Legalectric

Yes, it gets worse. Let me see if I understand this — the government is monitoring Muslim gathering spots for radiation, ranging from mosques to homes, and this is the same government that refuses to monitor the Prairie Island Indian Reservation, next to the operating Prairie Island Nuclear Generationg Plant, for radiation. And U.S. News & World Report is the one that broke the story? This is just to weird…

Exclusive from U.S. News & World Report: Nuclear monitoring of Muslims done without search warrants

In Washington, the sites monitored have included prominent mosques and office buildings in suburban Maryland and Virginia. One source close to the program said that participants “were tasked on a daily and nightly basis,” and that FBI and Energy Department officials held regular meetings to update the monitoring list. “The targets were almost all U.S. citizens,” says the source. “A lot of us thought it was questionable, but people who complained nearly lost their jobs. We were told it was perfectly legal.”

The question of search warrants is controversial, however. To ensure accurate readings, in up to 15 percent of the cases the monitoring needed to take place on private property, sources say, such as on mosque parking lots and private driveways. Government officials familiar with the program insist it is legal; warrants are unneeded for monitoring from public property, they say, as well as from publicly accessible driveways and parking lots. “If a delivery man can access it, so can we,” says one.

St.PPP: FBI official defends radiation monitoring

This is from the L.A. Times:

Domestic Spying on Muslims Discovered

“All Americans should be concerned about the apparent trend toward a two-tiered system of justice, with full rights for most citizens and another diminished set for Muslims,” said Nihad Award, an official of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the nation’s largest Muslim civil liberties group.

Nihad Awad

What have they been monitoring?

Roehrkasse and other federal law enforcement officials said the agents had targeted mosques, warehouses, businesses and some homes in and near several of the nation’s largest cities, including Los Angeles, Washington, New York and Chicago.

The monitoring program was also used near other potential targets, including the 2004 political conventions and the Group of Eight summit of the leading industrial democracies that year, in Georgia.

“The FBI believes it has the legal authority,” the official said. “A parking lot or a driveway is not necessarily private property, and our equipment is not intrusive.”

But Awad and other Muslim leaders at the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations said the monitoring fit a pattern of spying on U.S. citizens without first obtaining a court warrant.

“This disturbing revelation,” Awad said, “coupled with recent reports of domestic surveillance without warrant, could lead to the perception that we are no longer a nation ruled by law but instead one in which fear trumps constitutional rights.”

Just last week, British government sponsored Muslim leaders were detained without explanation while on their way to a Conference in L.A.

British Muslim leader held at LAX by DHS

“Explanations about the delay of our two British guests, who were sponsored by the British government to speak at the MPAC Convention, have not been satisfactory,” said Maher Hathout, MPAC Senior Adviser. “This and other similar situations are severely damaging the civil rights departments of the US government and the potential for cooperation between grassroots communities and the US government.”

Muslim conference frustrated by airport security

Muslim leaders who gathered Saturday to discuss their role in combatting extremism within the Islamic community complained that two scheduled speakers missed the event after being detained at Los Angeles International Airport.

â??People are upset,â? said Salam Al-Marayati of the Muslim Public Affairs Council, which organized the conference. â??On one hand the U.S. government is asking us to do more, but on the other they are preventing us from doing our work.â?

Salam Al-Marayati

Security poster from U.S. Army Space and Missle Defense Command/U.S. Army Forces Strategic Command