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Laurie Gindin Beacham, (212) 519-7811 or 549-2666; media@aclu.org
The
American Civil Liberties Union sent a letter to Attorney General Eric
Holder reiterating its call for the Department of Justice to appoint an
independent prosecutor to investigate the authorization to use torture
at CIA secret prisons. This follows recent revelations that the
International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) concluded in 2007 that
the treatment of detainees being held by American personnel constituted
torture, as well as cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. The ICRC
report is based on harrowing accounts from detainees about the
treatment to which they were subjected.
The ACLU's letter, signed by Executive Director Anthony D. Romero, states in part:
"The fact that such crimes have been committed can no longer be doubted
or debated, nor can the need for an independent prosecutor be ignored
by a new Justice Department committed to restoring the rule of law ...
Given the increasing evidence of deliberate and widespread use of
torture and abuse, and that such conduct was the predictable result of
policy changes made at the highest levels of government, an independent
prosecutor is clearly in the public interest. The country deserves to
have these outstanding matters addressed, and have the assurance that
torture will stop and never happen again. An independent prosecutor is
the only sure way to achieve these goals."
A full copy of the letter can be found below and online at: www.aclu.org/safefree/torture/39054res20090317
-------------------------------------------------
March 17, 2009
The Honorable Eric Holder
Department of Justice
Robert F. Kennedy Building
Tenth Street and Constitution Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20530
Dear Attorney General Holder:
The
American Civil Liberties Union respectfully but unequivocally calls
upon you to appoint an independent prosecutor, designated as a "special
counsel" under Department of Justice regulations, for the investigation
and prosecution of violations of federal criminal laws related to the
interrogation of detainees held by, or being questioned by, the United
States. The fact that such crimes have been committed can
no longer be doubted or debated, nor can the need for an independent
prosecutor be ignored by a new Justice Department committed to
restoring the rule of law. More than six years after the
first reported use of torture or abuse in interrogation and detention
and nearly five years after the exposure of torture at Abu Ghraib, it
is time for full and fair enforcement of federal criminal laws
prohibiting the use of torture and abuse. The ACLU made
similar requests for an independent prosecutor to your two immediate
predecessors beginning more than four years ago, but this is our first
official and public request for the appointment of an independent
prosecutor of your Justice Department, and we eagerly await your
official and public response in coming weeks.
The
disclosure on Sunday of substantial excerpts from the confidential
report of the International Committee of the Red Cross on its
interviews with detainees held at Guantanamo provides further and
incontrovertible documentation of the use of torture and abuse by the
United States against its detainees. In its report, the ICRC concluded:
The
allegations of ill-treatment of the detainees indicate that, in many
cases, the ill-treatment to which they were subjected while held in the
CIA program, either singly or in combination, constituted torture. In
addition, many other elements of the ill-treatment, either singly or in
combination, constituted cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.
Of
course, torture is a federal crime under the federal Anti-Torture Act
and War Crimes Act, and also violates general federal criminal statutes
barring assault and similar crimes.
The disclosure of portions of the ICRC report follows two other important recent developments. First, Susan Crawford, who is the convening authority for military commissions for the Department of Defense, stated to the Washington Post
on January 14, 2009, that "[w]e tortured [Mohammed al-] Qahtani," and
that "[h]is treatment met the legal definition of torture." With
that determination, the top Defense Department official overseeing
prosecutions at Guantanamo stated that she would not prosecute the
detainee. Second, during your own confirmation hearing,
you testified that waterboarding-which is one of the interrogation
tactics described as used on multiple detainees in the ICRC report and
was also acknowledged by the CIA as being used on multiple detainees-is
torture, and also made a clear statement that "no one is above the law." It
is impossible to see how there would not be credible evidence to
warrant opening a criminal investigation into torture crimes.
I would like to address several specific concerns:
Credible Evidence of Torture Crimes: The
excerpts from the ICRC report include reports of waterboarding,
beatings, deprivation of adequate food and water, induced hypothermia,
sensory deprivation, sleep deprivation, stress positions and prolonged
shackling, confinement in a mock coffin, prolonged nudity, and forced
shaving. Each of these practices would be criminal on its
own, but when combined as discussed in the report, the cumulative
effect is greater than the sum of the practices. The report of these incidents certainly warrants a criminal investigation.
