Thousands of Occupy Oakland Protesters succeed in shutting down the Oakland Port in December of last year. The Oakland Port is the 5th busiest in the United States.
Not surprising that the FBI was keeping close tabs on Occupy Oakland last year, but documents obtained by the ACLU through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request show agents were particularly interested in planned protests to shutdown West Coast ports.
Via:
The FBI kept a watchful eye on the local Occupy movement last year, especially while it was planning protests to shutdown West Coast ports, according to documents obtained by the ACLU of Northern California.
The 13 pages, obtained in a public record request, include FBI reports on Occupy protests in Oakland, a Jan. 27 meeting on how to deal with a possible Occupy Oakland action the following day at the Oakland International Airport, and an FBI alert to private corporate security officials before the attempted shutdown of the Port of Oakland on Dec. 12.
More troubling to the ACLU is that the bureau has refused to release an additional 24 pages of documents it acknowledges having, citing the need to protect confidential informants and protect national security.
"What we are really interested in finding out is why Occupy rises to that level," said ACLU attorney Linda Lye. "The bottom line issue for us is Occupy is a political activist organization, and the FBI has a history of surveilling political activists."
According to Lye, the ACLU suspects the FBI has far more documents than they have acknowledged regarding the local Occupy movement, and will continue efforts to obtain those reports.
