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ACLU: 900,000 Names on U.S. Terror Watch Lists
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ShareFebruary 27, 2008 12:40 PM
The FBI now keeps a list of over 900,000 names belonging to known or suspected terrorists, the American Civil Liberties Union said today.
If that number is accurate, it would be an all-time high, exponentially more than the 100,000 names on the list several years ago. But the number needs to be taken with a grain of salt: after all, the ACLU doesn't keep the list, the FBI does, and the bureau doesn't generally like to talk about it. (Indeed, the FBI has not yet responded to a request for comment for this post.)
But if the ACLU's figure isn't accurate, it's also unlikely to be off by that much. Last September, the ACLU notes, the Department of Justice's Inspector General reported the FBI watch list was at 700,000 names, and growing at 20,000 names per month.
The ACLU says they "extrapolated" from those figures to determine the list's current size. ACLU's Barry Steinhardt added that the group had spoken privately with people familiar with the watch list, who told them the 900,000 figure was not outlandish.
In the past, The FBI has told ABC News that the size of its watch list is classified. Despite that, both the bureau and the DoJ Inspector General have published the total figure in unclassified reports.
There's no doubt the FBI's list is growing: just last June, ABC News reported it was at 509,000 names, based on information in an unclassified FBI budget document.
But strangely, the list may be growing not because of swelling legions of foreign terrorists. Instead, it appears the FBI may be adding tens of thousands of names belonging to U.S. persons it suspects of being domestic terrorists -- people who have no known ties to international terrorist organizations.
A separate entity, the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC), keeps a list of all names believed to belong to terrorists linked to international terror groups. That list, which was at 100,000 names in 2003, grew to 465,000 names by last June – but since then has grown only modestly, according to NCTC spokesman Carl Kropf. Today, Kropf said that list stands at roughly 500,000 names. (Unlike the FBI, the NCTC does not maintain that the size of its watch list is classified information.)
The FBI takes that list and adds to it a new collection of names which belong to U.S. persons believed to be domestic terrorists: people who have links to terrorism but not to any international group.
Last June, the NCTC was responsible for putting 465,000 names on the watch list, and the FBI appeared to add an additional 44,000. By September, extrapolating from the DoJ Inspector General's report, the FBI's contribution appears to have grown to somewhere north of 200,000 names.
Today – if the ACLU is to be believed – the FBI's contribution may be as high as 417,000 names. Which would raise a new question: Where are so many domestic terrorists coming from? Or do they simply use more aliases than foreign terrorists?
Update: The FBI responded late Wednesday afternoon. Spokesman Chad Kolton did not dispute the ACLU's figure, but noted that the watch list contains names, aliases and name variations for individuals. The number of people on the watch list, he said, was around 300,000, and only 5 percent are U.S. persons. Kolton noted that the list is "regularly reviewed for accuracy." Last year the bureau removed 100,000 records "related to people cleared of any nexus with terrorism," Kolton said.
February 27, 2008 in FBI | Permalink | User Comments (42)
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The number of people in the list is sickening, I would love to see if Obama's name is on that list. I bet their would be an outcry if this was so.
Posted by: David | Feb 27, 2008 1:04:10 PM
Simple math suggests that if this is true, the FBI believes one in every three hundred people in the US is a terrorist. That would mean that practically every single person in this country knows at least one terrorist. I don't buy it. Either the ACLU is exaggerating or the FBI is completely nuts. Unfortunately for all of us, either could be true and neither would be very comforting.
Posted by: Jamie B. | Feb 27, 2008 1:04:17 PM
So what's the problem?
Posted by: Zinglesloff | Feb 27, 2008 1:12:22 PM
Jeez, if they'd just list all the names in the Republican party, or at least the entire Bush white house admin and all his former employees that have left under duress, or resigned, and the major GOP supporters... we'd have all the domestic terrorists in one group.
Posted by: FormerRepub | Feb 27, 2008 1:26:39 PM
"Which would raise a new question: Where are so many domestic terrorists coming from?"
Or maybe, just maybe, some on the list aren't actually terrorists. It is a list of "known or suspected terrorists", and the FBI has been casting a wide net.
Posted by: Roger Green | Feb 27, 2008 2:21:38 PM
It'd be interesting to know what qualifies an individual to be added to this list. Some democrats in congress want people named on the list to lose their 2nd amendment rights, yet for all we know they've never done anything wrong.
For all we know, it may just take a disagreement with a local cop or other official to get your name on the 'terror watch list,' and I don't believe there's any way to appeal and get your name removed. This could simply be a list of 'enemies of the state' and I'd be willing to bet it's full of names who've never actually done anything wrong.