Of course, the ICRC excerpts are only the latest additions to a long trail of evidence of possible torture crimes. The
Justice Department's own Inspector General, in a report last May on the
FBI's role in interrogations, reported that FBI agents present at the
CIA interrogation of Abu Zubaydah in spring 2002 (interrogations that
were also described by the ICRC in its report) characterized the CIA
interrogations as "borderline torture" and similar to Survival,
Evasion, Resistance, and Escape (SERE) tactics that formed the basis of
the government's torture program.
Similarly, government
documents obtained by the ACLU through our Freedom of Information Act
litigation and earlier reports of the ICRC documented torture or abuse
against U.S.-held detainees, including acts such as: soaking
a prisoner's hand in alcohol and setting it on fire, administering
electric shocks, subjecting prisoners to repeated sexual abuse and
assault, including sodomy with a bottle, raping a juvenile prisoner,
kicking and beating prisoners in the head and groin, putting lit
cigarettes inside a prisoner's ear, force-feeding a baseball to a
prisoner, chaining a prisoner hands-to-feet in a fetal position for 24
hours without food or water or access to a toilet, and breaking a
prisoner's shoulders.
But unpunished crimes go even further, to include possible homicides. An October 23, 2005 New York Times
article documents the role of CIA agents or CIA contractors in three
deaths of detainees being interrogated in Afghanistan and Iraq. Although U.S. soldiers were charged in two of those deaths, the civilians working alongside the soldiers have not been charged. There
are numerous other deaths that have not resulted in charges. In fact,
autopsy records obtained by the ACLU through FOIA requests document CIA
involvement in torture- or abuse-related deaths of detainees.
The
Justice Department, under your three immediate predecessors as
attorneys general, was unable or unwilling to prosecute any civilian,
other than a single contractor charged in June 2004, for any crime
related to interrogation. It is time for a thorough criminal investigation.
There Is Broad Authority to Investigate and Prosecute Torture Crimes, Including Any Crimes in Ordering or Authorizing Torture: Based
on prior government investigations, documents obtained by the ACLU
through our FOIA litigation, and numerous media reports, there is
credible evidence that acts authorized, ordered, and committed by
government officials constitute violations of federal criminal statutes. Although
the political debate about whether acts such as waterboarding are
torture has caused confusion in some press accounts, waterboarding and
other forms of torture and abuse clearly violate existing federal
criminal laws, including the War Crimes Act, 18 U.S.C. SS 2441, the
Anti-Torture Act, 18 U.S.C. SSSS 2340-2340A, and federal statutes that
criminalize conduct such as assaults by or against U.S. nationals in
overseas facilities used by the federal government. There
also are numerous federal criminal laws against obstructing or
interfering with government investigations or court proceedings.
Any Criminal Investigation of Torture Crimes Must Include a Top-to-Bottom Review: At
this point, there is too much evidence of high-level orders and
authorization for the use of torture and abuse to justify criminal
investigations focused solely on persons in the field. A full and fair criminal investigation must examine decisions made and carried out at the very highest levels of government.
From
the very start of the torture program, the Bush White House-including
the then-President and then-Vice President-had a central role in trying
to shield government officials from criminal prosecution. In fact, the
very decision by then-President Bush to order the government to deny
the protections of the Geneva Conventions to alleged Taliban and al
Qaeda detainees was made based on a memorandum that advised how to
avoid applicability of the War Crimes Act. In a January
25, 2002 draft memorandum for Bush, then-White House counsel Alberto
Gonzales advised against application of the Geneva Conventions to al
Qaeda and Taliban detainees. He stated that a "positive"
reason for denying Geneva Convention protections to these detainees was
that denial of the protections would "[s]ubstantially reduce[] the
threat of domestic criminal prosecution under the War Crimes Act." The
memorandum to Bush went on to highlight that some of the War Crimes Act
provisions apply "regardless of whether the individual being detained
qualifies as a POW."
