For the ACLU, Getting Trump Trumps Civil Liberties
The American Civil Liberties Union on whose national board I used to serve with pride, raises vast sums of money claiming to defend the civil liberties of all Americans. Unfortunately, however, over the last several years it has turned from being a neutral civil liberties organization to a left wing, agenda-driven lobby group that protects its contributors and constituents while ignoring the civil liberties of Americans with whom it disagrees.
Sure, it occasionally defends a Nazi or Klansman as an easy pretend-show of its willingness to protect the free speech of the most despicable racists. But it has been scandalously silent when it comes to the real current threats to civil liberties and free speech, especially on university campuses where the hard left demands suspension of free speech and due process rights for those with whom it disagrees.
Now, since the election of President Donald Trump, it has sunk to a new low, becoming a cheerleader for the violation of the civil liberties of those with on the other side of the political spectrum.
Consider the recent raid on the law office and hotel room of Donald Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen. In that raid, it appears as if FBI agents may well have seized material protected by the lawyer/client privilege, including communications between President Trump and his attorney.
On the day of the raid, I said that if a similar raid had been conducted on Hillary Clinton had she been elected, and a special prosecutor appointed to investigate her emails, the ACLU would have been up in arms. I condemned its doubled-standard silence. When I said that, I couldn’t possibly imagine that the ACLU would actually go out of its way to justify and defend the raid, even before all the facts were known. But that it exactly what it has done.
David Cole, who identifies himself as the ACLU Legal Director, said the organization relies on the good faith of the Justice Department, the FBI and the judge who issued the warrant to assure all Americans that this raid on a lawyer’s office, is “a sign that the rule of law is alive.”
The ACLU acknowledges that material covered by the lawyer/client privilege will be shown to a “privilege team” – sometimes called a firewall or taint team. This team consists of FBI agents and government lawyers who will get to read communications between lawyers and clients that are privileged, and not subject to any exceptions. They will then turn over to prosecutors only those communications that are not privileged, but these government agents will have read communications that are privileged.
It is enough for the ACLU that these privileged communications will not be used in a criminal case against the client. But the ACLU does not discuss the violations of the Fourth and Sixth amendments that occur as soon as government agents read communications that were supposed to be protected by the Fourth and Sixth amendments.
Imagine that the search was of your lawyer’s office, or your doctor’s office, or your spouse’s computer, or the rectory of your priest. And image that government agents got to read the most intimate privileged communications between you, your lawyer, your doctor, your spouse or your priest. Would it be enough that the government (and the ACLU) told you that the information wouldn’t be used in a criminal case against you? Would you believe that your civil liberties had been violated as soon as government agents read this material? Would you trust government agents not to leak embarrassing information about your conversations, especially if you were a controversial public figure?
The ACLU does not address any of these questions, because the person whose lawyer’s office was searched was Donald Trump. And virtually every contributor to the ACLU voted against Trump, as I did.
It is understandable in our hyper-partisan age that many Democrats, liberals and leftists are so outraged at President Trump that they are willing to ignore violations of his civil liberties, even if these violations establish a precedent for future use against all Americans. It is inexcusable that the ACLU should ignore these potentially blatant violations of the right of privacy under the Fourth Amendment and the right to counsel and confidentiality under the Sixth Amendment.
But for the ACLU getting Trump, trumps civil liberties.
It is precisely because the ACLU has abandoned its role as a neutral defender of civil liberties that I have had to speak up so loudly and repeatedly in opposition to the criminalization of political differences and to the violation of President Trump’s civil liberties. I wish I didn’t have to, but the hyper-partisan nature of American life – reflected by the ACLU’s decision to justify potential intrusions into Trump’s Fourth and Sixth amendment rights – makes it necessary for someone to take over the traditional role of the ACLU.
I hope others, both Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives will join me in protecting the civil liberties of all Americans.
This article first appeared in The Hill. https://www.newsmax.com/alandershowitz/aclu-civil-liberties-trump/2018/04/14/id/854540/
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The FBI served legal search warrants, requested by a Trump appointee Federal Prosecutor and approved by a Federal Judge during an ongoing investigation into Micheal Cohen that has been in process for several months by the Southern District of New York. The ACLU had nothing to do with this raid. No doors were kicked in and Cohen himself said that the Agents were very professional and respectful. This was a completely legal and by the book service of search warrants in a criminal investigation. No one's civil liberties were violated in any manner whatsoever.
You see no threat to Civil Liberties, Mr liberal? No concern by you of lawyer/client privilege?
Let's see the FBI will have a "taint team" go through all the documents to set aside those that don't pertain to the issues for the raid (whatever they are). We are going to rely on the investigators to ignore information which could indicate some other type of wrongdoing? What have we recently learned about the FBI? Does the name Peter Strozk mean anything? Up here in Boston we will always remember an agent named John Connolly. Suddenly progressives aren't worried about the seizure of an attorneys records.
Such hypocrisy!
So is your posit that a lawyer is immune to a search warrant and criminal prosecution based on attorney client privilege? From where does this immunity originate?
