On April 28, 2005, eight weeks before Beau Breedlove’s 18th birthday, Sam Adams joined three other Portland City Council members to remove the Portland Police Bureau from the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF). In the aftermath of last week’s attempted mass murder of
thousands of Oregonians by a local Muslim jihadist, Adams now says he is open to a “fact-based approach”
to reconsidering Portland’s role in the local JTTF. So what has been Adams’ decision-making approach prior to his epiphany that considering facts might be a good basis for policy-making?
In a November 30 interview with NPR (never to be confused with the Victoria Taft Show) Adams openly admits that his willingness to reconsider Portland’s singularly arrogant abstention from the JTTF has more to do with national politics than keeping Portlanders and fellow Oregonians safe from the likes of Mohamad “Mo Mo” Mohamud, the Somali man now accused by federal prosecutors of attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction. Adams told NPR that his newfound openness to the JTTF is because
“…we have a new administration, and an administration at the federal level and new leadership at the local in the FBI and U.S. Attorney’s Office that I have a lot more trust in than the prior administration. That’s one reason to take a look at our status of membership in the JTTF.”
Adams unwittingly acknowledged what most Portlanders understood since April 2005 – that Portland’s withdrawal from the JTTF was based more on a lack of trust in the Bush administration that on the “facts” Adams now says should drive city policy decisions. As for the new leadership at the federal level? Adams appears unaware that Robert S. Mueller remains Barack Obama’s FBI director after having been first appointed to the position by the distrusted George W. Bush on September 4, 2001 – one week before the day that changed the world.
Adams also falsely claims that the Portland Police Bureau was working “side-by-side” with the JTTF on this latest Muslim terrorist case. While it is true that police chief Mike Reese was briefed two months ago on the existence of the investigation, Reese was required to sign a confidentiality agreement and admits his agency’s involvement was limited to logistic planning and support for the sting operation and Mo Mo’s arrest. That’s a far cry from the Bureau’s investigative role prior to walking away from the JTTF five years ago. Of course, Mike Reese is in the same untenable position as is every Portland police chief who can be replaced by the petulant Adams faster than a citizens involvement committee that gives the wrong advice to the mayor. If Reese expects to remain in Adams’ company longer than a city hall intern, don’t expect the chief to weigh in on the wisdom of having the state’s largest police agency conspicuously absent from the JTTF.
Yet Adams now says he will “sit down with the FBI, the ACLU, and other organizations in the coming days” to reevaluate the ill-advised 2005 council decision. The question is what “other organizations” will Adams include with the Oregon ACLU in these discussions? And why is the ACLU even given a seat at the same table as the FBI? Can we assume the Oregon Tea Party, 9/12 Project – or even Victoria Taft will be given a seat next to the ACLU’s Andrea Meyer?
In a December 1st editorial in The Oregonian, the Oregon ACLU repeats its anti-JTTF mantra by describing Mo Mo’s attempted mass murder as an “FBI-choreographed fake attempted bombing” and “the stuff of high drama” designed to be used “as an occasion to urge the city of Portland to rejoin the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force.” And this is the source of Sam Adams’ fact –based legal advice?
The ACLU and the radical left who will no doubt rise in opposition to the Police Bureau rejoining the JTTF will point to the 2004 case of Brandon Mayfield as why Portlanders should not trust the FBI and why Portland should remain the only major city refusing to partner in any of the current 106 JTTF’s now protecting America. Yet these same protesters are conspicuously quiet about the Portland JTTF’s success in the 2003 “Portland Seven” case.
Lest we forget, Patrice Lumumba Ford, Jeffrey Leon Battle, October Martinique Lewis, Muhammed Ibrahim Bilal, Ahmed Ibrahim Bilal, Habis Abdulla al Saoub and Maher “Mike” Hawash were all home grown Muslim terrorists from the City of Roses. Naturally, their supporter’s claimed the familiar rant that the Portland Seven were just pawns and scapegoats in Bush’s allegedly failed wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Sam Adams wants facts? Try these:
- FACT: On September 18, 2003 Muhammad Bilal and Ahmed Bilal pled guilty in US District court to charges of conspiracy to provide services to the Taliban, and conspiracy to possess and discharge firearms in furtherance of crimes of violence. The Bilals planned to travel with co-conspirators from Portland to Afghanistan to assist the Taliban in fighting against the armed forces of the United States.
- FACT: The Bilals admitted that during the summer of 2001, they and others trained in fighting and with firearms in rural areas of Oregon and Washington state to prepare for jihad in Afghanistan or elsewhere. Both flew to Hong Kong to make their way into Afghanistan, but were forced to turn back when they were unable to cross into Pakistan.
- FACT: Maher “Mike” Hawash, their co-conspirator, pled guilty in August 2003 to conspiracy of knowingly and illegally supplying services “to the territory of Afghanistan controlled by the Taliban or to the Taliban” in violation of Executive Order 13129, which was issued by President Clinton on July 4, 1999.
- FACT: Patrice Lumumba Ford worked in City Hall under the nose of Mayor Vera Katz, Adam’s mentor. His father, Kent Ford was a 1960’s leader in the Black Panthers. At Ford’s sentencing, Judge Robert E. Jones said he was convinced Ford would have done anything he could to make sure he killed an American in Afghanistan. Judge Jones told Ford, “You do not represent the Muslim faith. You are an insult to the Muslim faith. You’re no Nelson Mandela or anyone close to it.” Yet Patrice Ford was described as a “model intern” in the Katz administration. At least Beau Breedlove changed the standard for model legislative interns.
- FACT: The Portland Seven investigation was conducted by the Portland FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, made up of members of the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms, Drug Enforcement Administration, the Internal Revenue Service, the U.S. Marshals Service, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Oregon State Police, the U.S. Postal Service, the Beaverton Police Department, the Port of Portland, the Vancouver Police Department, ICE (formerly INS), U.S. Customs Service, U.S. Secret Service, U.S. Coast Guard, and Federal Protective Services – and the Portland Police Bureau.
Where are the Portland Seven now? Though indicted, Habis al Saoub was never captured and tried in US courts. Justice was served, however, after he joined an al Qaeda cell and was killed by Pakistani forces in Afghanistan in October 2003. Ford and Battle are each serving eighteen-year sentences. Lewis was sentenced to three years in a work camp. Muhammad Bilal received an eight-year sentence, while Ahmed Bilal got ten years. Hawash was sentenced to only seven years after agreeing to testify against the others.
Those are facts Sam Adams and the city council can no longer ignore.
Tell ’em where you saw it. Http://www.victoriataft.com
