Last December, the Bush Administration’s Department of Homeland Security started a secret program in which it gives out intelligence information to fire chiefs and emergency medical administrators, then enlists firefighters, fire inspectors and EMTs under their administration to make reports on the people they help and homes they enter. Under the program now in place, firefighters and EMTs are instructed to make reports for, among other things, people “expressing hate or discontent with the United States” and, ironically, “still and video cameras” and other “surveillance equipment.”
“There are many things that firefighters do that other law enforcement or other agents aren’t able to do,” explains New York City Fire Chief Salvatore Cassano. Namely, says Larry Schultz, assistant chief of DC Fire and EMT services, “We can walk into your house. We don’t need a search warrant.” The Department of Homeland Security is using fire fighters, fire inspectors and EMTs to conduct Homeland Security surveillance without a warrant. Schultz further clarifies that this sort of thing would be very helpful if, for instance, the International Monetary Fund were having a meeting in Washington, DC and protesters were expected.
“It’s the evolution of the fire service,” says Bob Khan, fire chief in Phoenix, Arizona.
Firefighters, fire inspectors and emergency medical technicians are heroes who save lives every day. Through its programs, the Bush Administration is eroding these workers’ status and ability to do their jobs. They are able to do their jobs because people trust them to come into their homes without a hidden agenda. Schoolchildren are taught at a young age to trust fire fighters and do as they say. It would be a tragedy for that bond of trust to be broken as firefighters, EMTs and other public safety workers become agents of the Homeland Security state.
(Source: Associated Press November 23 2007)
