How Court Cited Clinton-Era Abuses Suppressed by Networks (NBC goes blank when Clinton named)

Abuses during the Clinton administration led a secret federal court panel to deny Attorney General John Ashcroft's request to expand the ability to share intelligence information with criminal prosecutors, but on Friday night network stories made only passing references to the Clinton administration as reporters focused on the “setback” for Ashcroft. Despite the fact that the department admitted in September of 2000 that it violated the evidence-sharing rules in 75 cases, no network ever uttered the name “Janet Reno,” the Attorney General at the time.

Though one judge specifically praised Ashcroft for cleaning up the abuses, only FNC cited the judge's assessment.

Usually, the networks follow the lead of the New York Times, but not this time. “Secret Court Says F.B.I. Aides Misled Judges in 75 Cases,” announced the August 23 New York Times front page headline above this subhead: “Clinton-Era Problems Cited in Sharing Intelligence with Criminal Investigators.” Instead, the networks followed the spin of the Washington Post, which headlined its front page story: “Secret Court Rebuffs Ashcroft; Justice Dept. Chided on Misinformation.” (More in item #2 below about the contrast between the two newspapers.)

Coincidence? NBC Nightly News went silent exactly when Fred Francis began the word "Clinton": "The secret court says the FBI deceived it largely during the Cl-"

The judges, who oversee the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), made their ruling in May but it became public after members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, chaired by Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT), asked that it be released.

-- ABC's World News Tonight. Peter Jennings saw a rebuke of the Bush team: “A federal court tells the Bush administration it is abusing its power in the campaign against terrorism.” Only deep in the subsequent story did John Yang mention the Clinton administration, but he made it sound as if the abuses were ongoing: “The court said the FBI misled it when it sought permission for wiretaps and search warrants, making mis-statements and omissions of facts in cases going back to the Clinton administration.”

(On Sunday's This Week, Cokie Roberts posed a single question to Clinton's Deputy Attorney General, Jamie Gorelick, about the Clinton-era abuses.)

-- CBS Evening News anchor John Roberts highlighted the “big setback for the Justice Department” as he portrayed the abuses as ongoing as he added that the court said “the department has been abusing the authority it already has as far back as the Clinton administration.” In the subsequent story, Jim Stewart didn't utter a word about Clinton or Reno. CBS reporter Jim Stewart uniquely recalled the Moussaoui case and how “because the bureau had already been slapped over ill-conceived FISA requests...it failed to ask the court's permission to search accused terrorist Zacharias Moussaoui's computer last year.”

-- In his NBC Nightly News story, Fred Francis wrapped it up by trying to mention Clinton, but the screen went black and the audio cut off just as Francis began to pronounce the first syllable of the name Clinton: “The secret court says the FBI deceived it largely during the Cl-” (Francis's story aired in complete form on CNBC's The News with Brian Williams.)

-- CNN's Wolf Blitzer conceded the “mistakes” took place during the Clinton years, but Blitzer, nonetheless, stressed: “Still, this court's rebuff is another development that makes John Ashcroft a lightening rod for criticism over his department's role in the war on terror.” Later, on NewsNight, David Ensor avoided the name Clinton: “The court also criticized the FBI for misleading the court 75 times before the Bush administration took over.”

-- Only FNC's Carl Cameron pointed out how in the ruling one judge credited Ashcroft with cleaning up the Clinton/Reno mess. Cameron noted how one judge wrote: “We consistently find the (FISA) applications 'well-scrubbed' by the Attorney General and his staff before they are presented to us. The process is working. It is working in part because the Attorney General is conscientiously doing his job, as is his staff.”

-- ABC's World News Tonight. Peter Jennings teased at the top of the broadcast: “On World News Tonight this Friday, a federal court tells the Bush administration it is abusing its power in the campaign against terrorism.”

Jennings opened the August 23 show, as taken down by MRC analyst Brad Wilmouth: “Good evening, everyone. We are going to begin tonight with the first ever published opinion from a secret court. The court which operates inside the Justice Department says the Bush administration is not adequately protecting the privacy of American citizens and permanent residents. This has a great deal to do with the campaign against terrorism. The opinion was made public at the request of Senators from both parties on the Senate Judiciary Committee. The Justice Department has already appealed the court’s opinion. And so we go to Washington first. We have two reports. John Yang, who’s in Washington, you have the details first of what this is all about.”

