S16 20-0691 Subject: Terminate OPD Participation In Joint Terror Task Force
From: Council President Kaplan
Recommendation: Adopt A Resolution Terminating The Oakland Police Department's Participation In The Joint Terror Task Force
As a community member, I ask that you vote to end the partnership between the OPD and JTTF. The JTTF’s tactics have deeply affected members of my community. As you might know the FBI continues to wrongfully surveil, harass and prosecute vulnerable Arabs, Middle Easterns, Muslims and South Asians community members because of their religion and national origin. It also goes after Black Lives Matter and environmental protestors for their political views. We cannot continue this dangerous partnership with the FBI’s JTTF. Thank you.
As a community advocate for Arab, Middle Eastern, Muslim, and South Asian communities in Oakland and the broader Bay Area, I have witnessed the harms and dangers of the Joint Terrorism Task Force program. By tapping into the local police force, the JTTF partnership increases the on-the ground force and local knowledge available to the FBI to harass communities of color, especially Black, Arab, Muslim, and immigrant communities.
In 2017, grassroot and civil rights organizations, along with community support, passed a transparency ordinance in Oakland that requires OPD to follow local and state laws and policies when participating in the JTTF, and to submit an annual report on such activities to the city council for oversight purposes.
However, three years after the ordinance was passed, it is clear that accountability and transparency are not enough. Withdrawal from the JTTF is the only option.
Even with transparency and accountability measures in place, the partnership makes it hard to hold OPD officers participating in the JTTF accountable to the local community. The FBI dictates a lot of what OPD can and cannot share with the public and elected officials.
Therefore, it is important for Oakland City Council to ensure community safety, and to do that we must terminate the partnership between OPD and the JTTF program. JTTF does not provide community safety, it only endangers our communities. We urge you to listen to your community's needs!
We urge you to terminate OPD's engagement with the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF). The JTTF has unfairly targeted communities of color for years throughout the Bay Area region, and Oakland's communities deserve to feel safe while engaging in protest against the injustices being committed against them and others throughout the country. They deserve to raise their voices without facing threats of arbitrary arrest or questioning by local law enforcement working in partnership with federal authorities. Muslim communities have long faced the specter of prejudice-based law enforcement targeting based on stereotypes and preconceived criminality. Other communities, particularly Black communities, face similar threats given recent political movements. We cannot allow Oakland residents to live in fear. Rather, Oakland must be a place where all communities feel safe to engage politically and have their voices heard without fear of reprisal. We urge you to support this resolution and end OPD's involvement and participation in the JTTF.
As a member of the Privacy Advisory Commission and a proud Muslim Oaklander, I urge you to support this resolution and terminate Oakland's participation in the JTTF. Oakland's standards prohibit racial profiling and require investigations to be based on reasonable suspicion or probably cause. Unfortunately, the FBI does not hold these standards for its own assessments, which has resulted in a track record of mapping ethnic and religious communities and harmful fishing expeditions. I urge you to support this resolution and hold true to Oakland's values.
Palestine Legal supports the resolution to terminate Oakland's participation in the JTTF because all too often JTTF agents target activists for their political speech – in violation of free speech protections. As an attorney at Palestine Legal, I represent people in the US, including people throughout the SF Bay area, who are vocal supporters of Palestinian freedom. Our clients are routinely accused of being dangerous, or supporting terrorism, simply because they are political activists who criticize U.S. and Israeli government abuses. My organization has fielded multiple calls from activists who are visited at home, at school, or at work by JTTF agents questioning them for statements they made in support of Palestinian rights. Being questioned by law enforcement for no reason other than speaking your mind about human rights and racial justice has far reaching consequences, especially when agents commonly target people who appear to them as Muslim or Arab. Our clients self-censor, they become sick with stress, students cannot participate equally in campus life, and as a result of the chilling effects, the public’s ability to debate urgent policy issues is suppressed. Because we have repeatedly seen JTTF agents subject activists to mistreatment and suspicion, we urge Oakland – and all jurisdictions -- to cease participation in the JTTF.
Please vote in favor of terminating the Oakland Police Department’s participation in the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Taskforce, which has created a culture of surveillance targeting communities of color.