The
last item on the January 25, 2002 memorandum's list of "positive"
reasons for finding the Geneva Conventions protections inapplicable
went even further in stating the intent to avoid War Crimes Act
prosecutions. Gonzales advised Bush that "it is difficult
to predict the motives of prosecutors and independent counsels who may
in the future decide to pursue unwarranted charges based on Section
2441 [the War Crimes Act]. Your determination [of
inapplicability of the Geneva Conventions] would create a reasonable
basis in law that Section 2441 does not apply, which would provide a
solid defense to any future prosecution." In other words,
Gonzales urged the then-President to find the Geneva Conventions
protections inapplicable to these detainees as a way to block criminal
prosecutions under the War Crimes Act. Bush subsequently ordered the Geneva Conventions inapplicable to the al Qaeda and Taliban detainees. In 2006, the Supreme Court held that Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions did protect these detainees.
After
attempting to render the War Crimes Act inapplicable to the detainees,
the Bush White House coordinated an attempt to make the federal
Anti-Torture Act similarly inapplicable. As White House
counsel, Gonzales asked the Office of Legal Counsel to issue at least
two memoranda that attempted to redefine and restrict the prohibitions
of the Anti-Torture Act, and then apply that narrow interpretation to a
specific list of interrogation tactics. The result was
the since-withdrawn August 1, 2002 OLC memorandum finding torture must
cause pain "equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious
physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function,
or even death," and a subsequent OLC memorandum that approved
waterboarding and other practices.
Top Bush White House officials participated in the preparation of these memoranda. For example, a January 5, 2005 Washington Post
article stated that one of the authors of the August 1, 2002
memorandum, then-Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Yoo, briefed
then-White House counsel Gonzales several times on the August 1, 2002
memorandum during its drafting. The Post also
reported that Yoo also briefed then-Attorney General John Ashcroft,
then-Vice President Cheney's counsel David Addington, the then-general
counsel for the Defense Department William Haynes, acting general
counsel for the CIA John Rizzo, and Condoleeza Rice's then-advisor John
Bellinger. In addition, the Post described a
meeting that included detailed discussions of "methods that the CIA
wanted to use, such as open-handed slapping, the threat of live burial
and 'waterboarding' - a practice that involves strapping a detainee to
a board, raising the feet above the head, and dripping water onto the
head . . . [which] produce[s] an unbearable sensation of drowning."
Bush and Cheney repeatedly defended the CIA interrogation program. For
example, Bush publicly defended the interrogation practices of the CIA;
Cheney, during congressional consideration of both the McCain Amendment
to the Detainee Treatment Act and the Military Commissions Act,
personally lobbied for stronger criminal defenses for CIA personnel or
exclusion of the CIA from the application of provisions against abusive
interrogations, and the Administration ordered more recent OLC
memoranda trying to limit the protections of the Military Commissions
Act and the McCain Amendment.
Although
there are no public records showing what the then-President and
then-Vice President knew or ordered in interrogations, both of them
have acknowledged involvement in setting interrogation policy. In
fact, on April 11, 2008, Bush discussed with ABC News its report of
high-level White House meetings that considered and approved abusive
interrogation tactics for specific detainees, and Bush stated, "And
yes, I'm aware our national security team met on this issue. And I
approved." In addition, in a document obtained through the ACLU FOIA litigation, former Major General Michael Dunlavey, who
asked the Pentagon to approve more aggressive interrogation methods for
use at Guantanamo, claimed to have received "marching orders" from Bush. On May 12, 2004, the Baltimore Sun quoted
then-Secretary of State Colin Powell, who reportedly had fought
internally for the government to comply with the Geneva Conventions,
describing his informing Bush directly on reports of abuse, long before
at least some of those reports became public. Whether anyone in the Bush White House violated any criminal laws would be a question for an independent prosecutor.