We need to know how a person qualifies for the list, how a person can find out if they're on it and a process for contesting their place on the list. At least for US citizens with no link to terrorist organizations. This is dangerous stuff right here!
Posted by: squeenter squillo | Feb 27, 2008 2:35:57 PM
Who should be surprised? The ACLU has been ANTI-AMERICAN for years. Their names should be on the list and erase the names they have put down...for they have been ANTI-CONTITUTION and ANTI-EVERYTHING AMERICA HAS STOOD FOR SINCE THE BEGINNING....HUMM...PERHAPS THEY ARE 'THOSE' WHO WANT TO BE 'MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE'. They don't realize that "....He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision. Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure."
Psalms 2:4-5
Posted by: Of the Founding Fathers | Feb 27, 2008 11:07:47 PM
these DC crimminals are afraid of the people.
Posted by: Morse | Feb 28, 2008 9:13:15 PM
It is more likely that the increase in the numbers of "watched" persons on the 'list' are due to an expanded definition of terror suspects. The list probably now contains the names of persons that have spoken out against the Bush administration and persons in the peace movement. Also it probably contains the names of felons of any description (esp. those convicted of drug and morality type crimes which this regime would consider possible potential terrorists due to the intense resentment at being handled so brutally in the politically motivated justice system.) Empires have always had to look over their shoulders like any schoolyard bully would.
Posted by: Michael | Feb 28, 2008 10:10:38 PM
Anti-American ACLU??
"Stop throwing the constitution in my face, it's just a g##d##n piece of paper." -Dictator Bush 12:9-05
Stop throwing the Bible in our faces, it's just just a g##d##n book.
Posted by: Jacob | Feb 28, 2008 10:48:47 PM
So 15,000 Americans are terrrrrrists?
Really? Is Bush at the top of the list?
Posted by: Smash the State | Feb 29, 2008 12:37:06 AM
The list is probably being expanded to include those who have critcized our out of control federal government, those who have visited alternative news sites on the Internet, both left and right, and those who frequent websites critical of the war, Bush, the impending police state, anything that challenges elite agendas and power. "Terrorism" is just a ruse to control the American people.
Posted by: Basil | Feb 29, 2008 2:13:20 AM
Rather or not the ACLU's number sounds outrageous, the fact is,the Department of Justice's Inspector General reported the FBI watch list was at 700,000 names, and growing at 20,000 names per month and that alone should be alarming people. That means sooner or later everyone will have their name on the list. The problems created from being added to the list from getting on a plane and/or somewhere else in their daily lives is going to be made difficult and they/you will not know why.
Our country and/or any other country should not be afraid of making that list should be made public so as to quickly correct the situation.
Someone from the F.B.I. can say they correct this list all the time, but again how do you know for sure and once on the list how do you know how soon you come off of it after a mistake.
This is insanity. If we ever had that large of a problem with terrorist to begin with, our borders and everything else would have been cut off and our troops would be protecting us. Nothing like living in fear to make sure you are willing to hand over your freedoms.
Posted by: Winkers | Feb 29, 2008 9:46:43 AM
It's important to get the news out to the people, but what can we DO about it? We all know the problem, where is the solution?
Posted by: Kelly | Feb 29, 2008 3:02:35 PM
Gee. Where are they going to get all that money to watch 900,000 people? Maybe they should create more prisons. Did I say that? How Anti-American of me.
Posted by: Kini Cosma | Feb 29, 2008 4:49:18 PM
I'm scared of all the domestic terrorists,Do the FEMA camps have enough room for them all? What if some get past the screeners or escape? Who is going to protect us? Tell them I am not a thought criminal. I trust my government,I trust my government,I trust my government.
Don't let them take me away.NOOOOooo BAM klink.
Posted by: nobody worth noticing | Mar 1, 2008 1:30:41 AM
FASCISM
Posted by: Hal Lepino | Mar 1, 2008 1:40:40 AM
What has happened to this country since Bush was INSTALLED as president? We soon won't have a country left! I have never seen police meaner or more brutal, I have never seen a time since McCarthey when anyone with a different take on things was automatically a communist! No wonder several million Americans have left!
Posted by: Cat Callahan | Mar 1, 2008 2:04:02 AM
I would like to see every member of the Council on Foreign Relations on U.S. Terror Watch Lists.
Posted by: Pancho | Mar 1, 2008 2:10:41 AM
...And several years from now, the list should grow to about a billion at this rate. Right?
Posted by: Scott | Mar 1, 2008 2:59:34 AM
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