against ordinary citizens, not affiliated with MIM. In fact, we ask that you assign someone not so scary, perhaps to break the bad news privately to the individual(s) threatened. No one needs someone from DoD, FBI or CIA on their doorstep. We also ask that the press release refer to anonymous individuals, so as to respect privacy.
We do not bother to complain about death threats and sick rape fantasies against our female members. We have also witnessed threats against a few faculty members' jobs at the University of Colorado by undercover agents with an axe to grind against Ward Churchill, who has done original work on the FBI.
All that we ask this year is an admission by your staff and an illustration for the press that does not use names. If your staff would be so good as to explain the principles at work, and admit errors, we will declare ourselves satisfied. Otherwise, let this stand as an explanation to the public why journalists sometimes have to use the means they do.
Maoist Internationalist Movement
June 2, 2007