There is Only a Little More than a Year Left in the Statute of Limitations Period for Certain Alleged Crimes of Torture: The federal statutes of limitation are a potential problem in investigating and prosecuting certain torture crimes. Although
the general federal statute of limitation for most federal crimes is
five years, there is no limitations period when death resulted from the
crime, and there is an eight-year period for violations of the federal
Anti-Torture Act. The ICRC report and the Justice
Department Inspector General report on the FBI's role in interrogations
both provide substantial details on the torture and abuse of Abu
Zubaydah in the spring and summer of 2002, prior to the issuance of the
August 1, 2002 OLC opinions. The eight-year statute of
limitation period for Anti-Torture Act charges related to crimes
allegedly committed in spring 2002 will expire in spring 2010. As
a result, a prosecutor has only a little more than a year from today to
bring charges for some important and well-documented alleged torture or
abuse incidents.
Even with a Change in Administration, an Outside Special Counsel to Direct an Investigation is Warranted: The rule on appointment of an independent prosecutor is clear. Justice
Department regulations require the Attorney General to appoint an
outside special counsel when a three-prong test is met. First, a "criminal investigation of a person or matter [must be] warranted." 28 C.F.R. SS 600.1. Second,
the "investigation or prosecution of that person or matter by a United
States Attorneys' Office or litigating Division of the Department of
Justice would present a conflict of interest for the Department." Third,
"under the circumstances it would be in the public interest to appoint
an outside Special Counsel to assume responsibility for the matter." If
the regulation's three-prong test is met, then the Attorney General
must select a special counsel from outside the government, SS
600.3, who would have the authority to secure necessary resources for
the investigation and prosecution and have full investigatory and
prosecutorial powers, SSSS 600.3-600.6.
Although
the "conflict" that would trigger appointment of an outside special
counsel is not as clear after the change in Administration, a conflict
remains for three reasons. First, although political
appointees at the Justice Department had the most visible roles in the
development and implementation of the torture and detention policies,
career Justice Department attorneys and FBI personnel also had roles,
including numerous career personnel in the FBI, the Criminal Division,
U.S. Attorney's offices, and other career personnel specifically
identified in reports, such as the Justice Department Inspector
General's May 2008 report on the FBI's role in interrogations. Second,
the Justice Department has a role now-and may eventually have an even
greater role-in the prosecution of detainees, some of whom have claimed
that they were subject to torture or abuse. There certainly could be
conflicts in having the Justice Department prosecute terrorism suspects
who claim that evidence was obtained through torture or abuse, while
also being charged with prosecuting persons who ordered or carried out
that torture or abuse. The interest in obtaining convictions of
detainees alleging that they were tortured, including an interest in
preserving the admissibility of evidence, could compromise the ability
to prosecute persons involved in the alleged torture. Third,
the Justice Department has a significant institutional interest in
maintaining strong deference to OLC opinions generally, which could
affect how it weighs a potential defendant's reliance on OLC opinions
in making prosecutorial decisions. All of these conflicts
or potential conflicts weigh in favor of appointing an outside special
counsel to lead a criminal investigation and any resulting prosecutions.
There is a Clear Public Interest in the Appointment of an Independent Prosecutor for any Torture or Abuse Crimes: There
is an obvious public interest in investigating and prosecuting all
persons committing torture or abuse or conspiring to commit those
crimes against detainees being held or questioned by the United States. Responsibility for the wrongdoing extends higher up the military chain of command and to civilians. A
small number of enlisted men and women and a few military officers
should not be the only persons prosecuted for crimes, if civilians also
engaged in criminal wrongdoing.
Given
the increasing evidence of deliberate and widespread use of torture and
abuse, and that such conduct was the predictable result of policy
changes made at the highest levels of government, appointment of an
independent prosecutor is clearly in the public interest. The
country deserves to have these outstanding matters addressed, and have
the assurance that torture will stop and never happen again. Appointment of an independent prosecutor is the only sure way to achieve these goals.
OLC Opinions Could Be Part of a Defense to Certain Criminal Charges, But Do Not Provide Immunity: There
has been a tremendous misunderstanding in the press, in Congress, and
among some members of the Executive Branch on whether the OLC opinions
provide immunity against prosecutions for torture or abuse. They do not. At
most, the statutory defense included in the Detainee Treatment Act and
Military Commissions Act could result in the OLC opinions being part of
a defense to certain criminal charges. But the OLC
opinions are not a so-called "golden shield," do not provide immunity,
will likely not be an effective defense for many potential defendants,
and should not bar any criminal investigation.
