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For Immediate Release
April, 13 2021, 12:00am EDT
Contact:
Email:,pressdesk.int@greenpeace.org
The Japanese Government's Decision to Discharge Fukushima Contaminated Water Ignores Human Rights and International Maritime Law
Greenpeace Japan strongly condemns the decision of the of Prime Minister Suga's cabinet to dispose of over 1.23 million tons of radioactive waste water stored in tanks at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant into the Pacific Ocean.[1] This completely disregards the human rights and interests of the people in Fukushima, wider Japan and the Asia-Pacific region.
The decision means that Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) can begin radioactive waste discharges from its nuclear plant into the Pacific Ocean. It has been said it would take 2 years to prepare for the discharge.
TOKYO, Japan
Greenpeace Japan strongly condemns the decision of the of Prime Minister Suga's cabinet to dispose of over 1.23 million tons of radioactive waste water stored in tanks at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant into the Pacific Ocean.[1] This completely disregards the human rights and interests of the people in Fukushima, wider Japan and the Asia-Pacific region.
The decision means that Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) can begin radioactive waste discharges from its nuclear plant into the Pacific Ocean. It has been said it would take 2 years to prepare for the discharge.
Kazue Suzuki, Climate/Energy Campaigner at Greenpeace Japan, said:
"The Japanese government has once again failed the people of Fukushima. The government has taken the wholly unjustified decision to deliberately contaminate the Pacific Ocean with radioactive wastes. It has discounted the radiation risks and turned its back on the clear evidence that sufficient storage capacity is available on the nuclear site as well as in surrounding districts.[2] Rather than using the best available technology to minimize radiation hazards by storing and processing the water over the long term, they have opted for the cheapest option [3], dumping the water into the Pacific Ocean.
The Cabinet's decision failed to protect the environment and neglected the large-scale opposition and concerns of the local Fukushima residents, as well as the neighboring citizens around Japan. Greenpeace stands with the people of Fukushima, including fishing communities, in their efforts to stop these plans," said Suzuki.
Greenpeace Japan's polling has shown that the majority of residents in Fukushima and the wider Japan are opposed to discharging this radioactive waste water into the Pacific. Additionally, the nationwide federation of Japan Fisheries Cooperatives has continued to express its complete opposition to ocean discharges.
United Nations' human rights special rapporteurs warned the Japanese government in June 2020 and again in March 2021 that discharging the water into the environment breaches the rights of Japanese citizens and its neighbors including Korea. They called on the Japanese government to delay any decision on discharging the contaminated water into the sea until the crisis of COVID-19 is over and appropriate international consultations are held[4].
Though the decision has been announced, it will take around two years before these discharges commence at the Fukushima Daiichi plant.
Jennifer Morgan, Executive Director at Greenpeace International, said:
"In the 21st century, when the planet and in particular the world's oceans are facing so many challenges and threats, it is an outrage that the Japanese government and TEPCO think they can justify the deliberate dumping of nuclear waste into the Pacific Ocean. The decision is a violation of Japan's legal obligations under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea[5], (UNCLOS), and will be strongly resisted over the coming months."
Since 2012, Greenpeace has proactively campaigned against plans to discharge Fukushima contaminated water - submitting technical analysis to UN agencies, holding seminars with local residents of Fukushima with other NGOs, and petitioning against the discharges and submitted to relevant Japanese government bodies.
Furthermore, a recent Greenpeace Japan report detailed alternatives to the current flawed decommissioning plans for Fukushima Daiichi, including options to stop the continued increase of contaminated water.[6] Greenpeace will continue to lead the campaign to stop radioactive waste water from being discharged into the Pacific.
Greenpeace is a global, independent campaigning organization that uses peaceful protest and creative communication to expose global environmental problems and promote solutions that are essential to a green and peaceful future.
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'The Fourth Amendment Literally Exists to Prevent This': Memo Claims ICE Can Forcibly Enter Homes Without Judicial Warrants
"Every American should be terrified by this secret ICE policy authorizing its agents to kick down your door and storm into your home," said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, demanding congressional hearings.
Jan 21, 2026
"The United States government is looking for ways around that pesky Fourth Amendment," an investigative journalist said of Wednesday reporting by the Associated Press on an internal US Immigration and Customs Enforcement memo claiming that ICE agents can forcibly enter a private residence without a judicial warrant, consent, or an emergency.