We have a right to peaceful protest without worrying that Oakland police officers in the FBI’s JTTF will surveil and harass us. And you all have a duty to make decisions that keep us safe from overbroad and overreaching federal laws that infringe on our first amendment rights. Because of this, I ask you all to vote to end the partnership between OPD and the JTTF.
The FBI has been criminalizing communities of color for several years through this partnership. Muslim Students Association West calls on Oakland City Council to end the partnership between the OPD and JTTF.
I am a resident of Oakland and I strongly urge you to end the partnership between OPD and the JTTF. With the help of the JTTFs, the FBI has profiled, surveilled, and criminalized different communities and groups throughout California—Arab, Middle Eastern, Muslim, and South Asian communities, immigrant communities, Black activists, to name a few. When California law enforcement officers participate in JTTFs and follow the FBI’s weaker rules instead of stronger state and local laws, they add to the problem and put the safety of our communities at risk. Thank you for protecting communities of color from further criminalization by cutting ties between the OPD and the JTTF.
As a resident of Oakland, I strongly urge you to advocate for the safety of our community and for accountability and to vote to end the partnership between OPD and the FBI's JTTF. The JTTF puts greater power in law enforcement entities that continuously abuse and violate the trust of our community while promoting a culture of lack of transparency, accountability, and--frankly--humanity. These entities are not always held accountable to our local and state laws, and participation may violate Oakland's sanctuary laws through JTTF's collaboration with ICE.
In this time of continued criminalization of communities of color--and exceedingly reckless abuses of power on the federal level--we must stand against measures that endanger our most vulnerable neighbors. Thank you for working to protect the safety of our community by ending the partnership between OPD and the JTTF.
The FBI continues to wrongfully surveil, harass and prosecute vulnerable Arabs, Middle Easterners, Muslims and South Asian community members because of their religion and national origin. Muslim students have historically been particularly vulnerable targets of these types of surveillance programs and puts our students safety and wellbeing at risk. It also goes after Black Lives Matter and environmental protestors for their political views. JTTF is insidious and dangerous to communities of color by deputizing OPD officers as FBI agents. We cannot continue this dangerous partnership with the FBI’s JTTF. Muslim Students Association West calls on Oakland City Council to end the partnership between the OPD and JTTF.
As a community member, I ask that you vote to end the partnership between the OPD and JTTF. The JTTF’s tactics have deeply affected members of my community. As you might know the FBI continues to wrongfully surveil, harass and prosecute vulnerable Arabs, Middle Easterns, Muslims and South Asians community members because of their religion and national origin. It also goes after Black Lives Matter and environmental protestors for their political views. We cannot continue this dangerous partnership with the FBI’s JTTF. Thank you.
As a community advocate for Arab, Middle Eastern, Muslim, and South Asian communities in Oakland and the broader Bay Area, I have witnessed the harms and dangers of the Joint Terrorism Task Force program. By tapping into the local police force, the JTTF partnership increases the on-the ground force and local knowledge available to the FBI to harass communities of color, especially Black, Arab, Muslim, and immigrant communities.
In 2017, grassroot and civil rights organizations, along with community support, passed a transparency ordinance in Oakland that requires OPD to follow local and state laws and policies when participating in the JTTF, and to submit an annual report on such activities to the city council for oversight purposes.
However, three years after the ordinance was passed, it is clear that accountability and transparency are not enough. Withdrawal from the JTTF is the only option.
Even with transparency and accountability measures in place, the partnership makes it hard to hold OPD officers participating in the JTTF accountable to the local community. The FBI dictates a lot of what OPD can and cannot share with the public and elected officials.
Therefore, it is important for Oakland City Council to ensure community safety, and to do that we must terminate the partnership between OPD and the JTTF program. JTTF does not provide community safety, it only endangers our communities. We urge you to listen to your community's needs!
We urge you to terminate OPD's engagement with the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF). The JTTF has unfairly targeted communities of color for years throughout the Bay Area region, and Oakland's communities deserve to feel safe while engaging in protest against the injustices being committed against them and others throughout the country. They deserve to raise their voices without facing threats of arbitrary arrest or questioning by local law enforcement working in partnership with federal authorities. Muslim communities have long faced the specter of prejudice-based law enforcement targeting based on stereotypes and preconceived criminality. Other communities, particularly Black communities, face similar threats given recent political movements. We cannot allow Oakland residents to live in fear. Rather, Oakland must be a place where all communities feel safe to engage politically and have their voices heard without fear of reprisal. We urge you to support this resolution and end OPD's involvement and participation in the JTTF.
