What is the difference between an activist and a terrorist? To most, the answer seems pretty obvious; both have strong ideological beliefs, and are willing to fight for these beliefs, but their strategies in doing so are completely diametric. The widely held perception of a terrorist is a mass murderer who spreads fear to promote their ideology, while an activist is generally a peaceful individual utilizing their first amendment right to speak out against something they see as wrong. To the FBI, however, it is a bit more complicated. Whether its an environmentalist, anti-war activist, animal rights advocate, or occupy protester, the bureau appears to have a strict policy that any individuals or movements who criticize the government, corporations, or the nexus between the two, must be monitored, infiltrated, and if possible sent to prison.
The FBI’s mission, as stated on its website, is to “protect and defend the United States against terrorist and foreign intelligence threats, to uphold and enforce the criminal laws of the United States, and to provide leadership and criminal justice services to federal, state, municipal, and international agencies and partners.” This means that when investigating activists, it is because they suspect malicious intent -- possibly a threat of terrorism or revolutionary acts. And in some cases, there has indeed been reason to suspect acts that, while not terroristic in the widely held sense, were at least “criminal,” in the sense of vandalism or arson. But there is also a legitimate reason to believe that the FBI’s obsession with left-wing activists is not really about stopping terrorism, but stopping movements that are inherently opposed to the capitalist condition.
To see how the FBI leads the fight against activist campaigns, lets go back a couple of years to the Occupy movement, which was a blatantly anti-capitalist/corporate movement that spread like wild fire in 2011, only to suddenly fall apart towards the end of the year. Since the movement fizzled out almost as fast as it appeared, it has been revealed that the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security had set up intense surveillances of the movement, and coordinated with corporate America through the Domestic Security Alliance Council (DSAC). The DSAC is a government agency that was created in 2005, at the request of private industry, as a fusion between the FBI and DHS, to “advance the U.S. Private Industry’s ability to protect its employees, assets, and information by providing ongoing access to security information.”
Obviously this FBI-led organization felt it was necessary to protect private industry (i.e.Wall Street) from the building protests around the country that started in Wall Streets backyard. On FBI documents retrieved by the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund (PCJF), Executive Director of PCJF, Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, said: “These documents show that the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security are treating protests against the corporate and banking structure of America as potential criminal and terrorist activity. These documents also show these federal agencies functioning as a de facto intelligence arm of Wall Street and Corporate America.” Though the FBI knew Occupy was a peaceful movement, they repeatedly treated it as a “terrorist threat,” which, as we will see, is an unfortunately common practice with the shadowy organization.
The crackdown on Occupy was swift and beautifully coordinated between local and national government agencies -- and the private industry. Hundreds were violently arrested in cities across the country, while the FBI and DHS provided tactical and planning advice on evicting the protesters.
The Occupy movement was a widespread and national protest against the fusion between the government and corporate America, and that fusion responded accordingly. But the FBI is just as aggressive towards smaller activist movements, and tend to treat every person using their first amendment right as a possible terrorist.
Agent Provocateur’s
Earlier this year, Eric McDavid, who was convicted of “conspiracy to to use fire or explosives to damage corporate and government property” in 2008, and sentenced to twenty years in prison, was released ten years early after it was revealed that the FBI had withheld thousands of pages of evidence at his trial.
The case against McDavid was built on the common FBI tactic of sending in an agent provocateur to infiltrate activist groups, whether they be environmentalists or anti-capitalists, and aggressively provoke them into breaking the law. In this case, the paid informant was “Anna,” a nineteen year old woman who claimed to a be a stripper conveniently working at a chemistry lab.
Of the documents withheld at the trial nearly a decade ago, one reveals that “Anna” and McDavid had a rather romantic relationship that she encouraged. He was clearly enthralled by her, and sent multiple emails about how he felt, such as “all the endorphins shoot off in my head when ever I think of u (sic).” She responded with “I think you and I could be great, but we have LOTS of little kinks to work out,” and other flirtatious messages. While McDavid’s defense team argued that he had indeed fallen in love with her, the FBI made sure that the evidence showing her reciprocation was not disclosed, as it would have likely given cause for entrapment.
