Report Is Coming On ‘Rogue, Unaccountable Police Force’ Within Commerce Department WASHINGTON, DC - MAY 06: Ranking member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation US Senator Roger Wicker (R-MS) (Photo by Jim Watson-Pool/Getty Images) May 24, 2021 4:01 p.m.
For years, a security unit within the Commerce Department has allegedly run rampant, morphing into a full-scale counterintelligence force that investigates its employees and outside critics without any apparent authorization or proper training to do so.
The antics of the Investigations and Threat Management Service (ITMS), whose surveillance training reportedly involves following supervisor George Lee as he zips around mountain roads in his car, were first reported earlier Monday by the Washington Post.
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The US Department of Commerce building in Washington, DC, pictured in 2019. A security unit within the department has been accused of illegally spying on employees and private citizens (Getty)
A security unit for the US commerce department has been accused of spying on Asian-American employees and critics of the census as part of an undercover bid to root out “foreign influence”.
The Investigations and Threat Management Service (ITMS), whose job it is to protect employees, allegedly over-stepped legal limits by instead behaving like a counterintelligence agency and collecting information on hundreds of staff and private citizens, including searching their desks and reading their emails and social media, according to
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Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS) arrives at the U.S. Capitol on February 11, 2021 in Washington, DC. (Photo: Chip Somodevilla, Getty Images)
A security unit tasked with assessing threats against the U.S. Department of Commerce used counterintelligence tools to gather information about U.S. citizens and foreign visitors to the United States, unauthorised surveillance that included the monitoring of Americans’ Twitter accounts for comments critical of the government, according to a senior Republican in the U.S. Senate.
Ahead of a forthcoming report said to detail allegations of “improper activities dating back to the mid-2000s” by the Commerce Department’s Investigations and Threat Management Service (ITMS), Sen. Roger Wicker said Monday that government whistleblowers had reported a variety of abuses, including reprisals against Department employees.
WaPo: Commerce Security Unit Searched Employees’ Offices, Scanned Social Media For Census Critics WASHINGTON, DC - JULY 11: U.S. President Donald Trump makes a statement on the census with Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross (L) in the Rose Garden of the White House on July 11, 2019 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Mar. WASHINGTON, DC - JULY 11: U.S. President Donald Trump makes a statement on the census with Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross (L) in the Rose Garden of the White House on July 11, 2019 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images) MORE LESS May 24, 2021 11:31 a.m.
In recent years, a security unit meant to protect Commerce Department officials morphed into a force so aggressive that its members rifled through employees’ offices and combed through social media sites for criticism of the census process under the Trump administrati