The statute on reliance on the advice of counsel is clear and limited. The
relevant provision of the federal code on reliance on legal counsel by
government employees committing crimes related to the interrogation or
detention of aliens suspected of terrorism states that "good faith
reliance on advice of counsel should be an important factor, among
others, to consider in assessing whether a person of ordinary sense and
understanding would have known the practices to be unlawful."
Under this statute, evidence related to OLC and other legal opinions
would go to the reasonableness of whether a defendant thought his or
her actions were unlawful, but the existence of, or even the reliance
upon, legal opinions would not be an absolute defense or necessarily
dispositive.
The
application of the "advice of counsel" statutory defense depends on the
facts of any possible charge against a particular defendant. While
the OLC opinions and the statutory defense may be an effective defense
for some potential defendants, the OLC opinions and the statutory
defense will be less effective, or completely ineffective, for other
potential defendants. In particular, persons who might not be covered by the "advice of counsel" defense include: persons
who engaged in torture or abuse prior to the issuance of the OLC
opinions; persons who did not rely on the OLC opinions; persons who
knew the OLC opinions did not accurately reflect the law; persons who
are lawyers or were trained as interrogators on applicable law; persons
who acted outside the scope of the OLC opinions; or any persons who
ordered the OLC opinions drafted specifically for the purpose of
providing a defense. The determination of the likely
effect of the statutory defense would depend on the facts of a
particular instance of alleged torture and abuse. There is no immunity, and certainly nothing that should cut off a criminal investigation before it even starts.
Ongoing
Investigations on the Commission of Torture and Abuse are Simply Anemic
and Do Not Address the Full Extent of the Torture and Abuse That Were
Committed by Government Officials: Two
ongoing government investigations -one conducted by the Department's
Office of Professional Responsibility on whether OLC lawyers were in
breach of their ethical responsibilities as lawyers in authoring the
OLC memos, and another inquiry, led by Justice Department attorney John
Durham, investigating whether the destruction of the CIA tapes
constituted a violation of law - do not address the heart of the matter
as to the commission and explicit policy decision to torture and abuse
individuals in U.S. custody in clear violation of our domestic and
international legal obligations. It is simply preposterous that the
CIA tape destruction investigation is solely looking at whether the
destruction of the tapes was a crime - rather than whether the subject
matter captured on those tapes was proof of crimes committed, which
then led to the tapes' destruction and cover up. Former Attorney
General Michael Mukasey told the House Judiciary Committee last year
that he specifically limited the investigation to any crimes related to
the destruction of the tapes, but barred any investigation of crimes
related to their content.
It
is as if the police investigating the mafia for murder were determining
whether digging a ditch on public land was a crime, while overlooking
the corpse that had been deposited in that ditch.
To
date, over 600 individuals have been accused with having abused
prisoners, yet only about 10 of them have received prison terms of more
than one year. Even more troubling, the highest-ranking
officer prosecuted for the abuse of prisoners was a Lieutenant Colonel,
Steven Jordan, was court-martialed in 2006 for his role in the Abu
Ghraib scandal, but acquitted in 2007. Only one government contractor has been charged for any crime related to interrogation, and that indictment was in June 2004.
Most
on point to Sunday's revelations of torture and abuse as documented in
the ICRC report, no government official has been charged in relation to
the CIA's torture program. The vast majority of the
prosecutions that have occurred were in response to the atrocities at
Abu Ghraib, but with respect to the torture of prisoners in CIA custody
- torture that was plainly the result of decisions made by the Bush
administration's most senior officials - no one at all has been held to
account. Ongoing
investigations and previous inquiries conducted by the government have
obfuscated the real search for truth, and despite government officials'
best efforts, this issue has not gone away. Nor will it ever, General
Holder, until a full criminal investigation is conducted.
Finally,
General Holder, let me respectfully submit for your considered
reflection that the decision of whether or not to investigate crimes
and violations of the law - with increasingly incontrovertible evidence
- is not a discretionary matter to be determined by political agendas
or the White House's desire to avoid seemingly partisan squabbles. As
the country's top-ranking law enforcement official, you took an oath of
office to uphold the Constitution and defend the rule of law. You alone are charged with making the determination of whether and how to investigate crimes that have occurred. As
you know better than I, our finest Attorneys General made independent
decisions that were not approved or even appreciated by the White House.