They are not completely immune, there is a very high standard involved to cross such a threshold. Based on what we have learned about the FBI and DOJ, are you confident that those requirements have been satisfied?
They [lawyers] are not immune AT ALL...
What 'requirements' are you talking about specifically? BTFW, you seem to be forgetting that a JUDGE was involved.
One would presume that Cohen [Trump's lawyer] READ the freaking warrant before allowing his hotel room [he was there at the time] to be searched. One would also assume that one of lawyers at his law firm READ the freaking warrant before allowing Cohen's office to be searched. Neither Cohen nor the lawyer @ Squire Patton Boggs has said a peep about the warrants being unlawful. Since Trump wasn't a party to the warrants, his fallacious opinion of their legality is irrelevant.
They [lawyers] are not immune AT ALL...
Attorney-client privilege is a long-standing doctrine of U.S. law that allows the subject of a lawsuit or criminal case to shield their communications with legal counsel.
Suddenly, liberals want to explain how it's really nothing and never was, until Trump is gone, right?
What 'requirements' are you talking about specifically?
Of course you know that answer, you want to prove I know it, right? (it's called liberal tactic 127).
Well here it is:
This particular action requires some evidence that simply asking for the documents wont ensure that they will be turned over.
The application would then need to be approved by a federal judge tasked with determining whether there is probable cause to believe the search would produce evidence of a particular crime.
the search warrant authorizing the raid would have described with specificity the items FBI agents could seize.
U.S. courts have said prosecutors must set up a review process to ensure that attorney-client communications are not being improperly used as evidence.
I assume nothing, except that this has nothing to do with the so-called mission of the "Mueller investigation", thus the referral to the Southern District of NY.
Nope. Attorney-client privilege isn't about protecting the ATTORNEY.
No.
Please post a link of the others...
Which of those many 'requirements' do you believe were omitted in the Cohen warrants?
The Southern District of NY, whose US Attorney was JUST installed by Trump, signed off on Cohen's warrant and then promptly recused himself from the case. Assist. AG Rosenstein and FBI Director Wray, BOTH Trump nominees, signed off on the warrants too.
Seriously, this BS deep state crap is getting old...
As far as dissenting opinions go the Constitution doesn't apply according to the left.
Who on the left said they don't support the constitution? When? What were they referring to? Link to back up your claim?
Google Antifa, any gun control group, the CA ag illegal rule against companies speaking to the federal govt, campus speech codes, hell just look up the DNC platform.
So in other words, you have nothing. Got it. And as you well know, antifa stands for, "Anti Fascism". While I completely despise their acts of violence, I do support their message, and unless you are a fascist yourself, you should support their message too. Do you support fascism? Trump does.
Gun control doesn't mean banning all guns, your hyperbole is BS.
You claimed that leftists don't support the constitution. Again, prove it. Provide a link.
Maybe you are thinking of the fascist pig Mike Pence that has said that we need to scrap the US Constitution and run the country according to the Christian Bible, (in other words, a theocracy).
Antifa is fascist. They use violence to supress opinions. Their very nature is fascist. If you believe a group actually does what it's name then you must believe Jerry Falwell was really moral and part of the majority and that North Korea is really a democratic republic.
That's a very simplistic description. In the following quotation, you'll find that the citations describing Antifa come from CNN, NYT, BBC, and The Atlantic articles:
Antifa certainly does not endorse and support the rights given to a constitutional republic.
They have free speech rights just like everyone else.
They also have free speech rights.
This claim is incoherent.
What part of the DNC platform supports violating the US Constitution?
An anti fascist group is a fascist group? George Orwell, is that you?
Rmando and other Trump supporters are furious because the Antifa have adopted the tactics of the alt-right to use against them.
Very true!
Is it the ACLU's fault Trump's lawyer engaged in espionage with known Russian state operatives? It is a common thing for the far right to blame the ACLU for just about every and anything but this is ridiculous. Plainly the far right must suspend reality to excuse Trump and Co for their multitudinous crimes...
Another unproved allegation! Mr Cohen still denies it and still lacks a passport allowing a visit to Prague. The fact is that allegation is one of many growing out of yet another leak from the "deep state". It would be convenient to somehow prove that, since it was one of the allegations in the Steele Dossier, which was improperly used to launch the investigation.
As always, we await the proof!!!
Which one can presume will be forthcoming based on evidence collected because of the lawful search warrant served to Cohen.
and that is exactly why a TOTALLY LEGAL search warrant was served and executed on Cohen. There had to be strong probable cause that a crime had been committed by Cohen himself for that warrant to be executed and approved by a judge. The rule of law was scrupulously followed and that is why the ACLU did not object. As usual, Newsmax is not reporting accurately, but they do have a right to their opinion, even when it is not supported by facts.
We will have to wait and see on that. I'm not convinced that such a raid was necessary.
They were concerned that Cohen would destroy evidence, that's why the raid was conducted the way it was. Also, the judge that signed the warrant wouldn't have done so if credible evidence wasn't provided in the first place. In other words, they already knew Cohen was guilty before the raid ever even took place. Why do you think trump freaked the fuck out about it? Because he knows he is screwed and his, "fixer" is screwed too.