The Fourth Amendment to the US Constitution states, "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."
ICE's May 12 memo, part of a whistleblower disclosure obtained by the AP, says that "although the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has not historically relied on administrative warrants alone to arrest aliens subject to final orders of removal in their place of residence, the DHS Office of the General Counsel has recently determined that the US Constitution, the Immigration and Nationality Act, and the immigration regulations do not prohibit relying on administrative warrants for this purpose."
The January 7 disclosure was sent to the US Senate by the group Whistleblower Aid, which is "keeping the whistleblowers' identities anonymous even from oversight investigators," according to the document. It notes that despite being addressed to "All ICE Personnel," the seemingly unconstitutional memo "has not been formally distributed to all personnel."
Instead, it "has been provided to select DHS officials who are then directed to verbally brief the new policy for action. Those supervisors then show the memo to some employees, like our clients, and direct them to read the memo and return it to the supervisor," the disclosure details. "Newly hired ICE agents—many of whom do not have a law enforcement background—are now being directed to rely solely on" an administrative warrant drafted and signed by an ICE official to enter homes and make arrests.
Yeah, why could anyone think that ICE fits the description of the Gestapo?apnews.com/article/ice-...
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— Dan Sohege (@danielsohege.bsky.social) January 21, 2026 at 4:48 PM
Asked about the May 12 memo, signed by acting ICE Director Todd Lyons, Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin told the AP that everyone DHS serves with an administrative warrant has already had "full due process and a final order of removal," and the US Supreme Court and Congress have "recognized the propriety of administrative warrants in cases of immigration enforcement."
However, as Whistleblower Aid senior vice president and special counsel David Kligerman stressed in a Wednesday statement, "no court has ever found that ICE agents have such legal authority to enter homes without a judicial warrant."
"This administration's secretive policy advocates conduct that the Supreme Court has described as 'the chief evil against which the wording of the Fourth Amendment is directed'—that is the warrantless physical entry of a home," he noted. "This is precisely what the Fourth Amendment was created to prevent."
"If ICE believes that this policy is consistent with the law, why not publicize it?" he asked. "Perhaps they've hidden it precisely because it cannot withstand legal scrutiny. Policies which impact fundamental constitutional rights, particularly one which the Supreme Court has called the greatest of equals among the Bill of Rights, should be discussed openly with the American people. It cannot be undone by hidden policy memos."
They just make up bullshit, bad-faith legal theories, do what they want until a court stops them, then lather, rinse, and repeat. In the meantime, they get to terrorize people. And nothing will happen to any of those responsible.Our courts are not equipped to deal with this.
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— Radley Balko (@radleybalko.bsky.social) January 21, 2026 at 5:14 PM
Other lawyers, journalists, and critics responded similarly to the AP's reporting on social media. Alejandra Caraballo of the Harvard Law Cyberlaw Clinic declared that "the Fourth Amendment literally exists to prevent this."
Bradley P. Moss, an attorney specializing in litigation related to national security, federal employment, and security clearance law, said, "Remember when the Fourth Amendment was still a thing?"
American Immigration Council senior fellow Aaron Reichlin-Melnick wrote: "It has been accepted for generations that the only thing which can authorize agents to break into your home is a warrant signed by a judge. No wonder ICE hid this memo!"
"This is the Trump administration trashing the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution in pursuit of its mass deportation agenda," he continued, highlighting a footnote that suggests "they won't even rule out authorizing home invasions with no judicial warrant for people not even ordered removed!"
"In short, this secret memo explains SO MUCH of what we've been seeing over the last months, including this raid of a home in Minneapolis where ICE officers presented no judicial warrant before breaking in the door," he said. "Turns out they were secretly told they don't need one!"
While Reichlin-Melnick shared photos of a scene in which armed immigration agents used a battering ram to enter a Minneapolis home and arrest a Liberian man, federal agents also recently broke down the door of a residence in neighboring Saint Paul, Minnesota, and arrested ChongLy "Scott" Thao, a US citizen who was later freed.
The AP reporting and responses to the leaked memo came as the Trump administration on Wednesday surged immigration agents to Maine for what it dubbed "Operation Catch of the Day," mirroring the federal deployment to not only Minnesota—where ICE officer Jonathan Ross fatally shot Renee Good, a US citizen, in her vehicle earlier this month—but also Illinois and California.
US Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), ranking member of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, opened an inquiry into reports of unconstitutional detentions of US citizens by immigration agents in October and on Wednesday demanded answers about the new whistleblower disclosure.
Blumenthal sent lists of questions and requests for records to Lyons and US Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem as well as Benjamin C. Huffman, director of the Federal Law Enforcement Training Centers. The senator also wrote to Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Chair Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), urging them to call the ICE and DHS leaders to testify before their panels.
"Every American should be terrified by this secret ICE policy authorizing its agents to kick down your door and storm into your home," Blumenthal said in a statement. "It is a legally and morally abhorrent policy that exemplifies the kinds of dangerous, disgraceful abuses America is seeing in real time."
"In our democracy, with vanishingly rare exceptions, the government is barred from breaking into your home without a judge giving a green light," he continued. "Government agents have no right to ransack your bedroom or terrorize your kids on a whim or personal desire. I am deeply grateful to brave whistleblowers who have come forward and put the rights of their fellow Americans first."
"My Republican colleagues who claim to value personal rights against government overreach now have an opportunity and obligation to prove that rhetoric is real," the senator added. "They must hold hearings and join me in demanding the Trump administration answer for this lawless policy."
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Judge Blocks Trump Admin From Searching Data Seized During Raid on Reporter's Home
“The search and seizure of Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson’s records is unconstitutional and illegal in its entirety," said one free press defender.
Jan 21, 2026
A US judge on Wednesday blocked federal prosecutors from searching data on a Washington Post reporter's electronic devices seized during what one press freedom group called an "unconstitutional and illegal" raid last week.
US Magistrate Judge William B. Porter in Alexandria, Virginia—who also authorized the January 14 raid of Post reporter Hannah Natanson's home—ruled that "the government must preserve but must not review any of the materials that law enforcement seized pursuant to search warrants the court issued."
The government has until January 28 to respond to the Post's initial legal filings against the agent's actions. Oral arguments in the case are scheduled for February 6.
Natanson—who describes her work as covering "Trump's reshaping of the government"—welcomed Wednesday's order.
"I need my devices back to do my job," she said on Bluesky.
Federal Bureau of Investigation investigators executed a warrant to search Natanson's Virginia home as part of a probe into Aurelio Perez-Lugones, a federal contractor who is accused of illegally possessing classified documents. FBI agents seized Natanson’s cellphone, her smart watch, and her personal and work laptops.
As Politico senior legal affairs reporter Kyle Cheney noted, the criminal complaint for Perez-Lugones’ case contains no allegations that he gave classified documents to any Post reporter, as implied by Attorney General Pam Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel.
The Post said that the seized devices “contain years of information about past and current confidential sources and other unpublished newsgathering materials, including those she was using for current reporting."
“The government cannot meet its heavy burden to justify this intrusion, and it has ignored narrower, lawful alternatives,” the newspaper added.
As the Post noted Wednesday:
It is exceptionally rare for law enforcement officials to conduct searches at reporters’ homes. The law allows such searches, but federal regulations intended to protect a free press are designed to make it more difficult to use aggressive law enforcement tactics against reporters to obtain the identities of their sources...
The US has no law that explicitly makes it a crime for a journalist to obtain or publish classified information. In 2019, when WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was indicted under the Espionage Act for disclosing classified information, First Amendment scholars warned that his case could set a precedent that could be used against journalists. That issue was never tested in court because Assange and the government reached a plea deal in 2024.
"The outrageous seizure of our reporter’s confidential newsgathering materials chills speech, cripples reporting, and inflicts irreparable harm every day the government keeps its hands on these materials,” the Post said in a statement. “We have asked the court to order the immediate return of all seized materials and prevent their use. Anything less would license future newsroom raids and normalize censorship by search warrant.”
Free press defenders cheered Porter's order.
“The search and seizure of Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson’s records is unconstitutional and illegal in its entirety," Freedom of the Press Foundation chief of advocacy Seth Stern said in a statement. "But even the Trump administration’s policies require searches of journalists’ materials to be narrow and targeted and that authorities use filter teams and other measures to avoid searching protected records."