Now, after nearly ten years of prison, McDavid is finally a free man, and as a part of his release, he had to agree not to sue the state for damages. The FBI’s actions were disgraceful, and the judge who ruled over the trial said “I’ve never heard or seen anything like this.” Unfortunately, this behavior is not a rarity in the FBI’s world.
In a 2011 investigative report by Mother Jones and University of California-Berkeley that examined the prosecutions of 508 defendants in terrorism related cases, they found that about half of the cases used informants like “Anna,” and of 158 prosecutions, 49 of the defendants had been lead by an agent provocateur.
The FBI has built up a massive national network of around 15,000 informants since 9/11, with many working in Muslim communities. Critics have argued that rather than stopping potential terrorist attacks, this strategy simply creates them to stop them, and then claim success in the war on terror. Yassir Fazaga, from the Orange County Islamic Foundation, said in an Al Jazeera documentary: “It literally boils down into, if you cannot find terrorists within the Muslim community, make terrorists. Create the terrorists.”
There is no reason to believe that the FBI’s attacks on activists are any different. People who speak out against issues like fracking, the keystone pipeline, animal abuse, or the capitalist system, among many other things, can expect the FBI or DHS to come looking into their activities and quite possibly encouraging them into doing something they wouldn’t have.
As seen in the case of McDavid, this tactic of surveilling any individual who may use their first amendment right a bit too freely, and then trying to coerce them into breaking the law, or saying something a bit to radical, is quite common. Or in other words, the FBI’s goal is to transform usually peaceful activists into dangerous revolutionaries or terrorists, and then foil their evil plots.
There are many reoccurring cases that tell this same Orwellian tale. Back in 2010, 23 activists across the midwest were subpoenaed for their activism, and accused of providing “material support” to terrorist organizations. This charge comes from a provision in the Patriot Act which makes it a crime to provide the vague concept of “material support” to any organization the State Department designates as terrorist. This includes anything from humanitarian aid to political advocacy, and in this particular case, it was from providing money to a group aiding the poor in Gaza.
These activists were members of the marxist group “Freedom Road Socialist Organization,” and the FBI used their regular technique of sending in an undercover agent to encourage the group into breaking the law. The agent was named “Karen,” and the mission was to reveal what these anti-war peace activists were really all about; mass murder and revolutionary overthrow of the government.
It kind of sounds like Melissa McCarthy satire; “Karen” was a lesbian socialist with a teenage daughter who was dead set on revolution, but after about two years of infiltrating the group, there was never enough hard evidence to actually go to trial, other than hyperbolic testimony from “Karen,” who obviously did not want all of her hard work to go to waste. None of the activists have yet been arrested.
Guarding Corporate Interests
Today, the FBI continues its aggressive surveillance of activists around the country, with who knows how many informants currently posing as ideological warriors. At the same time, state governments are criminalizing certain activist and journalistic activities, like filming, taking photographs, or recording agricultural operations without permission. This has been coined the “ag-gag law,” and has been enacted in various states, making it ever more risky for activists to obtain proof of animal abuse, labor issues, and other misdeeds without being arrested. This law covers everyone, from journalists to employees, and it has been argued that it suppresses ones first amendment right. Obviously, it makes revealing what goes on at farms and factories that produce everyone’s food to the public increasingly difficult.
Recent reports have also shown that the FBI is currently targeting activists who oppose the Keystone XL pipeline and hydraulic fracturing. In different states, FBI agents have been making house calls, trying to “learn more about the movement.” An FBI spokesperson said, “The FBI has the authority to conduct an investigation when it has reasonable grounds to believe that an individual has engaged in criminal activity or is planning to do so...This authority is based on the illegal activity, not on the individual’s political views.”
This may be the official statement, but if the FBI’s past actions tell us anything, it is that political views seem to play more of a role than they would ever care to admit. The bureau has not simply investigated individuals who they had reasonable ground to believe would be engaging in criminal activity; they have actively pushed individuals to commit actions, and even seduced them, as in the case of McDavid. They have also targeted movements that, by their own admission, were peaceful, yet treated them as potential terrorist threats. Does the fact that all of these movements oppose the abuses of some of the most powerful private industries, like finance, oil and gas, and food production, have anything to do with it? The FBI would surely deny this, but if there is one other thing to take away from the organizations actions over the past decade, it is that they are about as trustworthy as the “The most trusted source of News” in America.