We
have every confidence that you will make the right decision in
appointing an independent prosecutor to investigate crimes that
increasingly no one in America - or the world for that matter -
believes did not occur. And we look forward to providing
any information or assistance to an independent prosecutor that may
prove fruitful in restoring the rule of law and rendering justice for
crimes that have occurred.
Thank
you for your attention to this matter, and please do not hesitate to
call me if you have any questions regarding this matter.
Sincerely,
Anthony D. Romero
Cc: Aaron Lewis
The American Civil Liberties Union was founded in 1920 and is our nation's guardian of liberty. The ACLU works in the courts, legislatures and communities to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to all people in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States.
(212) 549-2666"There must be accountability for political retaliation and abuse of power," said Khalil. "And I won't stop here."
Pro-Palestinian student protest leader Mahmoud Khalil on Thursday began the process of suing U.S. President Donald Trump's administration for $20 million in damages for the harm he suffered as a result of the government's "politically motivated plan to unlawfully arrest, detain, and deport" him.
"This is the first step towards accountability," Khalil said in a statement. "Nothing can restore the 104 days stolen from me. The trauma, the separation from my wife, the birth of my first child that I was forced to miss. But let's be clear, the same government that targeted me for speaking out is using taxpayer dollars to fund Israel's ongoing genocide in Gaza."
"There must be accountability for political retaliation and abuse of power," he asserted. "And I won't stop here. I will continue to pursue justice against everyone who contributed to my unlawful detention or spread lies in an attempt to destroy my reputation, including those affiliated with Columbia University. I'm holding the U.S. government accountable not just for myself, but for everyone they try to silence through fear, exile, or detention."
In March, federal agents who were in plain clothes and lacked a warrant accosted Khalil, a lawful permanent resident who recently finished a graduate program at Columbia, and his wife—Noor Abdalla, a U.S. citizen who was then pregnant with their son—outside their New York City home. Following Khalil's arrest, several other student activists critical of the U.S.-backed Israeli assault on Gaza were also targeted for deportation.
The claim that 30-year-old Khalil filed Thursday against the U.S. Homeland Security and State departments, as well as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), is a precursor to a lawsuit that will cite the Federal Tort Claims Act of 1946, according to the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), part of his legal team.
The filing accuses the Trump administration of carrying out a plan to deport Khalil "in a manner calculated to terrorize him and his family," and says the mistreatment caused "severe emotional distress, economic hardship, damage to his reputation, and significant impairment of his First Amendment and Fifth Amendment rights."
Mahmoud Khalil has filed a claim against the Trump administration, seeking either $20 million or an official apology and change in the administration’s policy after he was held in detention for over 100 days. NBC News’ Maya Eaglin spoke to Khalil in New York City.
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— NBC News (@nbcnews.com) July 10, 2025 at 5:01 PM
Khalil, an Algerian citizen of Palestinian descent who was finally freed from an ICE facility in Louisiana last month, is seeking $20 million to help others similarly targeted by the government and Columbia, but "he would accept, in lieu of payment, an official apology and abandonment of the administration's unconstitutional policy," CCR explained.
The Associated Press reported that "a White House spokesperson deferred comment to the State Department, which said its actions were fully supported by the law. In an emailed statement, Tricia McLaughlin, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security, called Khalil's claim 'absurd,' accusing him of 'hateful behavior and rhetoric' that threatened Jewish students."
While the departments' comments signal that the Trump administration won't be making any apologies, Khalil's team is determined to move forward with his case.
"The Trump administration's unconstitutional targeting of Mr. Khalil led to severe harms that he continues to navigate, including financial loss, reputational damage, and emotional distress," said Samah Sisay, staff attorney at CCR. "Mr. Khalil will never get back the three months stolen from him while in immigration detention, including his child's birth and first months of life. The government must take accountability for their unlawful actions and compensate Mr. Khalil for his suffering."
