On Jan. 24, 2003, a new law enforcement and investigatory agency whose duties include functions taken from as many as 22 other federal agencies came into existence. The reorganization of these operations reportedly marks the biggest government bureaucratic shake-up since the creation of the Department of Defense half a century ago.
Even before the new Department of Homeland Security opened its doors, controversies arose over not just how it would operate and exercise its powers, but what level of access to information it would allow, and how it would respond to news media requests. Will new exemptions be carved out of the FOI Act, either by law or by practice? Will officials and agents feel free to tap phones of journalists, or subpoena their records during investigations? Will the new director consider procedural safeguards, like those adopted years ago by the Department of Justice, to ensure that freedom of the press will not be denied? And will those practices be followed?

But "homeland" security is not the only concern for journalists covering anti-terrorism initiatives; military actions abroad often present a greater challenge, as questions over disclosure of information, access to troops, and restraints on reporting seem to resurface anew with each conflict.

Questions and issues like these led the Reporters Committee to launch this "weblog," so that there will be a centralized site on the Internet for journalists who want to follow these issues and pass along information they learn while covering — or worse, being covered by — the new department and other anti-terrorism actions. Please submit comments and pass along tips to make this project as useful, thorough and up-to-date as possible.

A few words about what this project will not do. We do not intend to cover many of the issues that will undoubtedly come up as the Department takes shape, even if those issues are the ones generating headlines. We will cover information access and free press issues, but will not follow debates over many civil liberties issues that, while important, are outside of our domain.

Funding for the launch of this site was provided by The Robert R. McCormick Tribune Foundation.

Oct. 31, 2006

EDITOR: MILITARY COVERED UP CAUSE OF SOLDIER'S DEATH. Greg Mitchell of Editor & Publisher found that while a Washington Post article reported that a 20-year-old soldier was ambushed and killed by the Iraqi police, the newspapers that had already reported his death stated he was killed when a roadside bomb exploded near his Humvee and the official military account makes no mention that he was killed by police. "How many other such deaths have occurred - and been falsely related and reported?" Mitchell writes. USA Today has reported that the Army released wrong or misleading information about the deaths of seven soldiers, including Pat Tillman. — Posted at 5:12 pm

PENTAGON STEPPING UP PUBLIC RELATIONS EFFORTS. Following increased criticism of the Iraq war, the Defense Department is reorganizing its public affairs office, according to a memo obtained by The Associated Press. The memo states that new teams will "develop messages" for the news cycle and "correct the record." Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has long complained that the press is too negative and said the United States deserves a grade of D or D-plus in the "battle of ideas." — Posted at 2:27 pm

Oct. 30, 2006

DECLASSIFICATION BOARD CHAIRMAN SAYS HE NEEDS PRESIDENTIAL APPROVAL TO ACT. The chairman of a panel designed to reduce government secrecy has told Congress the panel can only act at the request of President Bush. L. Britt Snider, chairman of the Public Interest Declassification Board said he reads the statute to authorize board action to review the necessity of government secrecy only when the President has asked it to do so, reports The Washington Times. Open government advocates disagree with Snider's interpretation, saying it would make the board nothing more than a "White House puppet." Snider's stance was revealed in a letter to Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.). Wyden and other senators had previously written to Snider asking the Public Interest Declassification Board to look into possible overclassification of information in a report on pre-Iraq war intelligence. — Posted at 1:36 pm

GENERAL: MILITARY MUST BE ACCESSIBLE TO THE PRESS. Lieutenant General David Petraeus said that while journalists should not be embedded during operation missions, in general military officials should cooperate with the press. "What I tell my officers is, it's not your Army, it's not the officers' Army - it's Americans' Army, and they have a right to know what we're doing," Petraeus told a group of journalists during the annual conference of Military Reporters and Editors last week. — Posted at 1:35 pm

ACLU DROPS LAWSUIT CHALLENGING THE PATRIOT ACT. The American Civil Liberties Union has dropped a three-year-old lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the USA Patriot Act, citing "improvements to the law." — Posted at 10:26 am

