Common Cause, League of Women Voters Decry FBI "Intimidation"

March 23, 2006: In a joint statement released on March 22, Common Cause President Chellie Pingee and League of Women Voters President Kay Maxwell said that the action of an FBI agent in Michigan concerning a recent speech by Pingree at a League event "smacks of intimidation."

"Our country faces many serious threats to our security, but surely none of those threats come from Common Cause or the League of Women Voters," Pingree said. "It is troubling to think that the FBI would scrutinize my remarks about the Patriot Act at a public meeting organized by the League of Women Voters. Surely the FBI's resources could be put to better use."

On March 14, Pingree participated on a panel on open government sponsored by the League of Women Voters of Berrien and Cass Counties, Michigan that received news coverage in the local newspaper on March 17. A week after the panel, an FBI agent contacted the local League president, Susan Gilbert, to raise questions about Pingree's published remarks at the panel. In her brief comments addressing the law, Pingree raised some privacy and secrecy concerns about the USA PATRIOT Act, and praised Senators John Cornyn (R-TX) and Patrick Leahy (D-VT) for their leadership on Freedom of Information issue.

According to Gilbert, FBI agent Al Dibrito said that Pingree's comments on the USA PATRIOT Act were "way off base," and that the League should have invited someone from the federal government to be on the panel and to respond. DiBrito then told Gilbert that she would be contacted by someone from the assistant U.S. attorney's office in Grand Rapids to give her the real story on the Patriot Act.