"That the administration wouldn’t follow its own guidelines shows that the raid on Natanson’s home wasn’t about any criminal investigation, and certainly wasn’t about national security," he added.
The search and seizure of @washingtonpost.com reporter @hannahnatanson.bsky.social's records is unconstitutional and illegal in its entirety.The judge was right to block it until a full hearing, at which time he should block it permanently.Read our statement: freedom.press/issues/judge...
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— Freedom of the Press Foundation (@freedom.press) January 21, 2026 at 2:30 PM
“This is the first time in US history that the government has searched a reporter’s home in a national security media leak investigation, seizing potentially a vast amount of confidential data and information," Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press president Bruce Brown said in a statement. "The move imperils public interest reporting and will have ramifications far beyond this specific case."
Wednesday's order came two weeks after the Republican-controlled House Oversight Committee voted to subpoena Seth Harp, a journalist wrongly accused of “leaking classified intel” and “doxing” a US special forces commander involved in President Donald Trump’s invasion of Venezuela and abduction of the South American nation’s president and his wife.
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16 Years After Citizens United, Critics Say Trump Exemplifies Dangers of Corporate Political Spending
Campaigners at Public Citizen say the unchecked flood of corporate money unleashed by the Supreme Court's 2010 decision "paves the way for demagogues like Donald Trump to seize power."
Jan 21, 2026
The consumer watchdog group Public Citizen on Wednesday highlighted how President Donald Trump not only has taken advantage of the "torrent of corporate spending" unleashed by the US Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling 16 years ago, but also is now working to make the fallout from the decision even worse.
“In 2024, the already horrifying amount of money went on steroids, as we witnessed the largest direct corporate spending on elections ever," said the group's co-presidents, Lisa Gilbert and Robert Weissman.
Corporate-funded dark money groups, nonprofits, and shell companies, which are not required by law to disclose their donors, poured more than $1.9 billion into the 2024 federal election cycle, nearly twice as much as in 2020, according to the Brennan Center for Justice. That amount of spending has climbed dramatically since 2010, with $4.3 billion spent to influence elections since the decision.
The most recent election saw spending power more consolidated into the hands of a few powerful individuals than ever before, with top Trump benefactors including Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, investor Timothy Mellon, pro-Israel megadonor Miriam Adelson, and several others all spending more than $100 million apiece to support his candidacy.
The cryptocurrency industry likewise dumped over $245 million into the election cycle and "drove election outcomes and completely reshaped congressional policy debates, as politicians caved to crypto demands rather than face an onslaught of industry spending in the next election," according to Gilbert and Weissman.
Since Trump took office, his administration has further eroded the guardrails, allowing companies to go unchecked in their political spending.
On Wednesday, Public Citizen also unveiled a report showing that "the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC), under Trump appointee Chair Paul Atkins, acted in unprecedented ways to erect barriers to shareholders holding companies accountable for corporate political spending," most notably telling companies that they would not face objections if they fail to include political activity on shareholder statements.
Public Citizen democracy advocate Jon Golinger said this "ripped away the fig leaf by which the Supreme Court aimed to hide the shame of Citizens United."
The group noted that former Associate Justice Anthony Kennedy, who wrote the majority opinion in the case, had justified it by saying that there is "little evidence of abuse that cannot be corrected by shareholders through the procedures of corporate democracy" and that runaway corruption could be headed off by the "prompt disclosure of expenditures."
"All Americans suffer and our democracy withers when corporations and the superrich have more of a say in elections than regular voters do," Gilbert and Weissman said.
"It’s not only that corporations and the superrich are able to block overwhelmingly popular policies—meaningful cuts to drug prices, raising the minimum wage, making corporations pay their fair share in taxes, cracking down on polluters and much more—that would make our country more just, healthier, and more sustainable," they continued. "It’s also that deep frustration with a failed political system paves the way for demagogues like Donald Trump to seize power."
Across party lines, Americans overwhelmingly say that the corporate spending in elections allowed by Citizens United undermines democracy.
An October poll conducted by Issue One found that 79% of Americans said "large independent expenditures by wealthy donors and corporations in elections give rise to corruption or the appearance of corruption." This included 84% of Democrats, 74% of Republicans, and 79% of independents.
Gilbert and Weissman said, “A constitutional amendment to overturn this terrible decision is 16 years overdue.”
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