UMD faculty union denounces FBI attacks on anti-war movement

On January 25th, the Executive Committee of the University Education Association-Duluth (UEA-D) adopted a resolution calling for an end to FBI harassment and grand jury investigations of the Midwest anti-war movement. UEA-D represents nearly 500 faculty members at UMD.

This follows an similar statement from the 17,000-member Duluth Central Labor Body in October. The DCLB was one of the first labor councils in the country to take a stand against federal attacks on our movement. 


Continue to read the text of the UEA-D resolution.

Resolution adopted by the Executive Committee of the
University Education Association – Duluth (UEA-D) on January 25, 2011

Whereas the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) conducted raids in September 2010 at the homes and an office of antiwar and solidarity activists, including union members, in Minnesota and Illinois for their alleged material support of foreign terrorist organizations; and


Whereas the FBI in September 2010 also questioned activists in Michigan and North Carolina; and


Whereas the Department of Justice (DOJ) has issued subpoenas for nearly two dozen antiwar and solidarity activists to appear before a grand jury investigation; and


Whereas the DOJ has not made public any credible evidence of illegal activity by any of the targeted activists; and

Whereas the FBI has a history of violating the civil liberties of activist individuals and organizations, including those violations revealed just days before the September 2010 raids by the inspector general of the Department of Justice, Glenn Fine; and


Whereas the government reportedly infiltrated one of the targeted groups, the Twin Cities-based Anti-War Committee, with an undercover agent who went by the name “Karen Sullivan”; and


Whereas the government has often incited fears of subversion and terrorism to secure public support for restraints on the free exercise of civil liberties; and


Whereas the government has increasingly defined “material support” of foreign terrorist organizations in a manner that includes legitimate political and humanitarian activities; and

Whereas such a broadened definition of “material support” poses a grave threat to the legitimate political activities of all Americans;


Therefore be it resolved that the University Education Association – Duluth (UEA-D) joins numerous civil liberties, antiwar, and labor organizations in condemning the September 2010 raids on the antiwar and solidarity activists and the issuance of subpoenas to nearly two dozen of them as a dangerous assault on what appears to be lawful and legitimate political activity; and


Be it further resolved that the UEA-D calls on Senators Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken as well as Representative Chip Cravaack to request full and transparent investigations in the Senate and the House of Representatives of the government’s surveillance of lawful political activity and the use of expansive anti-terrorism laws to criminalize political dissent.