Americans from across the political spectrum have begun organizing themselves to take action against those members of Congress who voted for the National Defense Authorization Act (the NDAA).  While much of the Act is a routine appropriations bill, what was ultimately included in the Act contained provisions that permit the indefinite detention of any person, including American citizens in violation of several Constitutional guarantees.  Initially, the President promised to veto the bill, but at the last minute inexplicably reversed himself and he signed it into law.  No satisfactory explanation for his 11th hour change of heart has been offered.

Some, such as Glenn Greenwald have argued that the NDAA  — while wrong  — doesn’t break new legal ground, buy only codifies prior court rulings such as those in the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals decision in Padilla and the US Supreme Court’s decision in the Hamdi case. In a piece he published on salon.com in early December he wrote:

I haven’t written about this bill until now for one reason: as odious and definitively radical as the powers are which this bill endorses, it doesn’t actually change the status quo all that much. That’s because the Bush and Obama administrations have already successfully claimed most of the powers in the bill, and courts have largely acquiesced.

Whether Mr. Greenwald’s analysis is right or wrong (and he is almost always right on questions of the Constitution), the fact of the matter remains that the US is drifting in a very dangerous direction and our elected leadership is only accelerating that trend.

In reaction to this trend generally and specifically to the NDAA vote, Montanans have launched a recall effort aimed at that state’s senators, Max Bacchus and Jonathan Tester, both of whom voted for the NDAA. While this is the first state-level action undertaken to recall those responsible for helping to bring in a potential police state, many other groups are also working to reverse the NDAA via the ballot box.

For the past week or so, several reddit.com threads have sprung up concerned with focusing on recalling Senators who voted for the NDAA and/or who have voiced support for the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA).  Based on votes, they have now launched “Operation Graham Cracker” aimed at unseating Lindsey Graham of South Carolina. Similar threads have been started targeting Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin.

Elsewhere on the internet several Facebook groups have sprung up, the largest we’ve been able to find thus far is  “Recall Every Congressman Who Voted for the NDAA.” And, Change.org has started an online petition to impeach every Senator who voted for the Act. As the impeachment process requires Congress to actually draw up and vote on the articles of impeachment, it is unlikely that this approach will go very far.  However, it does reflect the general level of dissatisfaction with the state of affairs.

Oathkeepers.org has launched its own recall effort to remove from office any member of Congress who voted for the NDAA.  Oathkeepers describes itself as

… a non-partisan association of currently serving military, veterans, peace officers, and firefighters who will fulfill the oath we swore to support and defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic, so help us God.

Our oath is to the Constitution, not to the politicians, and we will not obey unconstitutional (and thus illegal) and immoral orders, such as orders to disarm the American people or to place them under martial law and deprive them of their ancient right to jury trial.

It is based upon their oath to uphold the Constitution that they oppose the NDAA.  As they write on their website:

This is a bi-partisan assault on the Bill of Rights that will require a bi-partisan defense.  We the People must adopt a scorched-earth policy against all who voted for the NDAA of 2012, regardless of party, using any and all lawful means available to remove them from office.  If you can remove them by means of recall, then do so.  If that option is not available in your state, consider working to make it an option in your state.  If attempts to recall are stopped by the courts, then root the oath breakers out in the next primary of whatever party they are in, making this issue the litmus test and supporting a challenger who will pledge to repeal this dangerous law.   Make this desecration of our Bill of Rights campaign issue number one.

And if you don’t manage to root them out in the primary, then defeat them in the general election, again supporting a challenger who pledges to repeal the detention provisions of the NDAA.   Use whatever lawful means or combination of strategies available to get the job done.   And even when any particular method “fails,” it still succeeds in keeping the focus on this act of betrayal, and it serves to educate the American people, waking them up to the ongoing bipartisan assault on our Bill of Rights.  Even if we lose a battle we can still win the war.

 

Many in the Occupy movement as well have also come out strongly against the NDAA’s detention provisions leading to arrests at a recent occupy rally in Iowa shortly before President Obama signed the Act into law.

What is coming into focus is a realization by both the left and the right that their elected leadership is not protecting their civil liberties, but instead has dedicated itself to the expansion of a bi-partisan surveillance state with ever increasing police powers.  As many were hopeful that the President would veto the act, they had not yet begun to organize a formal opposition to the NDAA nor focus on recalling those members of Congress who voted for it. Now that the President has broken yet another promise to the American people, and the Act has become a reality, we can expect to see a rapid spread of recall efforts against any elected leader who has supported the destruction of the Constitutional framework which until recently preserved and guaranteed Americans’ liberties.