At a Congressional hearing on May 5, 2011, the top counterterrorism official at the State Department said the a decision about adjusting the Mujahadeen-e-Khalq (MEK) status on the State Department’s list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs) was to be expected within six months. The Coordinator for Counterterrorism, Ambassador Daniel Benjamin was responding to a series of questions from Rep. Ted Poe (R-TX) about a U.S. Court of Appeals ruling from July 2010 said State must evaluate the group’s designation after they failed to adequately provide the MEK with an opportunity to review the unclassified information used for its designation. Placed on the State Department’s FTO list in 1997, MEK is a militant group that opposes the Iranian government.
The introduction of the bill underscores the red flags civil rights and civil liberties advocates have raised about the fundamental problems with the listing process both at State and at the Treasury Department. Significant due process violations, including improper designations and illegal seizure of private property, in Treasury’s investigations of two U.S. charities, KindHearts for Charitable and Humanitarian Development and Al-Haramain Oregon, have been recognized by federal courts. In both cases, a U.S. District Court ruled that Treasury’s action violated the organizations’ Fifth Amendment rights and potentially their Fourth Amendment rights as well. After Treasury’s actions, both charities have been effectively shut down despite neither facing criminal charges.
“The counterterrorism legal framework denies charities due process, exposing them to mistake and abuse…The laws allow the seizure and indefinite freezing of a charitable organization’s assets “pending investigation” without charges, opportunity to respond, or meaningful judicial review. A 9/11 Commission staff report on terrorism financing found that the laws that allow the Treasury Department to designate and seize the assets of charities raise “substantial civil liberty concerns,” says the ACLU report, Blocking Faith, Freezing Charity.