Opinion ID: 174989
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Whether and to What Extent the Evidence Is

Text: Privileged [10] The government asserts the state secrets privilege over four categories of evidence. In particular, the government contends that neither it nor Jeppesen should be compelled, through a responsive pleading, discovery responses or otherwise, to disclose: “[1] information that would tend to confirm or deny whether Jeppesen or any other private entity assisted the CIA with clandestine intelligence activities; [2] 8 This skepticism is all the more justified in cases that allege serious government wrongdoing. Such allegations heighten the risk that government officials may be motivated to invoke the state secrets doctrine not only by their obligation to protect national security but also by a desire to protect themselves or their associates from scrutiny. 9 As previously noted, the government filed declarations meeting the procedural requirements for the Reynolds privilege even though such declarations are not strictly necessary to support a Totten claim. See Tenet, 544 U.S. at 11. MOHAMED v. JEPPESEN DATAPLAN 13545 information about whether any foreign government cooperated with the CIA in clandestine intelligence activities; [3] information about the scope or operation of the CIA terrorist detention and interrogation program; [or 4] any other information concerning CIA clandestine intelligence operations that would tend to reveal intelligence activities, sources, or methods.” U.S. Br. 7-8. These indisputably are matters that the state secrets privilege may cover. See, e.g., Tenet, 544 U.S. at 11 (emphasizing the “absolute protection” the state secrets doctrine affords against revealing espionage relationships); CIA v. Sims, 471 U.S. 159, 175 (1985) (“Even a small chance that some court will order disclosure of a source’s identity could well impair intelligence gathering and cause sources to ‘close up like a clam.’ ”); In re Sealed Case, 494 F.3d at 152 (prohibiting “all discussion of intelligence sources, capabilities, and the like”); Al-Haramain, 507 F.3d at 1204 (applying the privilege to “the means, sources and methods of intelligence gathering”); Ellsberg, 709 F.2d at 57 (applying the privilege to the “disclosure of intelligence-gathering methods or capabilities”). [11] We have thoroughly and critically reviewed the government’s public and classified declarations and are convinced that at least some of the matters it seeks to protect from disclosure in this litigation are valid state secrets, “which, in the interest of national security, should not be divulged.” Reynolds, 345 U.S. at 10. The government’s classified disclosures to the court are persuasive that compelled or inadvertent disclosure of such information in the course of litigation would seriously harm legitimate national security interests. In fact, every judge who has reviewed the govern- ment’s formal, classified claim of privilege in this case agrees that in this sense the claim of privilege is proper, although we have different views as to the scope of the privilege and its impact on plaintiffs’ case. The plaintiffs themselves “do not dispute that, during the course of litigation, there may well be relevant evidence that may be properly withheld pursuant to the privilege.” Br. of Plaintiffs-Appellants 26. See El-Masri, 13546 MOHAMED v. JEPPESEN DATAPLAN 479 F.3d at 308-13 (affirming the dismissal of a case involving essentially the same types of claims on the basis of the states secrets doctrine). [12] We are precluded from explaining precisely which matters the privilege covers lest we jeopardize the secrets we are bound to protect. See Black, 62 F.3d at 1119 (“Care in protecting state secrets is necessary not only during a court’s review of the evidence, but in its subsequent treatment of the question in any holding; a properly phrased opinion should not strip the veil from state secrets even if ambiguity results in a loss of focus and clarity.”). We can say, however, that the secrets fall within one or more of the four categories identified by the government and that we have independently and critically confirmed that their disclosure could be expected to cause significant harm to national security.