FC: FBI illegally harassed California students, faculty

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

[I just got back to SF after spending the last five or so days in Big Sur. 
I'm slowly catching up on email. Photos to follow, of course. --Declan]

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http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/06/09/MNCFLEADIN.DTL 


   Secret FBI files reveal covert activities at UC
   Bureau's campus operations involved Reagan, CIA
   Seth Rosenfeld, Chronicle Staff Writer Sunday, June 9, 2002
     _________________________________________________________________

   Under the guise of protecting national security, the FBI conducted
   wide-ranging and unlawful intelligence operations concerning the
   University of California that at different points involved the head of
   the CIA and then-Gov. Ronald Reagan, The Chronicle has learned.

   According to thousands of pages of FBI records obtained by The
   Chronicle after a 17-year legal fight, the FBI unlawfully schemed with
   the head of the CIA to harass students, faculty and members of the
   Board of Regents, and mounted a concerted campaign to destroy the
   career of UC President Clark Kerr, which included sending the White
   House derogatory allegations about him that the bureau knew were
   false.

   The FBI, in contrast, developed a "close and cordial" relationship
   with Reagan, who made campus unrest a major issue and vowed to fire
   Kerr during his 1966 gubernatorial campaign.

   And after he was elected, the FBI failed to report that Reagan falsely
   stated on a federal security clearance form that he never had been a
   member of any group officially deemed subversive, an omission that
   could have been prosecuted as a felony.

   The FBI later secretly gave Gov. Reagan's administration information
   it could use "against" protesters.

   The disclosure of the FBI activities concerning the University of
   California during the 1950s and 1960s comes as the bureau has been
   granted wider authority and more resources to conduct domestic
   intelligence activities, and as President Bush seeks to create a new
   Department of Homeland Security.

   Experts said the FBI and CIA's past activities involving the
   University of California provide a cautionary tale about potential
   dangers to academic freedom and civil liberties.

   [...]




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