Oct. 27, 2006

A FEDERAL JUDGE DENIES MOTION TO SEAL COURT DOCUMENTS IN A TERRORISM CASE. A U.S. District Court judge ruled that if the government wants unclassified information in a terrorism prosecution in Atlanta to remain under seal, it must present a narrowly tailored argument for doing so rather than seek a blanket order. — Posted at 8:31 pm

SWEEPING INQUIRY INTO NIE LEAK PROPOSED. The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee has proposed a broad inquiry into the leak of a classified National Intelligence Estimate to reporters that would include auditing staff telephone records and e-mail to identify unauthorized contacts with journalists. A Democratic staff member who was stripped of his security clearance has signed an affidavit saying he did not leak the document. — Posted at 4:35 pm

AP PRESIDENT: PHOTOGRAPHER'S JAILING MEANT TO 'STIFLE' FREE PRESS. The military's refusal to charge AP photographer Bilal Hussein or explain why he is being jailed in Iraq means the organization is "left to conclude that this is not an issue of a threat to American security," AP President Tom Curley wrote to mediabistro.com. "It is an overt effort to stifle a free press." — Posted at 4:33 pm

Oct. 26, 2006

NUMBER OF EMBEDDED JOURNALISTS IN IRAQ DWINDLES. Only nine journalists are embedded with the U.S. military in Iraq, down from about 770 at the start of invasion, according to The Weekly Standard. Independent writer and photographer Michael Yon, who was embedded in Iraq for nine months, blames the "ineptitude" of the Combined Press Information Center in Baghdad and said the Defense Department has "allowed the problem to fester to the point of censorship." By denying reporters the chance to embed with military units, Yon said, the United States is losing the battle of public opinion. — Posted at 4:32 pm

FBI, CONGRESS CLASH OVER HANDLING OF ANTHRAX INVESTIGATION The FBI and Congress are clashing over the FBI's handling of the 2001 anthrax attack investigation. Senator Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) sent a lengthy letter to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales requesting a briefing on the investigation's progress, and the FBI's Assistant Director for Congressional affairs responded by summarily halting all briefings to Congress on the subject. The FBI is currently being sued by Steven Hatfill, a scientist who was named as a "person of interest" in the investigation when an FBI employee allegedly leaked his name to the media. — Posted at 4:30 pm

Oct. 25, 2006

MILITARY ASSIGNS UNIT TO MONITOR SOLDIERS' BLOGS. The U.S. military has assigned a National Guard unit to monitor the Internet for violations of operational security in a move that could affect troops blogging from Iraq, the Boston Herald reports. The new rules also require field commanders to approve anything that goes onto a public Web site. The previous rules already required troops to have their commanders' permission to blog and to submit to periodic reviews. — Posted at 12:32 pm

LAWMAKER'S TIES TO LOBBYING GROUP INVESTIGATED. The FBI and Justice Department started an investigation last year of California Rep. Jane Harman to see if she improperly sought the help of a pro-Israel lobbying group to be appointed the top Democrat on the House intelligence committee, Time magazine reported. The case is related to a probe that led to espionage charges against two former lobbyists for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) Time reported that Harman agreed to help persuade the administration to go lighter on AIPAC officials caught up in the investigation, but that it is unclear if they ever acted on the idea. Federal officials told The Washington Post that the investigation, while still open, found no evidence of wrongdoing and that there has been no major action taken in the probe in months. — Posted at 12:19 pm

U.S. FALLS IN PRESS FREEDOM RANKINGS. The United States is now ranked 53rd - nine places down from last year - in Reporters Without Borders' annual rankings of countries' press freedoms. The group cites the administration's use of a "pretext of 'national security'" to regard as suspicious any journalist who questions the "war on terror," as well as the imprisonment of a cameraman and photographer in Iraq. The drop also may be due to improvement in some developing countries that now rank above the United States. — Posted at 11:42 am

