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Experts slammed the Department of Homeland Security for allegedly employing a little known customs statute to try to get telephone and social media records for journalists and nonprofits.
According to The Guardian, the DHS has leaned on an “arcane” piece of federal law known as 19 USC 1509, which gives the agency the authority to inspect records related to customs imports and the payment of duties and taxes, to evade a judge’s scrutiny as it pursued records involving former CNN anchor Don Lemon and independent journalist Georgia Fort.
Lemon and Fort were arrested in January and charged with conspiracy to deprive rights after they reported on a protest at a St. Paul, Minnesota church amid numerous immigration demonstrations in the region.
Fort described in shocking detail how two dozen agents showed up at her home to arrest her.
Federal prosecutors tried twice in February to get warrants for Fort and Lemon’s YouTube channels and were rejected by a judge who said the government failed to establish the pair — who have pleaded not guilty — committed a crime. The judge also wanted the two journalists to be informed of the request, which DHS later withdrew, according to The Guardian.
DHS ultimately got six months worth of Fort’s phone records from T-Mobile and served Google with a summons under USC 1509, which doesn’t require a green light from a judge, the outlet reported.
The agency’s targets went beyond Fort and Lemon to include the YouTube accounts for Democracy Now; podcaster Megyn Kelly; the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel and independent journalist Brendan Gutenschwager, The Guardian reported.
Using the customs statute was “outrageous,” John Roth, who worked as the DHS’s inspector general from 2014 to 2017, told The Guardian.
“It’s outrageous conduct on so many levels. It’s hard to know where to begin,” he said, adding, “This is an improper use of the subpoena under any circumstances. This is not a customs case; it is not a customs violation. They are not investigating a customs violation.”
Former DHS lawyer Chris Duncan concurred.
“These laws have absolutely nothing to do with a domestic situation at a church, a social media post, even an immigration matter,” he told The Guardian.
Caitlin Vogus of the Freedom of the Press Foundation called the move by DHS “very concerning” and said the information sought by the government could reveal a journalist’s sources.
“There is no judge in the loop. You don’t have that independent authority to scrutinize the demand and to say whether or not it’s legitimate,” she said.
She noted DHS was seeking YouTube subscriber information for Fort and Lemon, saying “there’s there’s no reason it would need this information for the criminal charges that it’s brought against them.”
“It’s not a crime to post a YouTube video, and it’s not at all clear why the government is demanding this information about Lemon and Fort’s YouTube accounts,” she said.
The White House referred Mediaite to DHS, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The move comes after the widely criticized and ultimately dropped effort by the Trump administration to subpoena four journalists from The New York Times following its reporting of security issues with Air Force One.
The post Trump Administration Using Little Known Customs Law to Try to Get Phone Records for Journalists: Report first appeared on Mediaite.
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