The ACLU of Northern California (ACLU-NC), Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Asian Law Caucus (ALC), and the San Francisco Bay Area office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-SFBA) are urging the San Francisco Police Commission to ensure that the San Francisco Police Department comply with local civil rights protections when officers are cooperating with FBI agents in the Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF).
The letter states in part:
“In short, nothing the FBI will or could say can interfere with the SFPD’s need at all times to comply with local intelligence gathering standards and protocols in DGO 8.10, as well as with the state constitutional right to privacy’s requirement not to create intelligence records absent reasonable suspicion (it is important to note that JTTF activities routinely involve activities where there is no reasonable suspicion). The need to follow our own state and local laws and policies — which were enacted to reflect our values and priorities — rather than the federal government’s was never more important that it will be under President Trump.”
SEE: Letter to SFPD
CAIR-SFBA Civil Rights Attorney Brittney Rezaei said “We are especially concerned about compliance with the ordinance after San Francisco’s Office of Citizen Complaints ruled that a ‘training failure’ had occurred when a SFPD JTTF officer failed to comply with DGO 8.10 and the Ordinance and showed up unannounced at a Google employee’s workplace and sought an interview involving First Amendment activity without first obtain supervisory approval.”
ACLU-NC Senior Counsel Alan Schlosser says “Given the statements coming from President-elect Trump and his nominees, the abuses that we have seen in the past from FBI overreaching is a very real threat. The protections in local and state law are intended to prevent local law enforcement from participating in overbroad and discriminatory investigations, and they must be vigorously enforced.”
ALC Staff Attorney Christina Sinha echoed “Mr. Trump’s looming inauguration makes this issue more pressing than ever. Now is not the time for the same bare assurances of compliance that we have gotten from SFPD for the past five years, especially now that we know those assurances were incorrect. We need real answers, real specifics, and we need them before January 20th.”