Civil liberties officials at the Homeland Security Department did
not agree with some of the language in a controversial report on
right-wing extremists, but the agency issued the report anyway.
The intelligence assessment issued to law enforcement last week
said some military veterans could be susceptible to extremist
recruiters or commit lone acts of violence. That prompted angry
reactions from some lawmakers and veterans' groups.
Homeland Security spokeswoman Amy Kudwa said the report was issued
before officials resolved problems raised by the agency's civil rights
division. Kudwa would not specify what language raised the concerns.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano defended the report
Thursday, but she said the definition of right-wing extremism that was
included in a footnote should be changed.
In the report, right-wing extremism was defined as hate-motivated
groups and movements, such as hatred of certain religions, racial or
ethnic groups. "It may include groups and individuals that are
dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or
immigration," the report said.
"If there's one part of that report I would rewrite, in the
word-smithing, Washington-ese that goes on after the fact, it would be
that footnote," Napolitano said Thursday on Fox News.
The same definition was included in the agency's March 26 report
on domestic extremism. Both reports were marked "For Official Use Only."
The report on right-wing extremists cites the 1995 Oklahoma City
bombing by military veteran Timothy McVeigh as one instance of a
veteran becoming a domestic terrorist.
Several lawmakers, the American Legion and Vets for Freedom took
offense to the intelligence review. The Veterans of Foreign Wars
defended it as an assessment, not an accusation.
Napolitano said, "We do not mean to suggest that veterans as a
whole are at risk of becoming violent extremists."
She also said: "I apologize for that offense. It was certainly not
intended."
The top Republican on the House intelligence committee, Michigan's
Pete Hoekstra, has asked the director of national intelligence's
ombudsman to investigate the Homeland Security report for
"unsubstantiated conclusions and political bias."
The senior Democrat of the House committee with oversight of the
department said the report raises privacy and civil liberty issues.
"This report appears to have blurred the line between violent belief,
which is constitutionally protected, and violent action, which is not,"
Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., wrote in a letter to Napolitano.
The department's definition of left-wing extremism in the March 26
report includes a reference to violence, stating these groups that
embrace anticapitalist, communist or socialist beliefs seek "to bring
about change through violent revolution rather than through established
political processes."
These reports are part of the department's routine analysis of
intelligence information to give to law enforcement agencies guidance
on possible security threats.
In February, the department issued a similar warning about
possible cyber attacks from left wing extremists. In September, the
agency reported that right-wing extremists over the past five years had
used the immigration debate as a recruiting tool.
Since September, the agency issued several reports on individual
foreign and domestic extremist groups such as al-Qaida and Hammerskin
Nation, a skinhead organization. The Hammerskin assessment said many of
the group's members received military training and fought in Iraq and
Afghanistan.
The latest report has turned into a "political football," said
Rep. Jane Harman, D-Calif. Harman, who chairs a House subcommittee on
intelligence and information sharing, said the report could have been
written more artfully, but added that "it was a well-intended effort to
describe to law enforcement what things to look for."
"If the result is to dumb down intelligence products that could
prevent the next attack to the homeland, we will all lose," she said.
(This version CORRECTS to show that DHS would not specify which
language raised concerns.)
