Emergency Security Supplemental to Respond to January 6th Appropriations Act, 2021
Floor Speech
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Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, in just a few weeks, our Nation will come together to remember September 11. It will be the 20th anniversary of that unspeakable act of horror, an attack on our Nation that devastated us and, most particularly, the families and loved ones who lost members of their family and friends--the fallen--who will be remembered on that day and honored.
And I have been honored to stand with those families over the years, as many of us have, as they remember their loved ones and continue to face the trauma and immeasurable grief of their loss. And in these years, many of those families have sought justice. They have tried to honor their loved ones with action to vindicate not only their individual grief and mourning but also justice for our Nation, truth, and truth-telling in the courts of law in this country. They have brought legal action against the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in the face of mounting, significant credible evidence that, in fact, the Saudis aided and abetted that attack on our Nation.
As a Congress, we have acted to support that effort, and I was proud to help to lead the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act, known as JASTA, when we passed it overwhelmingly here, and then on a bipartisan basis, we overrode the President's veto. It was President Obama who vetoed it, and many of us, including the Presiding Officer, voted to override that veto, I believe.
We opened the courthouse doors to the 9/11 families in their legal effort to hold Saudi Arabia accountable in the face of that evidence of its potential complicity. Again, I was proud to stand with these families in 2018 when I introduced, with the help of Senators Cornyn, Schumer, Gillibrand, Murphy, and Menendez, a resolution urging that documents related to the September 11 attack be declassified to the greatest extent possible.
That resolution passed the U.S. Senate unanimously--unanimously-- because all of us recognized that the survivors and the families of the fallen and the American people deserved answers, the truth about what happened on September 11, who was behind it, who supported it, who aided and abetted, and who was complicit in enabling that handful of terrorists to do such a devastating attack and unspeakable horror on this Nation. Many of us have stood with those families to ensure that the 9/11 families not only get their day in court but are also able to go to court with all the evidence they need to have a fair chance to prove their case.
I have asked questions at oversight hearings, including of Director Wray of the FBI. I have sought commitments from nominees like Attorney General Garland. I have written letter after letter after letter, with Democrats and Republicans alike, calling on the Department of Justice and the FBI to provide information that the 9/11 families have requested.
I am proud to continue to stand with those families as we approach this 20th anniversary date, but I also, in fairness to this administration, want to say that the moment of truth-telling now has arrived, and there is a moment of reckoning here.
These families, since JASTA, have been engaged in an epic legal struggle against the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for aiding and abetting the terrorists who attacked the United States on September 11, but now that struggle is also one against their own government, our government, because while Congress did our job in passing JASTA, opening the courthouse door to give those 9/11 families a chance at justice, the last administration invoked the state secrets privilege without explanation to shield the documents and information the 9/11 families need to make their case.
The last administration denied them their fair day in court, and I say with great regret that the current administration seems intent on doing the same. My hope is otherwise. That is the reason I have raised this issue publicly and privately repeatedly, not only in the last years but in the last weeks. To deny information to the 9/11 families and, equally important, to the American people is unacceptable, and it is unconscionable.
The requests that I and so many of my colleagues have made to the Department of Justice and the FBI to disclose and declassify what can be disclosed and declassified in the national interest--those requests have gone unanswered. Sadly, the executive branch across administrations has repeatedly failed to provide any explanation--let me repeat: failed to provide any explanation--let alone meaningful justification for why there has been no disclosure. That denial of explanation or justification is itself also unacceptable and unconscionable. These families will never get their loved ones back, but at the very least, they should get answers. In fact, they deserve answers. They deserve the truth. The American people deserve the truth.
Now, what the executive branch has done is to invoke broadly and unspecifically something called state secrets privilege. State secrets privilege was and remains intended to prevent court-ordered disclosure of government information when genuine and significant harm to the national defense or foreign relations is at stake but only to the extent necessary to safeguard those interests.