The raid should have only been done as a last resort not the first. What was taken ? Bank records and tax records for one thing - those could have easily been obtained elsewhere. What else? Private conversations between lawyer & client. You can bet your A$$ that the ACLU would have objected if it was done to Hillary Clinton's lawyer, you know, the one who was granted immunity with nothing in return
Based on what?
Also, the judge that signed the warrant wouldn't have done so if credible evidence wasn't provided in the first place.
Who was he? Name please?
In other words, they already knew Cohen was guilty before the raid ever even took place.
Guilty of what, Mr McCarthy?
Right because a guy who said he 'would rather jump out of a building than turn on Donald Trump' would NEVER destroy evidence to protect him.../s
No idea, you would have to ask Mueller and the Judge.
Who is he? Here.
We will know as soon as the investigation is over, Mr. Trump.
Cohen was under observation for months. There was probable cause that there was a good chance that crucial evidence was going to be destroyed. That, in itself, is cause for the search warrant. If Cohen was to be asked nicely for those particular records, you could be certain that there would have been denials about those records ever existing.
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So everyone involved in this raid, even Cohen, said the raid was legal and professional. The judge that authorized the warrant is a far right wing conservative and the right is STILL complaining? You rightist's need to wake up and smell the covfefe, Cohen is dirty, and this raid is going to prove trump is too, (as if we needed any more proof of that).
Plainly you are seeing the big picture but a couple of dozen ranking Trump campaign officials including Trump's own personal lawyer Michael Cohen had plainly inappropriate conversations with multiple known Russian state operatives before, during and after the 2016 US Presidential Election regarding Russian efforts to hack and to otherwise attack state election systems, the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign and also to mount a coordinated multi-pronged effort to insure the election of Donald Trump as the next President of the United States and not a single one of them reported this important information to any law enforcement authorities. That is not merely collusion. That is espionage. What is so hard for righties to understand?
NDA's.. Trump loves them apparently. I am sure trump had most of his staff sign them in some way. Trump's NDA's are a way for trump to say, "yes, what I did was illegal, but it's more illegal to talk about the illegal shit that I have done!".
The piles of evidence alone tell us what we need to know. At this point the denials by trump and his crime syndicate are laughable, at best.
Cohen said that he is trump's, "fixer". That implies that it's his job to cover up trumps many crimes. Stands to reason that eventually he would get caught. And remember when Comey said he hopes there are tapes? Well, looks like there are tapes... Oops.
Pee tapes too? How long before the pee tapes get released??
I can't wait...
Possibly. But from what I have read, trump didn't hire hookers to pee on him, he hired them to pee on the bed Mr. And Mrs. Obama slept in when they went to visit Moscow.
No way, my sources tell me they peed on Trump's head until the orange ran too!!
Yeah, the only kind of fixers I ever heard tell of where the underworld mobster variety ala Ray Donovan...
Attorney/client privilege is not all encompassing. It doesn't mean that ALL conversations are protected. Trump is an idiot.
The attorney-client privilege protects most communications between clients and their lawyers. But, according to the crime-fraud exception to the privilege, a client's communication to her/his attorney isn't privileged if she/he made it with the intention of committing or covering up a crime or fraud.
Ohhh, I see....So where was the raid on the offices of Cheryl D. Mills?
Is she trump's personal attorney? I have no clue who she is.
You don't?
She was Hillary Clinton's attorney, senior Adviser and Counsel for the Clinton campaign. She raised attorney/client privilege protection in May 2016, when questioned by the FBI in connection with Clinton's e-mail server, she was also granted immunity along with 5 others in the so-called "e-mail investigation".
Remember now?
That's right, she PROPERLY claimed Attorney-client privilege. The FBI chose to give her immunity for her testimony about HER OWN actions, NOT Clinton's. Only the client can waive privilege.
I am having a hard time finding the connection between Mills and Cohen? You know, trumps personal attorney.....like, the person we are talking about here? Or are you just offering up the standard issue, "well, what about..........???!!!!!!!!!!!" line of BS? FOCUS.
Whataboutisms are all the gop has left. Slowly they turn but even righties are beginning to see...
I had an article going on Cohen and that's all the goppers had to say, "Well, what about Hillary".
Clinton hasn't held public office for over 5 years and has been investigated to death by the gop.
They cannot seem to fathom HRC and the DNC were the victims of Putin's and Trump's hacking...
1) There is a taint team making sure that no privileged information is compromised.
2) Attorney client privilege doesn't apply if it is invoked to cover up crime, corruption or any other illegal activity.
Sorry!
ACLU proves yet again it's a guardian of left-wing agenda
Earlier this month, I wrote a column about the American Civil Liberties Union. I said then that the ACLU, which bills itself as “ our nation’s guardian of liberty ,” would more accurately be described as the guardian of a far-left progressive agenda.
What is this supposed left-wing agenda that the ACLU is pursuing, at the expense of the constitutional rights of everyone else? I assume that you have proof and not just your closely held beliefs to support your claims?
I dare you to name a single instance of the ACLU not defending the constitutional rights of someone because of their religious or political affiliation.