From frogs to immigration, Secret Service kept close tabs on peaceful protests

From frogs to immigration, Secret Service kept close tabs on peaceful protests

PRISM briefings show the USSS closely monitoring political demonstrations, regardless of what’s being demonstrated for or against

Written by

A 2011 FOIA request by Jason Smathers led to the release of a little over a week’s worth of the reports from the Secret Service’s Protective Research Information System Management system (PRISM, but a different PRISM than the one Snowden was talking about) regarding demonstrations.

Though the time period is fairly narrow, the variety of demonstrations is nevertheless impressive, from legalization of marijuana …

to immigration reform …

to AIDS treatment …

to the Iranian government …

and, finally, frog extinction, helpfully labeled under the keywords “Environment/Animal Rights.”

Interestingly enough, the demonstrations apparently didn’t have to involve the POTUS directly. A follow-up request specifically requesting all PRISM briefings mentioning “Anonymous” only yielded one result regarding Occupy Wall Street.

Read the full release embedded below or on the request page:


Image via Wikimedia Commons and is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0