The Department of Justice has just released its annual report on its surveillance activities for 2010 including its use of secret court orders, National Security Letters (NSLs) and electronic and physical surveillance — and boy were they busy. The report disclosed a dramatic increase in surveillance of Americans between 2009 and 2010, and these statistics don’t even include surveillance conducted under the new FISA Amendments Act.

The government more than quadrupled its use of secret court subpoenas, known as 215 orders, which give the government access to "any tangible thing," including a wide range of sensitive information such as financial records, medical records, and even library records. In 2010, the FBI made 96 applications, up from just 21 in 2009.

There was also a huge increase in NSLs, which allow the FBI to demand records related to a broad range of personal information, including financial records, a list of e-mail addresses with which a person has corresponded, and even the identity of a person who has posted anonymous speech on a political website, all without the permission or supervision of a court. In 2010, the FBI more than doubled the number of U.S. persons it surveilled with NSLs, requesting 24,287 NSLs on 14,212 people, up from 14,788 NSLs on 6,114 people the year before. The FBI also increased its electronic and physical surveillance, making 1,579 applications to wiretap and physically search individuals’ property last year, up from 1,376 the year before.

In just a few weeks, three of the most controversial provisions of the Patriot Act are set to expire: the aforementioned 215 orders; the roving wiretap provision that allows the government to listen in on phone calls without specifically identifying a phone line for their tap, or even a target; and the "lone wolf provision," which has never been used, but nevertheless allows the government to conduct surveillance on non-U.S. citizens who have no connection to a terrorist organization.

This report is yet another example of the need for reform. For nearly 10 years, the Patriot Act has allowed the government to abuse the privacy of innocent Americans by spying on them without cause or accountability. With three of the most troubling provisions expiring at the end of the month, now is the time to demand that Congress protect our Constitutional rights, and rein in the government’s abusive surveillance practices.

(Originally posted on the Blog of Rights.)

Derby, Kansas, high school sophomore Jonathan Villarreal was walking to the bus after school when a police officer ordered him to pull his pants up above his hips. Jonathan refused, on the grounds that the school day was over. As reported in the Wichita Eagle, here’s what happened next:

[Villarreal] said one of the officers, a man who was larger than him, pulled him to the ground by the neck and told him to stop resisting arrest. Villarreal denied he was resisting.

Both officers kneed him in the back and neck while he was on the ground, he said.

Because they were physical with him, he struggled to get up, but was pushed back down, he said.

At one point as he tried to get up, Villarreal said he felt his arm break when he was pushed back down.

After Villarreal tried three times to get up, one officer fired a Taser at his chest, he said. Although he was wearing a heavy coat, he still felt an electrical shock, he said.

According to the article, the police department is investigating the incident. But, sadly, it illustrates a larger problem that continues to pop up around the country: the use of street-policing tactics against kids, and disproportionately kids of color, for behavior that, at worst, might merit ordinary school-based discipline.

Around the country, police assigned to patrol school campuses — where police may have a legitimate role in responding to serious criminal conduct or imminent danger — often direct their efforts where law enforcement is clearly misplaced. This is part of a disturbing national trend called the School-to-Prison Pipeline, wherein children are funneled out of public schools and into the juvenile and criminal justice systems. Jonathan’s story is a perfect example of this larger problem. A school’s right to regulate dress code is one thing; but whatever role such regulations play in a school’s educational mission, they fall miles short of justifying a police officer’s use of brutal force against a kid.

Every child deserves an educational experience free from inappropriate policing. Over and over again, however, a pattern emerges: students of color are most likely to face overaggressive policing in schools and to suffer long-lasting effects on their educational prospects as a result. Being arrested nearly doubles the odds that a child will drop out of school, and, if coupled with a court appearance, nearly quadruples the odds of dropout; an arrest also lowers standardized test scores, reduces future employment prospects, and increases the likelihood of future interaction with the criminal justice system.

The ACLU is engaged in nationwide advocacy against over-policing in the classroom. One aspect of that advocacy is a case we filed with the New York Civil Liberties Union and the law firm Dorsey & Whitney challenging the manner in which New York Police Department officers are deployed in public middle and high schools in New York City. Following years of investigation and advocacy, the lawsuit argues that a pattern of unlawful arrests, seizures, and uses of force violate the constitutional rights of students throughout New York City.

Jonathan’s story has disturbing echoes in our lawsuit: In New York City, kids are routinely arrested and subjected to force for behavior that arguably violates school rules but falls far short of criminal conduct. The litigation tells several of these stories. One 12-year-old girl was handcuffed and arrested for drawing on a desk in erasable marker. Another student — a 15-year-old girl — was painfully handcuffed and arrested for not proceeding quickly enough to detention.

Our lawsuit is pending. We hope that it will lead to meaningful reforms in New York City. Beyond the immediate ruling we seek from the court, we hope it has a broader impact as well. Eventually, policing in the school environment should be limited to only the most extreme circumstances. But the realm of ordinary school discipline should belong to educators, not cops.

(Originally posted on the Blog of Rights.)

The U.S. House of Representatives is getting ready to vote on the misleadingly titled No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act (H.R. 3) today. As early as noon, your representatives will be deciding whether or not to take away insurance coverage for abortion from millions of women. You can watch the debate in real time on www.cspan.org, or follow our twitter feed for live updates.

Yesterday, we discussed the mean-spiritedness that pervades this bill. As the House edges closer to passing this attack on women, we thought we'd remind you about the basics:

• H.R. 3 singles out and excludes abortion from a host of programs that fulfill the government's obligation to provide health care to certain populations. It would permanently deny millions of women, including Native Americans, federal employees, Peace Corps volunteers, poor women and women in federal prisons, access to abortion care except in very limited circumstances. These discriminatory policies should be repealed – not made into permanent law.
• H.R. 3 manipulates the United States Tax Code to penalize a single, legal, medical procedure: abortion. In particular, it penalizes small businesses and middle-class families. It would deny small businesses tax credits designed to make health insurance affordable to all Americans if the insurance they provide includes abortion coverage. And it imposes a tax increase on women who need abortion care by excluding it from health savings accounts, medical savings accounts, and flexible spending arrangements.
• H.R. 3 would eliminate abortion coverage in the health insurance exchanges created by health care reform by denying the subsidies at the heart of health care reform to women and families who want to purchase plans that offer coverage for the full range of reproductive services women need. Congress rightly rejected this kind of ban when it passed health care reform; H.R. 3 tries to resurrect it.
• H.R. 3 would make permanent a provision that violates Washington, D.C.'s, autonomy and forbids the local government from choosing for itself whether to use its own locally raised non-federal dollars to provide coverage for abortion for its low-income residents. If you're curious how the District feels about that, ask Mayor Vincent Gray, who was arrested in protest last month after D.C.'s right to care for its own citizens got traded away to cement the budget deal.

H.R. 3 is nothing less than a direct attack on a woman's ability to make personal, private medical decisions. Tell your representative that Congress needs to stop playing politics with women's health and reject H.R. 3.

(Originally posted on the Blog of Rights.)