As a member of the Privacy Advisory Commission and a proud Muslim Oaklander, I urge you to support this resolution and terminate Oakland's participation in the JTTF. Oakland's standards prohibit racial profiling and require investigations to be based on reasonable suspicion or probably cause. Unfortunately, the FBI does not hold these standards for its own assessments, which has resulted in a track record of mapping ethnic and religious communities and harmful fishing expeditions. I urge you to support this resolution and hold true to Oakland's values.
Palestine Legal supports the resolution to terminate Oakland's participation in the JTTF because all too often JTTF agents target activists for their political speech – in violation of free speech protections. As an attorney at Palestine Legal, I represent people in the US, including people throughout the SF Bay area, who are vocal supporters of Palestinian freedom. Our clients are routinely accused of being dangerous, or supporting terrorism, simply because they are political activists who criticize U.S. and Israeli government abuses. My organization has fielded multiple calls from activists who are visited at home, at school, or at work by JTTF agents questioning them for statements they made in support of Palestinian rights. Being questioned by law enforcement for no reason other than speaking your mind about human rights and racial justice has far reaching consequences, especially when agents commonly target people who appear to them as Muslim or Arab. Our clients self-censor, they become sick with stress, students cannot participate equally in campus life, and as a result of the chilling effects, the public’s ability to debate urgent policy issues is suppressed. Because we have repeatedly seen JTTF agents subject activists to mistreatment and suspicion, we urge Oakland – and all jurisdictions -- to cease participation in the JTTF.
Please vote in favor of terminating the Oakland Police Department’s participation in the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Taskforce, which has created a culture of surveillance targeting communities of color.
We have a right to peaceful protest without worrying that Oakland police officers in the FBI’s JTTF will surveil and harass us. And you all have a duty to make decisions that keep us safe from overbroad and overreaching federal laws that infringe on our first amendment rights. Because of this, I ask you all to vote to end the partnership between OPD and the JTTF.
This program is threatening community safety and does not belong in Oakland, and am strongly in favor of this agenda item.
The FBI has been criminalizing communities of color for several years through this partnership. Muslim Students Association West calls on Oakland City Council to end the partnership between the OPD and JTTF.
I am a resident of Oakland and I strongly urge you to end the partnership between OPD and the JTTF. With the help of the JTTFs, the FBI has profiled, surveilled, and criminalized different communities and groups throughout California—Arab, Middle Eastern, Muslim, and South Asian communities, immigrant communities, Black activists, to name a few. When California law enforcement officers participate in JTTFs and follow the FBI’s weaker rules instead of stronger state and local laws, they add to the problem and put the safety of our communities at risk. Thank you for protecting communities of color from further criminalization by cutting ties between the OPD and the JTTF.
As a resident of Oakland, I strongly urge you to advocate for the safety of our community and for accountability and to vote to end the partnership between OPD and the FBI's JTTF. The JTTF puts greater power in law enforcement entities that continuously abuse and violate the trust of our community while promoting a culture of lack of transparency, accountability, and--frankly--humanity. These entities are not always held accountable to our local and state laws, and participation may violate Oakland's sanctuary laws through JTTF's collaboration with ICE.
In this time of continued criminalization of communities of color--and exceedingly reckless abuses of power on the federal level--we must stand against measures that endanger our most vulnerable neighbors. Thank you for working to protect the safety of our community by ending the partnership between OPD and the JTTF.
The FBI continues to wrongfully surveil, harass and prosecute vulnerable Arabs, Middle Easterners, Muslims and South Asian community members because of their religion and national origin. Muslim students have historically been particularly vulnerable targets of these types of surveillance programs and puts our students safety and wellbeing at risk. It also goes after Black Lives Matter and environmental protestors for their political views. JTTF is insidious and dangerous to communities of color by deputizing OPD officers as FBI agents. We cannot continue this dangerous partnership with the FBI’s JTTF. Muslim Students Association West calls on Oakland City Council to end the partnership between the OPD and JTTF.
I am strongly in favor of having OPD cut its ties with this FBI program
I support this.