The administration of US President Barack Obama has lost its argument that a potential threat to US security was a good enough reason to stop a lawsuit challenging the government’s warrantless wiretapping program.
A federal appeals court in San Francisco on Friday rejected the Justice Department’s request for an emergency stay.
The Obama administration, like the administration of former US president George W. Bush before it, cited the so-called state secrets privilege as its defense.
The government claimed national security would be compromised if a lawsuit brought by the US chapter of an Islamic charity was allowed to proceed.
The case was brought by the Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation, a defunct charity with a chapter in Oregon.
The decision by the three-judge appeals panel was a setback for the new Obama administration as it adopts some of the same positions on national security and secrecy as the Bush administration.
Earlier this month, Attorney General Eric Holder ordered a review of all state secrets claims that have been used to protect Bush administration anti-terrorism programs from lawsuits.
Yet even as that review continues, the administration has invoked the privilege in several different cases, including Al-Haramain.
The case began when the Bush administration accidentally turned over documents to Al-Haramain attorneys.
Lawyers for the defunct charity said the papers showed illegal wiretapping by the National Security Agency.
The documents were returned to the government, which quickly locked them away, claiming they were state secrets that could threaten national security if released.
Lawyers for Al-Haramain argued that they needed the documents to prove that wiretapping had occurred.
The US Treasury Department in 2004 designated the charity as an organization that supports terrorism before the Saudi government closed it.
The Bush administration redesignated it last year, citing attempts to keep it operating.
The 9th Circuit eventually agreed that the disputed documents were protected as state secrets.
But the court ruled that the Oregon chapter of Al-Haramain could try to find another way to show it had standing to sue the government over domestic wiretapping.
A number of organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union, tried to sue the government over warrantless wiretapping but were denied standing because they could not show they were targeted.
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