T5 B61 Vip Fdr- Commission Draft- The Interview Project 223

9.3 The Interview Project Immediately after September 11, 2001, the Attorney General developed an AntiTerrorism Plan with "two primary strategic goals: (1) develop intelligence that will help us identify and apprehend those who are involved in the planning or perpetration of terrorist attacks; and (2) to undertake law enforcement operations that sow disruption among those planning such attacks."1 In furtherance of these two goals, the Attorney General announced on November 9, 2001, that the Department of Justice would undertake to interview several thousand non-immigrant aliens from countries with an al Qaeda terrorist presence about their knowledge of terrorist elements within the United States.2 This undertaking was known as the Interview Project.3 The first step was to determine who should be interviewed. The Foreign Terrorist Tracking Task Force was assigned this job. The FTTTF was established by the Attorney General on October 31, 2001, and charged with preventing terrorist attacks by tracking the movements of foreign terrorists and preventing them from entering the country. The FTTTF studied characteristics of the September 11 hijackers and determined they were primarily males between the ages of 18 and 33 who entered the United States after January 1, 2000 on non-immigrant visas and who held passports from or resided in one of 15 countries with an al Qaeda presence. The FTTTF adopted these commonalities as parameters for a list of interview subjects, and searched the Immigration and Naturalization Service's (INS) database for arrival records (I-94s) for individuals fitting these criteria. The FTTTF reduced the list to 5,147 individuals by including only individuals whose last known address was available on public source databases. The individuals were separated by state of most current address, and the lists were turned over to the Executive Office of United States Attorneys (EOUSA) for distribution to the United States Attorney's Offices.4 The Attorney General issued a memorandum on November 9, 2001, announcing the project and establishing a one-month deadline for its completion, and the Deputy Attorney General issued guidelines for the interviews that addressed the manner of conducting them—stressing that the interviews were voluntary— and included a six-page set of questions for each interviewee.5 The interview topics included personal information about the alien such as basic biographical information, their family, friends, associates, employment and income. Other topics included the individual's foreign travel, involvement in armed conflicts, reaction to terrorism, knowledge of terrorism or the financing of terrorism, and knowledge of any criminal activity. There were a total of 33 questions, 21 of which were in a "yes/no" format. Some questions included: • • • • • •

"Has the person ever visited Afghanistan?" "Has the person ever participated in any armed conflict?" "Reason for person's visit to the United States?" "Purpose and destination of any trips the person has made outside of the U.S.?" "Have threats or violence been directed at the person" "Does the person have knowledge regarding the events of September 11, 2001?"

"Does the person have any knowledge of involvement in advocating, planning, supporting or committing terrorist activities?" "Is the person aware of anyone receiving training at terrorist camps?"6

The United States Attorneys, in coordination with the FBI, were responsible for assigning interviews to members of Joint Terrorism Task Forces (JTTFs) and Anti-Terrorism Task Forces (ATTFs). ATTFs were groups established by each U.S. Attorney after September 11, consisting of federal law enforcement agencies and the primary state and local police forces in that district to serve as the primary coordinating body for implementing the Anti-Terrorism Plan in each district. The Attorney General and local U.S. Attorneys engaged in outreach efforts in an effort to allay concerns that the goal of this Project was to "harass" or "round up" persons who fit a certain ethnic or religious profile.8 Nevertheless, four districts opted not to have INS agents conduct any interviews because they felt it would intimidate the interviewees or was understaffed. In addition, local police departments in several jurisdictions refused to participate in the interview process, citing concerns about racial profiling and local laws or regulations that restricted their participation in the enforcement of federal immigration laws.10 United States Attorneys were responsible for determining how best to carry out the interviews. In some districts, investigators simply visited the interviewee's residence or called and requested an interview. In two districts—the Northern District of Illinois and the Eastern District of Michigan—the United States Attorney opted to solicit interviews by sending each of the individuals on the list a form letter that explained the Interview Project and requested that the recipient call to schedule an interview. If no call was received from the recipient, investigators followed up with a personal visit to request an interview. In February 2002, Justice reported: • • • • • •

it had conducted 2,261 interviews; of the 4,793 potential interviewees, 4,112 were in the country and 681 had left the United States; 1,097 of the individuals in the country could not be located; 785 were determined to have moved from the district to another district; "fewer than 20" people were arrested in connection with the interviews. "Most of those arrested were charged with immigration violations,12 and three individuals were arrested on criminal charges," none related to terrorism;13 at least 10 individuals had refused to be interviewed, but Justice had not kept collected this data in a systematic fashion;

