Vol. 73/No. 22      June 8, 2009

While seeking to clean up Washington’s image, tarnished by controversy over U.S. torture of prisoners abroad and the denial of their rights, the White House is asserting its prerogative to use military trials against Guantánamo prisoners, including the use of secret evidence and other violations of the right to due process.

In a further step, Obama calls for codifying into law the U.S. government’s authority to jail indefinitely—without charges or the right to a trial—anyone it designates a “terrorist threat.” The Guantánamo prison may eventually be shut down, but some of its current inmates will be either jailed without charges elsewhere, dragged before a military kangaroo court, or tried in a federal court. In continuity with the Bush administration, Obama has rejected releasing any more photos of U.S. abuse of Iraqis at the Abu Ghraib prison.

At the same time, the U.S. government is expanding funding for a program to fingerprint every prisoner in every federal, state, and local jail and compare this information with Homeland Security immigration databases. The pretext is to deport “criminals” who are immigrants.

These government measures are not just directed at “foreigners,” Muslims, or immigrants. The target is working people as a whole—and our ability to organize to defend ourselves against ongoing attacks on our living standards and rights.

What will stop the government from checking fingerprints of all those caught up in the “justice” system not just for immigration status, but for political views or union activity? All moves toward establishing a national government ID card or databank should be opposed; they will give a handle to cops and bosses for harassment and victimization.

If the FBI and other cops can use secret evidence and “preventively” detain “terror” suspects, won’t they try to use the same methods against the labor movement or those who fight for immigrant and Black rights?

The U.S. government and the wealthy capitalist rulers know that the effects of the worldwide economic crisis will sooner or later generate increasing resistance by working people. They want to lay the groundwork to block that resistance.

Defending constitutional rights—including the right to a trial and to see the evidence against you—is crucial to the ability of workers to defend our interests against the bosses today and in the class battles to come. This goes hand in hand with demanding the legalization of all undocumented workers and an end to deportations in order to help unite the working class in struggle.
 
 
Related articles:
White House uses ‘terror’ pretext to erode rights
N.Y.: Four entrapped by FBI, arrested on conspiracy charges
California inmate to appeal execution to high court
Hearing of Bay Area cop in killing of youth resumes
Convictions in Miami ‘terror’ case stir outrage  
 
 
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