Gonzales: No Complacency in Terror War
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Attorney General Gonzales, speaking at a banquet in Times Square last night, said Americans’ “shock, grief, and anger” have diminished since the September 11 attacks, but “we have not and will not become complacent” in the war against terrorism.
Defending the USA Patriot Act, whose renewal is under debate in Congress, and touting his accomplishments as the nation’s chief law enforcement officer since taking office more than 100 days ago, Mr. Gonzales spoke before a packed ballroom at the annual dinner of the Orthodox Union.
While describing himself as “open to suggestions” about revisions to the Patriot Act, he said the Bush administration won’t accept any changes “that will make America less safe.” Pushing for the reauthorization of the act, Mr. Gonzales has presented declassified documents to Congress that show how the law has been used to conduct surveillance.
“There has not been one single verifiable violation of privacy rights,” he said last night. Before the Orthodox Jewish group, whose leadership was an ally of his predecessor, John Ashcroft, the attorney general said the Bush administration has sought to protect religious rights.
He trumpeted the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, a law signed by President Clinton in 2000 that seeks to protect religious groups from discriminatory zoning rules. He offered the example of a suit filed by the federal government against Hollywood, Fla., on behalf of a Chabad-Lubavitch synagogue seeking to hold services on a residential street.
Before the dinner at the New York Marriott Marquis Hotel, a candidate for mayor, Rep. Anthony Weiner, showed up at a reception to hand out leaflets calling on Mr. Gonzales to release classified government documents that the congressman from Queens and Brooklyn said could help a convicted spy, Jonathan Pollard, make a case for clemency. Pollard was sentenced in 1987 to life in prison for conspiring to spy for Israel. In 2003, a federal judge denied his request to appeal the sentence and to review the documents cited by Mr. Weiner.