It is also clear under the Department of Justice rules that it should be invoked only upon sufficient showing that it is necessary ``to protect information the unauthorized disclosure of which could reasonably be expected to cause significant harm to national security and that the invocation be narrowly tailored for that specific purpose.''
Here is the problem: We don't know if that is what happened in the 9/ 11 families' case or in many other cases. We don't know whether decisions to invoke this privilege met this high and exacting standard or were narrowly tailored. And we don't know because in the 9/11 families' case, the Department of Justice and the FBI have claimed that even the Trump administration's ``justification for secrecy needed to remain secret'' and the ``public discussion of the issue `would reveal information that could cause the very harms [the] assertion of the state secrets privilege is intended to prevent.' '' These blanket assertions and vague justifications undermine both public confidence that our government will only invoke the privilege to protect national security and the pursuit of justice.
Now, let's be very clear. There are times when disclosure can imperil methods and secrets and sources in information gathering. There are times when secrecy is important to protect an ongoing investigation. We are talking here about disclosure of information relating to an attack 20 years ago. There is no indication of any ongoing investigation into the attack on our country. There has been no explanation that sources and methods may be imperiled. There has been no justification whatsoever.
Similar rationales, blanket assertions of protection, have prevented explanations in other cases as well and in some instances have led to the withholding of documents or information and outright dismissal of cases, depriving victims of an opportunity for justice.
In 1948, three civilians were killed when a B-29 aircraft testing secret electronic equipment crashed in Waycross, GA. Their grieving widows did the only thing they could, bringing a wrongful death action in Federal court against the government. But the invocation of the state secrets privilege prevented them from receiving justice and the truth.
In 2003, Macedonian officials abducted a German citizen at the request of the CIA. In that instance as well, justice was sought unsuccessfully, and the case was dismissed because the government invoked the state secrets privilege.
In 2006, the FBI allegedly engaged in the targeted religious profiling of Muslims in Southern California. If true, it was and it remains an egregious abuse, one that led these individuals to sue the FBI. But rather than let the case proceed and rather than let the truth come to light about what the FBI did and why, the government asked the trial court to dismiss the case on the basis of the state secrets privilege, and the trial court agreed. This case, however, is not yet over because the Supreme Court will hear it in the fall after it has wound its way through the lower courts. As we know, justice is often delayed. In this instance, justice delayed is justice denied, again because of the state secrets privilege.
Let me close with a bit of history. On September 11, 2019, the then- President of the United States, Donald Trump, made a promise. He made a promise to the 9/11 families. He made a promise to them to their faces. He looked them in the eye, shook their hands, and he told them that the Department of Justice would disclose documents relative to their case against the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The next day, the Attorney General of the United States, William Barr, in a sworn declaration to the Southern District of New York Federal Court, invoked the state secrets privilege to prevent the release of the very information that the President of the United States had promised those families, the same documents, the same evidence that the President of the United States had vowed to disclose. The very next day, the Attorney General of the United States went into the Federal District Court in New York and said no.
The 9/11 families, whom I have come to know and admire, deserved so much better from the last administration. But it is not about one administration or another. It is about the United States providing them with the truth. It is about our government providing the people of the United States with the truth.
I will be coming back to the floor in the weeks ahead, and I hope my colleagues will join me in raising this issue, in calling on the Department of Justice and the FBI to review their decision invoking this privilege, to declassify and disclose information that they have withheld. They have yet to explain why the national interest is served by this blanket, unjustified, and unexplained invocation of the state secrets privilege. The 9/11 families and the American public deserve that much and more. And this case is about accountability. It is about holding accountable the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
I am not here to argue the case in court. I am not here to take issue with any legitimate, urgent, narrowly-tailored interest that may be served by this Privilege, but there is no indication of any such interest and, in fact, neither the FBI nor the Department of Justice should stand in the way of justice for these families in court.
They owe the American people an explanation, and they owe the 9/11 families the truth so they can bring it to bear in their quest for justice.
Thank you, Mr. President.
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