Khalil's claim was filed a day after an ICE official testified under oath that a task force formed in March used lists from Canary Mission, an operation linked to Israeli intelligence agencies, and the pro-Israel group Betar Worldwide to compile reports on international students targeted for their protest activities.
"The stated position here is that socialists cannot be part of the Democratic Party," said one commentator. "Does this hold for the socialist voters too?"
In an interview with CNN, former Congressman Dean Phillips was asked whether "there is room" for him and New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani in the Democratic Party—but progressive Rep. Summer Lee was among those saying on Thursday that Phillips' rejection of Mamdani wwas really about millions of Americans who have voted for candidates like him.
"These guys aren't just rejecting him, but the millions moved to electoral action by candidates like him," said Lee (D-Pa.) in response to Phillips' interview.
CNN's Omar Jimenez asked Phillips about the "big tent" philosophy often promoted by Democratic leaders who believe the party should welcome lawmakers and candidates who don't agree with every aspect of its platform—politicians like anti-choice Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas) and former Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), who made millions of dollars from his coal business.
Jimenez asked whether Mamdani, a democratic socialist who stunned former Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the party's leadership in the Democratic mayoral primary last month, should also be welcomed into the party's "big tent."
"The answer ultimately is no," said Phillips, who was one of the wealthiest members of Congress before he left office to run for president in a long-shot bid against former President Joe Biden in the 2024 race—losing his home state of Minnesota and garnering just 1.7% of the vote in South Carolina, falling behind author Marianne Williamson.
Phillips admitted that "most Americans share the same values" as Mamdani, who has advocated for fare-free public transit, universal free childcare, and city-run grocery stores to operate alongside private stores and provide low-cost essentials to working families.
But he claimed that while "differences of opinion, perspective, life story, politics, and experience" are beneficial to the Democratic Party, the presence of so-called "socialists" like Mamdani is not.
"The overwhelming majority of Americans want neither far-left or far-right politics," he said without citing any supporting evidence.
Phillips appeared confident that Democratic voters across the country would recoil from candidates like Mamdani—despite recent rallies in red districts where progressive Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), who both endorsed Mamdani, have drawn crowds of thousands of people in recent months during Sanders' Fighting Oligarchy Tour.
In addition to Mamdani's historic success in the Democratic primary—with more New Yorkers voting for him than in any other primary election in the history of the nation's largest city—numerous polls have shown that Americans back policies like those that powered his campaign.
A poll by Child Care for Every Family in 2023 found that 92% of parents with children under age 5 supported guaranteed, government-funded childcare, including 79% of Republican parents and 83% of independent parents.
Raising taxes for corporations and wealthy households is also broadly popular, with about 6 in 10 Americans supporting the proposal in a recent Pew Research poll.
And despite efforts by centrist Democrats and Republicans to portray Mamdani's platform as radical, programs like his fare-free bus proposal have already been implemented in cities like Kansas City, Raleigh, and Boston on three of the city's busiest bus routes.
"Maybe our big tent should have less millionaire nepo heirs and more fighters for the millions of working-class people," suggested Lee on Thursday.
Matt Bruenig of the People's Policy Project also condemned Phillips for suggesting Mamdani—and ostensibly the 565,639 New Yorkers who voted for him—have no place in the party.
"The stated position here is that socialists cannot be part of the Democratic Party," said Bruenig. "Does this hold for the socialist voters too? Should they also not vote for the party? Phillips is trying to radically shrink the party. Scary stuff."
"Centrists and other moderates are spending a nontrivial amount of national political energy being mad at Zohran," he added, "which could instead be spent on [President Donald] Trump and Republicans."
As Common Dreams reported Wednesday, the progressive advocacy group Our Revolution is circulating a petition that's garnered more than 30,000 signatures from people urging Democratic leaders like House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand—all New York Democrats who have yet to endorse their own party's mayoral candidate—not to "sabotage" Mamdani.
Despite Phillips' insistence that Mamdani doesn't belong in the party, the resistance in New York appeared to weaken a bit Thursday as Rep. Adriano Espaillat (D-N.Y.) endorsed the candidate.
