Judge: FBI's terrorists list violates rights

A federal judge WASHINGTON — ruled Wednesday that an FBI watch list of more than 1 million “known or suspected terrorists” violates the constitutional rights of U.S. citizens in the database.

What happened

The decision from U.S. District Judge Anthony Trenga of the Eastern District of Virginia in favor of 23 Muslim Americans who sued over their inclusion the Terrorist Screening Database found that the watch list infringes on their constitutional right to due process. Trenga noted that the list restricts their ability to flfly and engage in everyday activities and backed the plaintiff ff ff ff ff ffs’ concerns that they were flflagged secretly and without a clear methodology.

“There is no evidence, or contention, that any of these plaintiff ff ff ff ff ffs satisfy the defifinition of a ‘known terrorist,’” wrote Trenga, adding that even harmless conduct could result in someone being labeled as a “suspected terrorist” on the watch list.

Why it matters

The ruling could reshape the government’s process for a watch list that has long been criticized for inaccuracy and described by opponents as “a Muslim registry created in the wake of the widespread Islamophobia of the early 2000s.” Trenga ordered both the plaintifs and defendants to submit arguments about how to fifix the constitutional problems with the database, which encompasses nearly 1.2 million people, including about 4,600 U.S. citizens or residents, as of June 2017.

The watch list is a different, less restrictive database than the No Fly List, which bars people from boarding U.S. airplanes or flflying through the nation’s airspace. In 2014, a federal judge in Oregon ruled the No Fly List was unconstitutional, forcing the Department of Homeland Security to reform its procedures. Gadeir Abbas, a CAIR attorney for the plaintiffs, told the Associated Press that Wednesday’s ruling was the fifirst to specififically target the watch list.

The FBI did not immediately respond to a request for comment late Wednesday.

The AP reported that the FBI’s lawyers argued in court that the government’s efforts to combat terrorism outweighed the diffifficulties alleged by the nearly twodozen Muslim American citizens on the list.

But the Muslim American citizens on the watch list told the court they suffered a wide range of abuse and harassment, according to the opinion.

What’s next

In his ruling, Trenga gave the parties in the lawsuit 45 days total to submit their arguments and replies for how the watch list could be reformed.

The watch list is a less restrictive database than the No Fly List, which bars people from boarding U.S. airplanes or flflying through the nation’s airspace.