KIDNAPPED AP PHOTOGRAPHER RELEASED. A Spanish photographer working for The Associated Press was freed Tuesday after he was snatched at gunpoint while working in the Gaza Strip. Emilio Morenatti, 37, said his kidnappers covered his head with a bag and dressed him in a woman's long veil while they took him around during his day in captivity. Fatah officials brought to the office of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. It was unclear who kidnapped Morenatti, who was the 11th journalist captured in Gaza since 2004, according to the International Herald Tribune . — Posted at 11:40 am

RECORD REQUESTS FACTOR INTO BUSH'S DECISION NOT TO E-MAIL. "I don't e-mail, because of the different record requests that can happen to a president," President Bush said in a recent interview with CNBC. — Posted at 11:39 am

LAWMAKER CALLS FOR OUSTER OF EMBEDDED CNN REPORTERS. Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, called for the Defense Department to oust all CNN reporters embedded with U.S. troops in Iraq after the network aired video that appeared to show a sniper killing an American soldier. CNN told the Los Angeles Times that there was intense debate about the decision to show the video, but producers decided the video illustrated the threat that insurgent snipers pose to American troops. Embedded reporters sign pledges promising not to show the faces of dead U.S. troops before their families have been notified, but there are no prohibitions against showing pictures where the soldiers cannot be identified. — Posted at 11:38 am

Oct. 24, 2006

AP PHOTOGRAPHER KIDNAPPED IN GAZA. Palestinian gunmen grabbed Associated Press photographer Emilio Morenatti in the Gaza strip Tuesday and whisked him away in their vehicle, according to a AP driver and translator who witnessed the kidnapping. AP President Tom Curley said the company was doing everything it could to find Morenatti, who is from Spain and has been reporting from Jerusalem for AP since April 2005. There was no immediate claim of responsibility, and a Hamas spokesman condemned the kidnapping. — Posted at 11:37 am

Oct. 23, 2006

CARD'S PERSONAL NOTEBOOK WITH NAMES OF HIGH-LEVEL REPLACEMENTS COULD BE A GOVERNMENT RECORD, EXPERTS SAY. In State of Denial , Bob Woodward quotes former White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card saying he kept a list of potential replacements for top government posts in a spiral notebook he purchased himself "so it wouldn't be considered a public document or presidential record." Some observers say this is not the way to get around the Presidential Records Act. Others disagree. — Posted at 12:10 pm

DEMOCRATIC STAFFER SUSPENDED; LINKED TO LEAK OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE ESTIMATE. An unidentified Democratic staff member has been suspended by House Intelligence Committee Chairman Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.) because of the staffer's possible connection to last month's leak of the National Intelligence Estimate. The New York Times published portions of the intelligence report, which said that the war in Iraq was hurting the broader efforts in the war against terrorism. — Posted at 12:09 pm

JUSTICE DEPARTMENT TELLS COURTS NEW LAW SAYS THEY MUST DENY HABEAS CORPUS TO GUANTANAMO INMATES. After President George W. Bush signed the new Military Commissions Act into law last week, the Justice Department sent a letter to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit informing the court that it no longer has jurisdiction over habeas cases concerning Guantanamo detainees. Lawyers for the detainees are challenging the new law in court. — Posted at 12:08 pm

U.S. PROPAGANDA PROGRAM IN IRAQ RULED LEGAL. A military program to pay Iraqi newspapers to run favorable stories about coalition forces is legal, a classified Defense Department inspector general's report has concluded. The office studied three contracts with the Washington-based Lincoln Group, worth $37.3 million, and found that the contracts fall under the rules of "psychological operations" and countered "anti-coalition propaganda." Critics say the contracts run counter to the goal of a free and independent press in Iraq. — Posted at 12:07 pm