"New Yorkers have spoken loud and clear," said Espaillat, who had previously backed Cuomo. "And as a lifelong Democrat, I'm endorsing the Democratic Party nominee."
Republicans plan to utilize a rare process called "rescission" to skirt Congress' power of the purse and illegally allow Trump to withhold hundreds of billions of dollars in federal funding to critical programs.
The U.S. Senate will soon vote on whether President Donald Trump can claw back billions of dollars that have already been appropriated by Congress.
Last month, the House narrowly voted to allow Trump to rescind $9.4 billion in funds that were meant to fund global health initiatives—including AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis prevention—and public broadcasters like PBS and NPR.
It's far from the first time that this Republican-controlled Congress has voted on massive budget cuts, but progressive groups and some Democratic lawmakers say this vote has another frightening dimension to it.
These funds were among the more than $420 billion appropriated by Congress that Trump illegally impounded, or refused to spend, at the start of his term.
In a letter sent Wednesday to members of Congress, a coalition of more than 100 groups—including Public Citizen, the AFL-CIO, and Greenpeace—warned that by voting to approve these rescissions of federal funds, they would be giving Trump tacit approval to unconstitutionally take away Congress' authority to spend money.
"This rescissions proposal does not ask Congress, as required by the Impoundment Control Act, to approve the entirety of the federal spending that has been illegally frozen by the Trump administration," the letter notes. "The administration is merely trying to establish a veil of legitimacy while it continues unconstitutional actions that it began more than 100 days ago."
The groups went on to warn that allowing the president to unilaterally cut funding that he doesn't approve of "risks irreparable damage to the regular bipartisan appropriations process."
"Despite the political back-and-forth, Congress eventually reaches a bipartisan agreement on government funding every year, one way or another," they said. "The basis for that bipartisan agreement is that both parties must agree to compromises to achieve any of their goals. If a party with a political trifecta can simply rescind funding for the parts of appropriations bills they compromised on, they undermine congressional checks and balances and the basis for future bipartisan dealmaking on an already politically fraught process."
Under the Impoundment Control Act of 1974, presidents are forbidden from unilaterally refusing to spend funds. However, Congress is allowed to pass a "rescission" bill within 45 days of canceling them if the president requests it.
Trump would be the first president since Bill Clinton in 1999 to successfully have funds rescinded by Congress, and it would be the largest rescission in four decades.
But as the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities points out, there is a key difference: "The administration illegally impounded the funds at issue for months before proposing the [rescission] package" and that it is "unlawfully withholding much larger amounts of funding that it has not proposed for rescission."
According to a tracker created by the office of Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), who sit on the House and Senate appropriations committees, respectively, the Trump administration is blocking congressionally appropriated funds for programs including:
Russell Vought, the head of the White House's Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has openly indicated a desire to use rescission to cut all of this spending "without having to get an affirmative vote" from Congress.
According to The New York Times, Vought is planning to use an even more arcane and illegal maneuver known as "pocket rescission" to avoid spending the funds. As Tony Romm reported in June:
Under the emerging plan, the Trump administration would wait until closer to Sept. 30, the end of the fiscal year, to formally ask lawmakers to claw back a set of funds it has targeted for cuts. Even if Congress fails to vote on the request, the president’s timing would trigger a law that freezes the money until it ultimately expires.
Some Senate Democrats have indicated they'd be willing to risk a government shutdown to prevent the rescission bill from passing.
In a letter published Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) wrote that the prospect of the rescissions bill passing had "grave implications."
"[I]t is absurd for [Republicans] to expect Democrats to act as business as usual and engage in a bipartisan appropriations process to fund the government, while they concurrently plot to pass a purely partisan rescissions bill to defund those same programs negotiated on a bipartisan basis behind the scenes," Schumer wrote.
Murray called out Vought directly on Wednesday at a markup session on the next round of bills in the Senate Appropriations Committee.
"For us to be able to work in a bipartisan way effectively, that requires us to work with each other. To not just write bipartisan funding bills—but to defend them from partisan cuts sought by the president and the OMB director," she said during her opening remarks. "We cannot allow bipartisan funding bills with partisan rescission packages. It will not work."