Police Spied on 'Terrorist' Climate Activists

by Emily Gertz

Published October 25, 2008 @ 12:03PM PT

This month, three current or former staff members of the Chesapeake Climate Action Network, including director Mike Tidwell -- a writer I've worked with on a story series for Grist -- each received a letter from the Maryland State Police. (Andy Revkin has put one of these letters up on his DotEarth blog at The New York Times.)

The letters informed them that for a 14-month period between March of 2005 and May 2006, their names had been entered into a list of 53 activists "suspected of involvement in terrorism" -- but since there was no evidence of violent crimes, the list was being purged.  They were invited to come in to view their files before the police destroyed them, under the conditions that we not bring an attorney, and that they could not make photocopies or take notes about what was in the files.

Mike and I talked this morning -- and to put it mildly, he is outraged that campaigning peacefully to stop global warming led him to be tagged a 'terrorist.'   Here's what he had to say:

Change.org: How did you and your CCAN colleagues find out that your name was on this list?

Mike Tidwell: The superintendent of the Maryland State Police sent us letters informing us that we were on this list: myself, Josh Tolkin, and another person who is not coming forward at this time.

CCAN was at that time a staff of around six or seven people -- and there were three who were entered into this list.  So essentially, half of our staff was spied on.

When I got my letter, I'd already read about this, [because] the police decided they would inform people individually [and there had already been some reports in the press].  They have been putting out letters slowly.  They have not released a list.

The only reason any of this came to light was that the American Civil Liberties Union of Maryland, in another case, made a Freedom of Information request to the Maryland State Police.  And these files started to come out.

C: How did it feel to learn that the state police had classified you as a terrorist?

MT: When I got my letter in early October, my first thought was that I should keep this a secret.  This could be damaging to my reputation, my organization, my family life.  It was so troubling and so disturbing that part of me considered just keeping my head down and not going public.

Then I called to inquire about reading my file, and they talked to me like I was a criminal, and called me a "person of interest," repeatedly -- which is a police term for suspect. 

That's when I decided I have a civic responsibility to come forward about this. But I believe that some people will never come forward, will live with this secret for rest of their life, who will never run for office, a judgeship, who will be afraid to engage more fully in civic action.

Groups like mine, our job is to inspire people to take action to protect the environment, or public safety, whatever.  If they feel like taking action puts them on a terrorist list, then democracy unravels. So this damage, this chilling effect, is already out there.

That's the real tragedy here.  That's why we have to respond strongly and prevent these abuses.

C: Do you know what kinds of materials they've collected?

MT: We don't know what kind of materials there are, or even if they might have already destroyed some of them.

C: Do you have any idea how your name ended up on this list?

They won't tell me. 

[One possibility is that] in November of 2004, I did a peaceful civil disobedience action at a coal-fired power plant in Dickerson, Maryland.  I was peacefully arrested after sitting in middle of street, at the entrance to the power plant, with five other people, who included a farmer and a rabbi.  We were all peacefully arrested.

I went before a judge two months later and pled guilty to two misdemeanors: disorderly conduct and trespassing.  In his decision, the judge called us "exemplary citizens for standing up for your principles."

I did another act of civil disobedience in October of 2006.  So both my actions fell outside of the time period that the Maryland State Police says it was spying.  Nothing adds up.

C: Do your colleagues know how they ended up on the list of 53?

Josh Tulkin and our other colleague [who is not coming forward at this time] have never been arrested for anything, or detained by the police.

If Josh can be on this list, that qualifies everyone in America to be on a list of suspected terrorists.

C: Do you know how the police watched you?

MT: We have no idea what kind of surveillance was conducted.  They're not denying that tapped my phone, or read my e-mails, or watched me dropping my eight-year-old son at school.  But they won't tell us.

C: Has the Maryland State Police shared the list with other law enforcement?

MT: [We're working with] David Roca of the Maryland ACLU. At a press conference last week he said, "It is our understanding that this list was accessible to various federal authorities."  So that would include DHS of course [the Department of Homeland Security], and the FBI.   You need to check with David.

The Maryland State Police should not only release everything so we can see what happened, and remove the whole list from state watch lists, but do everything in their power to get these 53 people removed from any federal or international lists they've ended up on.

C: Can you think of anything else going on with your work at the time, or in the state, that might have played into this? 

MT: You're the first person to ask me a question like that. [One thing that might be significant is that] all of this occurred under a Republican governor, who swears he had no knowledge of it.

In 2002, Maryland for first time in 30 years elected a Republican governor, Bob Ehrlich. [[Robert Ehrlich was Governor of Maryland from 2003 to 2007.]]

He was definitely a law-and-order type, a typical conservative Republican governor. So there was a culture of extreme enthusiasm for law enforcement in this period.

Erlich was opposed to virtually every clean energy bill and climate bill introduced under his administration. He was very protective of the interests of big business, utilities -- the Mirant Corp for example, which was our chief opponent in cleaning up coal plants in Maryland.  He did sign a number of landmark [environmental] bills, but only after having opposed them ferociously. 

CCAN and other groups were pushing for a "four-P" bill, one that would reduce four pollutants [from coal-fired power plants]: nitrous oxide, sulfur, mercury, and carbon dioxide.  Toward the end of his administration, because he wanted to get re-elected, Erlich introduced his own bill to clean up coal-fired plants. 

Erlich's bill was a "three-P" bill to reduce nitrogen, sulfur, and mercury, but not carbon dioxide. [The governor's position was that "global warming is a theory," and it was premature to regulate carbon dioxide]. 

And look, the "carbon group" got spied on -- the other groups [apparently] did not -- and, we were the only professional, mainstream, executive nonprofit figures that got spied on.  The others [that I know of] on the list were part-time or volunteers, no staff, no budget, not well connected politically.

[My staff and I] are white-collar, professional, seasoned organizers. The idea that I am a source of terror in my community, that I am a violent risk, is absurd. They have defamed me, they have broken laws; they have violated my civil liberties.  It's an outrage to everyone I'm aware of who's become aware of this story.

C: What are your next steps?

MT: We're now demanding that the Maryland State Police release printed copies of all the files they kept on all 53 supposed terrorists.  Turn over everything that's in the dark and bring it into the light.  Don't threaten to destroy it. 

They still haven't agreed to this, and the Maryland attorney general and the governor have yet to order that they turn over materials.

[CCAN is] supporting legislation [which will be introduced in the Maryland state legislature in January] that the police cannot have list with the word "terrorist" on it unless actions meet a certain standard.  You just can't call the milkman a terrorist because you feel like it.

Beyond that, and I'm not affirming or denying this for myself personally, you may see a lot of defamation suits by people on the list.

C:  Is there anything else you'd like to say?

MT: Most journalists are reporting this as a civil liberties issue.

What we're emphasizing, as a climate group, is that this is a waste of resources when we ought to be talking about the real terror in Maryland, and that's 20 feet of sea level rise, larger Atlantic storms and all the other impacts of climate change.  That's the terror side, and the real violence. 

The violent actions that are going on right now are combustion of coal to create electricity, and over-reliance on all other forms of fossil fuels.  That's the source of the violent action we should be focused on, to avoid the terror of climate change.

For more information:

Maryland Cops Put 53 Non-Violent Activists on Terrorist List (Wired News)

Md. State Police Spied on Climate Change Activists (The Washington Post) 

US nuns come home to discover 'terrorist' status (Agency France Presse) 

'My Co-Worker Is a Terrorist' (Jake Brewer - The Huffington Post) 

Image: "Eye in the sky" surveillance camera, via Wikimedia Commons