Should Telecoms Get Immunity?

Interview with AT&T Whistleblower Mark Klein



The Cafferty File on Telecom Immunity on CNN's The Situation Room


The above YouTube videos touch on the subject of whether or not the telecommunications industry should be granted immunity for allowing the NSA to warrantlessly tap the phone calls, emails and internet traffic of its customers.

The first video is of Mark Klein. He is a former AT&T employee who testified before Congress yesterday about why he believes lawmakers should reject immunity for telecom companies who assisted the Bush administration's spying on millions of Americans.

In an NPR interview, Mr. Klein describes a room at a AT&T main switching facility in San Francisco where the National Security Agency essentially intercepted the internet traffic of AT&T customers. And because other telecoms' networks come together at the facility, it gives the NSA wholesale access to all internet activity passing through.

“I flipped out,” he said. “They’re copying the whole Internet. There’s no selection going on here. Maybe they select out later, but at the point of handoff to the government, they get everything.”

Bringing lawsuits against those telecoms involved is a good thing according to Steve Benen of The Carpetbagger Report:

If senators disregard Klein’s first-hand knowledge, and approve retroactive immunity, the extent of the surveillance program will remain a mystery, and Americans seeking their day in court will be denied justice.

Former Attorney General John Ashcroft disagrees. In an opinion piece he penned for the New York Times, Ashcroft cites the "inherent unfairness of requiring companies to second-guess executive-branch legal judgments" when they have received "explicit assurances from the highest levels of the government that the activities in question were authorized by the president and determined to be lawful."

But is immunity really just to protect the telecoms? Dr. Steven Taylor of PoliBlog raises a good point:

Really, in all this discussion of immunity for telecoms it seems to me that the real consequence of granting them immunity will be protecting not the telecoms, but the Bush administration. Lawsuits, while possible financially damaging to AT&T and friends, will point an uncomfortable spotlight on the domestic intelligence gathering by the administration.

The Senate Judiciary Committee was expected to consider a revised FISA bill today, including the immunity provision, but Raw Story is reporting a delay:

A committee aide tells RAW STORY it is "likely" the panel will produce legislation that differs from an Intelligence Committee bill. The Intel bill includes telecom immunity, but it remains unclear whether immunity will be struck by the Judiciary committee.

-Dippold

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