Jan 6, 2005 

In anticipation of this week's expected confirmation hearings, the American Civil Liberties Union released a new report on attorney general nominee and current White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales.

Although as a matter of policy the ACLU cannot endorse or oppose nominees for any office other than on the Supreme Court, it can examine and publicize nominees' civil liberties records.

"There are too many questions swirling around Mr. Gonzales's role in developing the legal framework that may have led to the torture and abuse we all saw in those Abu Ghraib photographs," said ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero. "The Senate has a duty not to soft-pedal in its questioning."

To read the full ACLU press release, click here.

Read the ACLU's report on Gonzales.

In just two weeks on Inauguration Day, President Bush will pledge to protect and defend the Constitution. We need your help to reach our goal of 100,000 pledge signers by that date. Send a message to President Bush and other politicians in Washington that you are taking a stand and "Refuse to Surrender" your freedom.

More than 72,000 people have already signed the ACLU's "I Refuse to Surrender My Freedom" Pledge, join them and sign the pledge today.

For months, the Bush White House has refused to release dozens of documents related to the Administration's policies on the detention, interrogation, and torture of foreign prisoners. But President Bush's nomination of Alberto Gonzales, who is widely regarded as one of the key architects of those policies, to be the nation's top law enforcement officer should finally allow the Senate to insist on receiving these crucial documents.

As White House counsel, Gonzales oversaw the development of the Bush Administration's policy on prisoners that was applied in Afghanistan and Iraq. He wrote a memo denigrating the Geneva Conventions, and ordered and reviewed legal memoranda that stated that some of the laws against torture did not apply in Afghanistan -- and that many horrific interrogation techniques did not constitute "torture." These memos triggered dangerous changes in the treatment of prisoners by military interrogators.

Take Action! Urge your Senators to demand that Gonzales and the Bush Administration come clean and release all torture-related documents!

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