In March 2002, the Attorney General started a second phase of interviews. Again, the FTTTF compiled a list of 3,189 names of nonimmigrant aliens by broadening the age

range from the original criteria, shifting the focus to aliens who had arrived between January 1 and February 27, 2002, and expanding the number of countries to 26, essentially the same countries as were subject to the Condor name check process. The total number of names sent forward by FTTTF in both phases was 8,335, and the total-eliminating duplicate names—was 7,602.14 In March 2003, when the Interview Project was the subject of a GAO investigation and report, law enforcement officers had interviewed 3,216 aliens or about 42 percent of the 7,602 non-duplicate names on the original interview list.15 Results and Benefit The data from all the interviews conducted were entered into a database maintained by the Justice Management Division. However, this data was never analyzed by the Justice Department. Although we requested Justice to provide us with documents summarizing the origin, mission and results of the Interview Project, including the "intelligence, counterterrorism, and law enforcement benefits which resulted from the program,"16 Justice did not provide us with any documents prepared after February 2002, prior to the second phase of the project. In its February 2002 summary of the first phase, Justice asserted that the project met its two goals. "While most of the interviewees had no information relating to specific terrorists or terrorist acts, some provided leads that may assist in the investigation of PENTTBOM or other potential terrorist activities."17 Justice cited eleven examples of useful leads or reports of criminal activity, including: • • • • • •

"In Nebraska, an interviewee provided investigators with the name and address of a person who was acquainted with one of the nineteen September 11th hijackers;" "In the Southern District of Florida, an interviewee indicated that he recalled seeing one of the September 11th hijackers at a language school in Florida;" In Texas, an interviewee acknowledged making contributions to a non-profit organization linked to terrorist funding; In South Carolina, an interviewee described a person who discussed recruiting people to fight for al Qaeda in Afghanistan; In Oklahoma, an interviewee identified an individual who had possessed a false Canadian passport and was allegedly wanted for murder; In Texas, an interviewee reported knowing someone dealing in counterfeit identification documents.18

Justice also asserted that the project disrupted potential terrorist activities, stating, While our success in achieving this objective is impossible to measure, we have every reason to believe that the project had the desired disruptive effect. In the course of conducting these interviews, investigators fanned out

across the United States and made contact with thousands of people. In the course of locating and interviewing each person on the list, investigators generally had contact with many of the person's neighbors, friends and relatives. These contacts, combined with the widespread media attention the project received, ensured that potential terrorists sheltering themselves within our communities were aware that law enforcement was on the job in their neighborhood.19 Justice asserted that the interviews "would likely have caused the [al Qaeda] terrorist to pursue his plans less boldly, and possibly to scale back, delay or abandon his plans altogether."20 Justice further asserted that the project "forged stronger ties" between law enforcement and the communities of immigrants from countries with a significant al Qaeda presence, built closer relations among the participating law enforcement agencies, and demonstrated that "contrary to predictions, our law enforcement community can undertake aggressive and wide-ranging anti-terrorism measures with full respect for legal safeguards and the dignity of individuals who might be touched by the measures."21 Justice concluded that the Interview Project provides a precedent for future operations. As the GAO pointed out in its analysis of the project, however, there has been no analysis of the value of the law enforcement leads described above. Law enforcement officials differed on whether the interview project was helpful in building ties to the communities involved, with some stating it provided an opportunity to present a friendly law enforcement presence and obtain information—including on potential hate crimes directed against the interviewees—and others stating the project had a negative effect on relations between the Arab community and law enforcement personnel. The GAO reported that in districts where immigration rights advocates and attorneys sat in on interviews, these advocates believed the project had a chilling effect on relations-even though the interviewers were professional and unthreatening—because the aliens felt they were being singled out and investigated due to their ethnicity or religious beliefs and would be punished by the INS if they did not cooperate.22 The GAO concluded that the lack of analysis of the results of this project hampered the ability to draw valuable lessons from it, and recommended that the Attorney General, "upon completion of the interview project, initiate a formal review of the project and report on the lessons learned," to include analysis of: • • • • • •

Methods for identifying and locating aliens, Constructing effective interview questions, Designing a database for maintaining data collected, Issuing guidance on interview methods, Conducting the interviews, Obtaining state and local support for the project,

• •

Overseeing project status, and Analyzing the data.23

To our knowledge, Justice has never prepared a subsequent report of the results of the Interview Project after the February 26, 2002, Memorandum, and has never undertaken the "lessons learned" analysis suggested by the GAO. Accordingly, it is difficult to assess the counterterrorism or other benefits from this program, and likewise difficult to assess whether this project can serve as a model for future interview projects. One datum is that, according to the Attorney General, the Iraqi Interview Project carried out on the eve of the invasion of Iraq in March 2003, involved a substantially shorter list of questions than was used in the earlier Interview Project. According to the Attorney General, the questions were limited to • •

Do you know how to contact us if you are harassed based on your national origin, and Do you have any information that will help us (in the war)?24

