Security Analyst Discusses The Perils Of The Terror Watch List
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- David Inserra, a Homeland Security and Cybersecurity Analyst at the Heritage Foundation, talked with Rich Zeoli on Talk Radio 1210 WPHT about the downsides of terror watch lists that sometimes leads to innocent people being placed on them and terrorists, like the shooter in Orlando, being removed from them.
Inserra said Omar Mateen was actually removed from a watch list after an investigation a few years ago did not turn up any concrete evidence against him.
"The issue is that when we add someone to this comprehensive list, we only suspect, we have reasonable suspicion that they might be engaging in terrorism, but we don't know. That's one of the things that we're seeing, for instance, in the Orlando case, he was originally added, that's what we're hearing, to the terrorist watch because when they were doing several of those investigations on him, but then he was removed for the list because those investigations were not able to corroborate anything. The didn't see any evidence that he was actively plotting terrorism, so they stopped investigating him and they removed him from the list."
He said a more common problem is people find they are placed on watch lists by mistake and have a difficult time getting their names removed.
"One of the issues surrounding no-fly lists and these watch lists is how does one achieve redress? If you're wrongly placed on the list, is there an easy mechanism for you to say, hey, that's not me? Get me off this list. That's been a problem. There's been court cases about this and I think they're still trying to change the redress process because, yes, first you might not know, so it's kind of hard for you to fight something if you don't know about it and then when you do find out about it, it can be hard to actually get redress if you are mistakenly put on the list.
Inserra believes the primary concern should be making these lists as accurate as possible so law enforcement and the public can depend on them.
"It will continue to be litigated until they find the right balance and they create a process that provides people with that due process because you've got to let people fly on planes and do these things, especially if there is no reason for them to be suspected. You need to make sure that you are maintaining these lists as best you can. It makes sense to have these lists because we need to keep a list of who these guys are, but we need to provide an avenue for people to get off these lists if they say, hey, that's not me or I don't deserve to be on this list."
