Your Rights and Freedoms Are Being Denied by the Joint Base Lewis-McChord Force Protection

Something is horribly wrong at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington State, and if you’re paying any attention at all you know that it’s getting worse. The privacy and freedoms that you once took for granted have been taken from you, without your permission. In return you’ve been given the false promise of safety. But safety from what and from whom. The only real threat is coming from those people in power who pretend that they are protecting you, when in truth they are violating your rights and freedoms with impunity. The Joint Base Lewis-McChord Force Protection Division, with a total disregard for law and regulation, is gathering information about your private life, about your political and religious beliefs, about your comments to friends and family posted to social media, about your personal associations and your private friendships. More and more frequently peaceful citizens are being beaten, tazered, and arrested for the most trivial of offenses, based upon information collected by the Joint Base Lewis-McChord Force Protection Division. The Joint Base Lewis-McChord Force Protection Division is conducting an intensive and invasive intelligence-gathering operation against you.

According to the lawsuit [Panagacos v. Towery - https://aclu-wa.org/cases/panagacos-v-towery] Thomas Rudd, head of the Joint Base Lewis-McChord Force Protection Division, directed Towery to identify Washington and Oregon residents opposed to military activities in order to facilitate the arrest of these people without probable cause. Thomas Rudd instructed Towery to report on meetings, demonstrations, and private personal events and relationships so that civilian law enforcement agencies would be able to arrest, follow, cite, detain, harass, and compile and transmit dossiers that would facilitate disruption of the local protests and demonstrations - even though those events were protected by the First Amendment. On January 27, 2016 the National Lawyers Guild submitted a brief (http://www.peoplevtowery.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Panagacos_Amicus_Brief.pdf) in support of the lawsuit against Thomas Rudd.

Thomas Rudd is the same man accused of violating the civil rights of hundreds of Americans by illegally collecting information about them from 2007 - 2010. "The Army admits in their report that... Rudd... broke regulations and committed major violations of Posse Comitatus. Rudd and those under his command in the Joint Base Lewis-McChord Force Protection Division treated local political activists as enemy combatants and conducted intensive and invasive intelligence-gathering about them... they used everything in their arsenal, including reporting on their personal lives, political and religious beliefs, and even getting a few labeled as domestic terrorists.

Every morning in their daily bulletin the Joint Base Lewis-McChord Force Protection Division instructs the military and civilian personnel living and working on the base to report suspicious activity directly to them. And just what is this suspicious activity these evil men want reported to them? Well, in their own words "nothing is too trivial to report". Take a photograph, ask an innocent question, or even express an opinion on social media that the government does not approve of, and you will find your life being scrutinized by Thomas Rudd and Daniel Vessels at the Joint Base Lewis-McChord Force Protection Division. Your name and personal details will be entered into military antiterrorism databases, to be shared with law enforcement and security agencies nationwide (http://www.nwguardian.com/2011/08/04/v-print/10767_theres-no-such-thing-as-too-vigilant.html).

And so it happens again and again until it becomes natural for you to fear taking a photograph, or expressing your opinion on social media, for fear of being reported to the Joint Base Lewis-McChord Force Protection Division and thereafter being brutalized by the military and civilian police that work on the base. Like the schoolyard bully who is allowed to terrorize and assault the other children, if that behavior is not addressed and immediately corrected it will continue.

Where is the Joint Base Base Commander? Where is the Provost Marshall, LTC Ted Solonar? Why don’t these men put an end to this criminal activity? It is certainly within their power to do so. But it just may be that they are a part of it as well. If they were honest and honorable men they would have put an end to these crimes long ago. Maybe they benefit from the people who live and work on the base being repeatedly brutalized until they fear the sight of an MP walking through the housing area? As long as antiterrorism officers are allowed to collect information about the residents of Joint Base Lewis-McChord; as long as the Joint Base Lewis-McChord Force Protection Division is collecting "suspicious activity reports" about us we cannot trust any MP or civilian police officer on the base.

Remember the words of Daniel Vessels, the Joint Base Lewis-McChord Force Protection Division’s Deputy Chief, "nothing is too trivial to report".

The names contained in this "Force Protection Database" are not those of criminals or of men and women who pose a danger to the community, rather these names are those of people who expressed political opposition to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. This database contains the names of individuals who expressed disagreements with government policy and challenged the government abuse of their rights (http://seattleglobalist.com/2014/07/25/how-to-prove-the-government-is-spying-on-you/27863).

Don’t be lulled in to believing that your name is not also contained in the databases of the Joint Base Lewis-McChord Force Protection Division, just because you don't live on the base. Illegally collecting information about those who the government finds "questionable" did not end with the return of the troops from foreign wars. Right now the Joint Base Lewis-McChord Force Protection Division is illegally collecting information about those who protest gentrification in Seattle, oppose the movement of ships from Portland for oil drilling in the Arctic, those who protest police brutality and say Black Lives Matter, and those who oppose Bureau of Land Management abuses in Burns, Oregon! Anyone who questions government activities or opposes government policies is a potential terrorist in the eyes of Joint Base Lewis-McChord.

Through public records requests we have obtained copies of Joint Base Lewis-McChord Force Protection Division daily bulletins wherein each day Thomas Rudd and Daniel Vessels instruct the military and civilian personnel living and working on the base to send "suspicious activity reports" directly to their personal e-mail addresses, or call them on their personal cellphones, 24/7. And though you have committed no crimes, having your name listed in these terrorism databases can affect your credit, your ability to travel, your ability to earn a living, and cause you to be seen as a violent threat toward law enforcement and your community for doing nothing more than expressing a political opinion or questioning government activity.

But you cry, I am no terrorist! I have done nothing wrong! I have committed no crimes! I am not a Soldier, Sailor, Airman, or Marine. What right does the military at Joint Base Lewis-McChord have to gather information about me?

The answer, of course, is that they have no right to invade our privacy, infringe on our personal liberty, or deny us our civil rights. They have no right to do these things, and they admit that such conduct violates the law and their own regulations, but they continue to do as the please because we have not stood up and cried with a loud and firm voice STOP, ENOUGH, WE WILL NO LONGER TOLERATE YOUR ABUSES AND YOUR CRIMES!

Make your voice heard and demand the immediate closure of the Joint Base Lewis-McChord Force Protection Division. Demand the criminal prosecution of Thomas Rudd and Daniel Vessels for violating your civil rights.

Use the Joint Base Lewis-McChord online comment system and send your demands to Col. Daniel Morgan, the Joint Base Commander at (https://ice.disa.mil/index.cfm?fa=card&s=957&sp=121425&dep=*DoD) or directly to Thomas Rudd's supervisor Col. Matthew Toth at (https://ice.disa.mil/index.cfm?fa=card&sp=109607&s=957&dep=*DoD&sc=29) You do not need to leave your name, but you may provide a telephone number or e-mail address for a reply if you choose.