     Yang confirmed: “That’s right, Peter. This court has been in existence since 1978, and in all those years, no one has ever heard a public word from it -- until now. The Federal Intelligence Surveillance Court operates in total secrecy within the Justice Department itself. It reprimanded the Justice Department and, particularly the FBI, for systematically violating citizens’ privacy rights. The court says the department did it by sharing information gathered by counter-intelligence officers with federal prosecutors. In some cases, prosecutors used information gathered for intelligence when they did not have enough evidence of their own for a criminal search warrant.”
     James Dempsey, Center for Democracy and Technology: “It’s used to anticipate attacks. It’s used in counter-spy operations. And it was, by and large, not intended to be used in the criminal system.”
     Yang got to Clinton's name: “The court said the FBI misled it when it sought permission for wiretaps and search warrants, making mis-statements and omissions of facts in cases going back to the Clinton administration. Attorney General John Ashcroft has said he wants to remove all restrictions on sharing information, saying it is necessary for homeland security. The court refused.”
     Dempsey: “The court was saying here we’re going to fight this war and win this war against terrorism, but we’re going to do it pursuant to some rules, some supervision, some checks and balances.”
     Yang: “The court’s decision was made public at the insistence of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Some members say law enforcement should have the power it needs to prevent a repeat of the September 11th attacks -- within limits.”
     Senator Charles Grassley: “But that still does not give a free hand to the FBI. No law enforcement under our Constitution can do willy nilly anything they want to do.”
     Yang concluded: “The Senate Judiciary Committee has already been looking into this matter behind closed doors. But now that this decision is public, Peter, you can expect to hear a lot more about it in the weeks to come.”

Jennings set up a second story: “Ever since the September events, the Bush administration has sought aggressively to increase the powers of law enforcement, giving prosecutors and the FBI dramatic new powers to spy on people, to arrest them, and to detain them, as we all know. The administration says the court’s ruling takes away necessary tools in the fight against terrorism.”

-- CBS Evening News. Substitute anchor John Roberts opened the broadcast: “A big setback for the Justice Department in the war on terror. A secret U.S. court that deals with sensitive intelligence issues is refusing to expand the department’s surveillance authority. The court saying the department has been abusing the authority it already has as far back as the Clinton administration. At issue are FBI requests to wiretap potential terrorists. The court says it was misled about the need for the surveillance. Jim Stewart has more tonight about the court, the decision, and the impact.”

     Though he cited the earlier abuses as the reason why the judges were angry at the Justice Department, Stewart who didn't mention Clinton. He began:
     “They meet twice a month in a sealed courtroom on the sixth floor of the Justice Department, and until now had never issued a public order. Today the Bush administration was wishing they still hadn’t. The top secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court blasted the FBI for submitting a troubling number of inaccurate affidavits while seeking secret wiretaps and then making unauthorized disseminations of what they learned from the surveillances. Angered, the court turned down a request from Attorney General John Ashcroft to broaden the FBI’s surveillance and intelligence sharing powers in the war on terrorism. Ashcroft is appealing, but bureau critics point out the court was very specific in its criticism.”
     Senator Charles Grassley: “They cited a long history of 75 cases of the FBI not being credible, not being candid in the request of information.”

Stewart uniquely raised how the earlier abuses may have led to the failure to move in on a terrorist: “Ironically, it was because the bureau had already been slapped over ill-conceived FISA requests that it failed to ask the court's permission to search accused terrorist Zacharias Moussaoui's computer last year. That led to charges the FBI missed an opportunity to prevent the 9-11 attacks.”

-- CNN's Wolf Blitzer Reports at 5pm EDT. The fuller version of the Blitzer quote recited above: “The court cited more than 75 mistakes committed by the FBI in obtaining warrants for terrorism investigations. Most of those mistakes were committed by the FBI during the Clinton administration. Still, this court's rebuff is another development that makes John Ashcroft a lightening rod for criticism over his department's role in the war on terror.”

-- FNC's Special Report with Brit Hume. Anchor Jim Angle managed to do what eluded the other networks as he gave equal weight both to how the court rejected an Ashcroft request and to how the problems which led to the ruling occurred in the Clinton years:
“A court that works in secret is now publicly accusing the FBI of giving it misleading information in order to get wiretaps and surveillance on spies and terrorists. The 75 cases the court cites took place during the Clinton administration. The same court has also shot down Attorney General John Ashcroft's request for new procedures the judges say would give prosecutors too much leeway in counter-intelligence investigations.”