This dramatic shortening of the questions may relate to a potential problem discussed by the GAO in April 2003, namely that the Interview Project questions "were redundant, did not produce complete answers, had limited value, and elicited responses that aliens thought would help them avoid attracting further attention from law enforcement."25 It may indicate a conclusion on the part of Justice Department officials that the lengthier questionnaire used in the earlier Project was too long and should not be replicated in subsequent efforts.26

Memorandum for the Attorney General, Final Report on Interview Project, February 26, 2002. Memorandum for the Attorney General, Final Report on Interview Project, February 26, 2002. 3 Attorney General Ashcroft described the purposes of the project as threefold: (1) they wanted to have law enforcement presence in the community, (2) they wanted the agents "off their duffs," and (3) they were hoping to get some investigative leads. Commission Interview with John Ashcroft, December 17, 2003 (as memorialized in Commission MFR). 4 Memorandum for the Attorney General, Final Report on Interview Project, February 26, 2002. 5 Guidelines for the Interviews Regarding International Terrorism, Deputy Attorney General Larry Thompson, November 9, 2001; RDOJ10847B. 6 Justice Department's Project to Interview Aliens after September 11, 2001, GAO-03-459, April 2003, Appendix I. 7 Memorandum for the Attorney General, Final Report on Interview Project, February 26, 2002. 8 Memorandum for the Attorney General, Final Report on Interview Project, February 26, 2002. 9 Justice Department's Project to Interview Aliens after September 11, 2001, GAO-03-459, April 2003. 10 The Justice Department described this issue as follows: "The overwhelming majority of state and local law enforcement agencies enthusiastically participated in the Interview Project. However, in Oregon, despite the ruling of the Oregon Attorney General that nothing in Oregon law prevented investigators from participating in the interviews, the Portland Police Bureau nonetheless refused to participate. There were a handful of other jurisdictions where certain police departments declined to participate, citing concerns that the project amounted to racial profiling or that aspects of the Project were inconsistent with local laws or 1

2

regulations that restrict their participation in the enforcement of federal immigration laws. In those jurisdictions, the other members of the ATTF simply made up for the absence pf those departments by performing a greater share of interviews." Memorandum for the Attorney General, Final Report on Interview Project, February 26,2002, m l . 1 ' Memorandum for the Attorney General, Final Report on Interview Project, February 26, 2002. 12 Interviewers were instructed that "While the primary purpose of these interviews is not to ascertain the legality of the individuals' immigration status, the federal responsibility to enforce the immigration laws, as exercised by the Immigration and Naturalization Service ("INS"), is an important one. Therefore, if you suspect that a particular individual may be in violation of the federal immigration laws, you should call the INS representative on your Anti-Terrorism Task Force or the INS officials at the closest Law Enforcement Support Center. Those officials will advise you whether the individual is in violation of the immigration laws and whether he should be detained." Guidelines for the Interviews Regarding International Terrorism, Deputy Attorney General Larry Thompson, November 9, 2001; RDOJ10847B. Memorandum for the Attorney General, Final Report on Interview Project, February 26, 2002, fn 2. Justice Department's Project to Interview Aliens after September 11, 2001, GAO-03-459, April 2003; Memorandum for the Attorney General, Final Report on Interview Project, February 26,2002. 15 Justice Department's Project to Interview Aliens after September 11, 2001, GAO-03-459, April 2003. Because of uncertainty with the identity, address, and entry-exit information regarding the 7,602 potential interview subjects, it was not possible to state with certainty how many of the names represented unique individuals, and how many of those individuals were in the United States and, therefore, eligible to be interviewed. Id. 16 9-11 Commission, Department of Justice Document Request Number 9, Question 12. 17 Memorandum for the Attorney General, Final Report on Interview Project, February 26, 2002. 18 Memorandum for the Attorney General, Final Report on Interview Project, February 26, 2002. 13 14

19 20

Memorandum for the Attorney General, Final Report on Interview Project, February 26, 2002. Memorandum for the Attorney General, Final Report on Interview Project, February 26, 2002.

Justice Department's Project to Interview Aliens after September 11, 2001, GAO-03-459, April 2003; Justice Department's Project to Interview Aliens after September 11, 2001, GAO-03-459, April 2003. 24 Commission Interview with John Ashcroft, December 17, 2003 (as memorialized in Commission MFR). 25 Justice Department's Project to Interview Aliens after September 11, 2001, GAO-03-459, April 2003. 26 It is also, of course, possible that the situation with regard to Iraqi nonimmigrant visa holders was viewed differently—and the need to question them at greater length less pressing—since these individuals already were mandatorily subject to lengthier security clearance procedures as part of their visa application for many years prior to the invasion of Iraq in 2003. 22 23