U.S. ACCUSED OF OBSTRUCTING BRITISH INQUEST. A British journalists union said the U.S. military hampered a court hearing into the death of British television reporter Terry Lloyd, who was killed covering the Iraq war. A coroner concluded Lloyd was "unlawfully" killed by U.S. troops when they fired upon him in 2003. The inquest concluded that Lloyd was "unlawfully" killed. During the hearing, a major for the Royal Military Police said that 15 minutes were missing from a film of the incident supplied by the American military. Paul McLaughlin of the National Union of Journalists said U.S. officials have shown "complete comtempt" for the proceeding and made a "mockery of the so-called special relationship." — Posted at 12:06 pm

JUDGE ORDERS LOGS OF CHENEY VISITS RELEASED. A federal judge has ordered the release of names of those who visited Vice President Dick Cheney over a two-year period. The Washington Post in June asked for the logs of all visitors for Cheney, his legal counsel, chief spokesman and others. The judge ruled Wednesday that the information must be released this week. — Posted at 12:05 pm

Oct. 18, 2006

NAMES REDACTED IN DETAINEE ABUSE CASE. During casual conversation in a bar on base, Guantanamo guards told of abusing detainees, according to an affidavit signed by a U.S. Marine sergeant who was privy to the conversation. The name of the sergeant and the last names of the guards were redacted. — Posted at 12:16 pm

ARAB-AMERICAN CIVIL RIGHTS SUES U.S. GOVERNMENT UNDER FOIA. The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee has filed a lawsuit under the Freedom of Information Act against the Department of Homeland Security and the department's Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The suit alleges that the department misused a database that tracked immigrants and visitors to the United States from 25 foreign countries in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. The group believes that the department used the database to arrest a disproportionate number of Muslim and Arab individuals and wants the department to release the nationalities of those who were arrested. — Posted at 11:27 am

BOOK SAYS JOURNALISTS ATTENDED SECRET MEETING. In November 2001, a dozen policy makers and experts met to discuss a policy for dealing with Afghanistan after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks at the request of Paul Wolfowitz, former deputy secretary of defense. The secret meeting included journalists who signed confidentiality agreements not to reveal what was said, according to Bob Woodward's recently released book State of Denial. Newsweek's Fareed Zakaria told The New York Times he was unaware a report would be produced. Robert D. Kaplan of The Atlantic Monthly says that is not possible. — Posted at 11:25 am

PENTAGON WON'T RELEASE DETAILS ON JAILED AP PHOTOGRAPHER. The Defense Department has brushed off a request from the Committee to Protect Journalists for more information about Associated Press photographer Bilal Hussein, an Iraqi who has been detained since April without being charged. In a letter, a Pentagon spokesman states that Hussein was notified of at least two of three military reviews of his imprisonment. But an AP executive said Hussein was only notified of one of the hearings, and then only after the review took place. Of the roughly 14,000 people the U.S. military has detained as security threats, few have been charged with a specific crime or been allowed to argue their case before a court or tribunal. — Posted at 11:20 am

Oct. 17, 2006

DOCUMENTS SHOW HOW DEFENSE DEPARTMENT MONITORED ANTI-WAR PROTESTORS. Newly released documents show the scope of a Defense Department program to collect information on anti-war demonstrations conducted by, among others, students and Quakers, according to The New York Times. — Posted at 6:26 pm

NSA EMPLOYEES CAUGHT UP IN FAKE DIPLOMA SCAM. In a story that brings together a bizarre mix of government employees seeking promotions, disreputable Liberian diplomats and child pornographers, employees of the National Security Agency and the Department of Justice and White House may have purchased fake college degrees from an online diploma mill. Law enforcement officials first looked into the matter after they discovered many of the fake degrees were sold in Saudi Arabia, which raised national security concerns. Prosecutors have not identified any of the government employees involved. A U.S. attorney told The Spokesman-Review (Spokane) that the names of those who purchased the degrees would not be released until the trial was underway. — Posted at 6:24 pm

