ACSBlog: The Blog of the American Constitution Society

In Brief:

• Preview of Congressional and administrative priorities
• A closer look at military commissions
• 405 Texas death penalty executions

Legislation and Rulemaking

• Business lobbyists "are racing to secure final approval for a wide range of health, safety, labor and economic rules," reports Robert Pear of the New York Times. ACS recently held a panel discussion regarding the peremptory effects of agency rulemaking, in light of the upcoming Supreme Court case Riegel v. Medtronic, which will be argued tomorrow.
• The administration, the financial industry, and nonprofit and consumer groups have nearly completed an agreement to temporarily freeze mortgage rates for homeowners with suboptimal credit histories, David Cho reported in the Washington Post.
• The Washington Post has a preview of the legislative agenda for the next three weeks, which includes "a major energy bill, legislation to rein in President Bush's warrantless wiretapping program, 11 of the 12 annual bills to fund the federal government, a farm bill, and a bill to stave off the expansion of the alternative minimum tax and extend a raft of expiring tax credits," written by Jonathan Weisman and Paul Kane.

National Security and Civil Liberties

• Wired's Ryan Singel reports that the "Director of National Intelligence urged powerful members of Congress to rush through legislation this summer that gave the NSA wide powers to install phone and internet wiretaps inside the United States."
• A military judge ruled that 21-year-old Guantanamo detainee Omar Ahmed Khadr's attorneys cannot tell him (or anyone else) the identity of witnesses against him, which some attorneys say "underscore[s] the gap between military commission procedures and traditional American rules that the accused has a right to a public trial and to confront the witnesses against him," William Glaberson reported for the New York Times. ACS recently released an issue brief on "the Military Commissions Act and noncitizen vulnerability," and held a panel discussion at the 2007 ACS National Convention on detainee treatment under the MCA.
• The CIA has maintained a secret holding cell in Amman, Jordan "where at least 12 non-Jordanian terrorism suspects have been detained and interrogated," Craig Whitlock of the Washington Post reports.
• Linda Greenhouse of the New York Times previews Wednesday's Supreme Court argument in Boumediene and Al Odah.

Criminal Law

• Texas has executed 405 people in 25 years, John Moritz of the Star-Telegram reports.