Thousands of websites are participating Tuesday in “The Day We Fight Back” against NSA surveillance.
LINDA SCHADE, linda at defendingdissent.org, @defenddissent
“American democracy has been turned on its head. Rather than citizen oversight of a transparent and accountable government, we have government conducting secretive surveillance of every aspect of our lives,” said Schade, from the Defending Dissent Foundation. “Something is very wrong and it is our civic duty and responsibility to act. Today is the Day We Fight Back.” Schade is participating in a news conference at noon Tuesday on Capitol Hill.
PRATAP CHATTERJEE, pchatterjee at igc.org, @pchatterjee
Chatterjee is executive director of CorpWatch and a board member of Amnesty International USA and author of Halliburton’s Army and Iraq, Inc. He recently wrote the piece “Selling Your Secrets, The Invisible World of Software Backdoors and Bounty Hunters” for TomDispatch.
DAVID SEGAL, davidadamsegal at gmail.com, @demandprogress
Executive director of the group Demand Progress, Segal highlighted the demands many are making with the “Day We Fight Back”: “Pass the USA FREEDOM Act, which would end the bulk collection of Americans’ phone records and institute other key reforms. Defeat the so-called FISA Improvements Act, which would entrench — and potentially expand — the spying. Create additional privacy protections for non-Americans. End the NSA’s subversion of encryption and other data security measures. … The USA FREEDOM Act has more than 100 bipartisan sponsors, including two powerful lead sponsors: Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Representative James Sensenbrenner (R-WI), who was the original author of the PATRIOT Act.”