REPORTS UNCOVERING CIA SECRET PRISONS MAY HAVE BEEN SPARKED BY GOSS COMMENT, BOOK SAYS. In an off-hand comment during an interview with a British journalist, the former head of the Central Intelligence Agency, Porter Goss, provided the initial clue that lead to the reporting on the agency's controversal extraordinary rendition program, according to a new book. In December of 2001, Goss was a U.S. representative from Florida and head of the House Intelligence Committee when he mentioned the process of rendition to London-based reporter Stephen Gray. Though the specific rendition process Goss was referring to was not the same controversial technique employed by the CIA in handling suspected terrorists, it started Gray on an investigation that eventually led to The Washington Post reporting on the CIA's use of secret prisons in Eastern Europe. — Posted at 6:22 pm

CONGRESS LIMITS USE OF "SENSITIVE SECURITY INFORMATION." The Transportation Security Administration's use of the "sensitive security information" label has been somewhat reigned in by a provision in the bill funding the Department of Homeland Security signed by President Bush last week. Critics have accused the TSA of overusing the SSI label to withhold otherwise unclassified information from the public. — Posted at 6:21 pm

REPUBLICANS CALL FOR HOUSE INQUIRY INTO BERGER'S HANDLING OF CLASSIFIED DOCUMENTS. Some Republicans have called on the House Government Reform Committee to investigate the improper handling of classified documents by former National Security Advisor Sandy Berger. Last year, Berger was fined $50,000 after pleading guilty ito a count of unauthorized removal and retention of classified material. — Posted at 6:20 pm

Oct. 10, 2006

EX-CIA AGENT SUES OVER EXCESSIVE REDACTIONS OF HIS BOOK. A former CIA employee has sued the agency for allegedly censoring his book on the hunt for Osama Bin Laden. The official said the removal of 70 pages of his manuscript was designed not to protect classified infromation but to make his book "unreadable." He said when he resigned to write the book a higher-up threatened to "redact the [expletive] out of your book so no one will want to read it." — Posted at 4:35 pm

MILITARY MUM ON INJURIES SUFFERED IN BAGHDAD. The Washington Post reports the number of injuries suffered by U.S. troops in Iraq is at its highest level in two years, but the number of injuries incurred in the volatile capital of Baghdad remains a secret. According to the Post, a military spokesman said "he was not authorized to release the number of U.S. military personnel wounded in Baghdad or the number of attacks in the city, although the military has released such data in the past." — Posted at 2:44 pm

Oct. 5, 2006

WARRANTLESS SURVEILLANCE CAN CONTINUE DURING APPEAL. A federal appeals court panel ruled Wednesday that the Bush administration can continue its warrantless surveillance program during appeal. — Posted at 2:43 pm

THREE YEARS LATER, CHALLENGE TO THE PATRIOT ACT ALLOWED TO PROCEED. Three years after being filed in federal court, an ACLU lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the USA Patriot Act will go forward. The ACLU claims fear of the law prevented its clients from attending religious services and making charitable donations. — Posted at 2:42 pm

LAWYERS IN LIBBY CASE CONTINUE TO BATTLE OF WHAT INFORMATION CAN BE REVEALED AT TRIAL. Lawyers in the Lewis Libby criminal case squared off for a fourth day yesterday in a pretrial hearing on what classified information might be used in the perjury trial. Prosecutors have acccused Libby's lawyers of using a tactic called "graymail," or attempting to reveal classified information, as a way to force prosecutors to drop the case. — Posted at 2:41 pm

Oct. 4, 2006

GOVERNMENT HELPING DEVELOP SOFTWARE TO TRACK OPINIONS OF U.S. IN FOREIGN PUBLICATIONS. The Department of Homeland Security is helping fund the development of software that would monitor negative opinions of the United States in overseas newspapers, according to The New York Times. — Posted at 12:54 pm

Oct. 3, 2006

WOODWARD'S REPORT OF 2001 TENENT-RICE MEETING ON AL QAEDA BACKED UP BY WHITE HOUSE RECORDS. White House records confirm an account in Bob Woodward's new book that then-CIA director George Tenent meet with Condoleezza Rice in July 2001 to warn her about the threat posed by Al Qaeda. — Posted at 12:19 pm