吃瓜大本营

In August 2017, the FBI鈥檚 Counterterrorism Division issued a secret Intelligence Assessment that claimed the existence of 鈥淏lack Identity Extremists Likely Motivated to Target Law Enforcement Officers鈥� (鈥淎ssessment鈥�) and labeled the group a new domestic terror threat. The Intelligence Assessment was disseminated to more than 18,000 law enforcement agencies across the country and was subsequently leaked to the press. The document contains troubling revelations about the FBI鈥檚 targeting of Black people for surveillance, investigation, and prosecution based on unsupported allegations about a fictitious group of so-called 鈥淏lack Identity Extremists.鈥�

The Intelligence Assessment asserts, without evidence and based on flawed logic, that six isolated incidents of violence against police officers by Black people purportedly demonstrate the existence of a shared ideology motivating violence against law enforcement. It wrongly groups together Black people who, in the FBI鈥檚 own words, 鈥減erceive[ ] racism and injustice in American society鈥� and have beliefs about 鈥淏lack identity.鈥�

The Intelligence Assessment also reveals the FBI鈥檚 focus on First Amendment protected beliefs, activity, and associations in determining who is a so-called 鈥淏lack Identity Extremist,鈥� including through social media surveillance. Since its disclosure, some law enforcement leaders have openly acknowledged that no group of 鈥淏lack Identity Extremists鈥� even exists.

The FBI鈥檚 creation of a 鈥淏lack Identity Extremist鈥� threat label is the latest example in a sordid history of efforts to harass, discredit, and disrupt Black activists who advocate against white supremacy and racial injustice.

At the turn of the Twentieth Century, law enforcement targeted Ida B. Wells and Marcus Garvey as 鈥渞ace agitators.鈥� In the 1950s and 1960s, the FBI鈥檚 notorious Counterintelligence Program deployed covert activities against Martin Luther King, Jr., the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, the Black Panther Party, el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz (previously known as 鈥淢alcolm X鈥�), and Ella Baker. In the late 1960s and 1970s, the FBI surveilled and investigated Black-owned bookstores on the grounds that the stores were purportedly centers of extremism.

In 2018, the ACLU and the MediaJustice filed a Freedom of Information Act request for information about why the 鈥淏lack Identity Extremist鈥� threat designation was created, how it is being used, and whether it is leading to illegal surveillance of Black people and Black-led organizations. As a Black-led organization and the nation鈥檚 largest racial-justice network for media and technology rights, access, and representation, the MediaJustice represents organizations vulnerable to FBI surveillance under the 鈥淏lack Identity Extremist鈥� label.

UPDATE (6.12.20):

In the course of our litigation, the FBI has repeatedly represented that there are approximately one million pages of investigative records potentially responsive to our request consisting of both open and closed investigations.

Additionally, in response to multiple congressional inquiries, the FBI recently stated that it is no longer using the 鈥淏IE鈥� designation but is instead lumping alleged violence attributed to Black activists with the broader category of 鈥淩acially or Ethnically Motivated Violent Extremism鈥� (RMVE), which includes white supremacist violence. Because we know there are still active investigations of Black people on the basis of purported shared ideology, we can assume that the new 鈥淩MVE鈥� category includes active investigations of Black people.

In order to gain more information on the use of the newer RMVE categories and the continued investigations of Black people based on First Amendment protected activity, we submitted a new FOIA request regarding the FBI鈥檚 development and use of its new terms 鈥淩acially Motivated Violent Extremists,鈥� 鈥淩acially Motivated Extremists,鈥� 鈥淩acially or Ethnically Motivated Violent Extremists,鈥� and 鈥淩acially or Ethnically Motivated Extremists.鈥�

View the Freedom of Information Act records

In response, the FBI is keeping critical information secret without any valid justification and has even refused to search for entire categories of records. Nor has there been any sign that the FBI has retracted its flawed 鈥淏lack Identity Extremist鈥� threat label despite calls to do so from the Congressional Black Caucus and some law enforcement.

The complaint, MediaJustice v. Federal Bureau of Investigation, was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. It cites violations of the Freedom of Information Act. The ACLU of Northern California is co-counsel.