FNC's Carl Cameron noted that the Justice Department maintains the court ignored the Patriot Act which had expanded FISA. He then observed: “What did not escape the court's notice, however, was the conduct of the FBI during the last year of the Clinton administration. Some 75 FBI wiretap requests were rejected because the court said they were full of inaccuracies and misrepresentations. Former FBI Director Louis Freeh even signed off on one that is said to have been misleading. Under the Bush administration those errors were corrected and new procedure for requesting wiretaps adopted. And one judge on the court said quote, 'We consistently find the (FISA) applications 'well-scrubbed' by the Attorney General and his staff before they are presented to us. The process is working. It is working in part because the Attorney General is conscientiously doing his job, as is his staff.'”

-- NBC Nightly News. Last, but definitely not least since, whether by coincidence or happenstance, at the very second Fred Francis was about to say “Clinton,” the screen went to black and the audio dropped out. This occurred during the show as broadcast at 7pm EDT on NBC-owned WRC-TV in Washington, DC, but was clearly a NBC network glitch, not something that just occurred on WRC. I assume they fixed it for the later MDT/PDT feed and I don't know whether it occurred during the 6:30pm EDT/5:30pm CDT showing on most EDT/CDT affiliates, but since WRC-TV's 7pm EDT showing is simply a delayed playing of the 6:30pm EDT feed, I'd assume it's what all EDT/CDT viewers saw.

Substitute and future permanent anchor Brian Williams introduced the lead story. He refrained from the kind of shots at the Bush administration stressed by ABC and CBS: “Good evening. After the attacks on September 11th, Americans were told this would be the war they wouldn’t always be able to see. The same is also true, however, about intelligence gathering. And until now, the Bush administration has received much of what it has requested. But a secret court inside the Justice Department has spoken, and the administration is not happy.”

     Reporter Fred Francis proceeded to explain how the court ruled that Ashcroft had gone too far, blurring the line between intelligence gathering and criminal prosecutions. After noting how Ashcroft says 9-11 changed how the department must function, Francis asserted:
     “Ashcroft and the administration has come under fire for what critics say is an abuse of civil liberties -- jailing people without charges, keeping secret their names.”
Paul Rosenzweig, Heritage Foundation: “In the end, it’ll be harder for us to bring terrorists to justice in our own court system.”
     Francis, standing in front of a building, probably the Justice Department, concluded: “This fight surfaced earlier this year when FBI field agents wanted a secret warrant to look into the computer of the so-called 20th hijacker, Zacharias Moussaoui. Headquarters refused because of heat it was getting from the court. The secret court says the FBI deceived it largely during the Cl-”

Just as Francis began to pronounce the word “Clinton” the sound cut out and the screen went to black, but with the graphics listing Fred Francis's name, his Washington DC location and the NBC logo, still showing at the bottom of the screen.

After three seconds of silence and nothing but the graphics over a black screen, NBC jumped back to Brian Williams in the studio. He stated: “Fred Francis with us from Washington tonight, thanks.”

Viewers of CNBC's The News with Brian Williams heard what Francis intended to say, though he used slightly different wording in the live wrap-up: “The secret court has said largely during the Clinton years, the FBI deceived it 75 times to get surveillance warrants. Now at this unprecedented public rebuke, the court is saying enough.”

+++ Watch NBC go black and silent just as Fred Francis was about to say “Clinton.” On Monday morning the MRC's Mez Djouadi will post a RealPLayer clip of the technical snafu. To view it, go to the posted version of this CyberAlert.

the screen went black and the audio cut off just as Francis began to pronounce the first syllable of the name Clinton

Well, yeah, they have a seven-second delay so they can hit the shutoff button if somebody says an obscenity.

Blitzer: Most of those mistakes were committed by the FBI during the Clinton administration. Still, this court's rebuff is another development that makes John Ashcroft a lightening rod for criticism over his department's role in the war on terror.”

Spin at it's finest! Why doesn't that make Janet Reno a "lightning rod for criticism"? This spin of Blitzder is intellectually dishonest.

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