Elian Raid Fuels Right’s Outrage at Federal Force

When Rudolph W. Giuliani and Tom DeLay are louder than the American Civil Liberties Union in denouncing police tactics, it may be time to check the political compass.

Indeed, since federal law enforcement agents seized Elian Gonzalez last weekend, most of the complaints about the raid have come from law-and-order Republicans like the New York mayor and House majority whip from Texas.

The pointed, even vitriolic, denunciation from the GOP leaders is not simply a predictable partisan attack on a Democratic administration. It also is the latest example of a decade-long political shift: Many Republicans have grown at least as likely as some Democrats to complain about the excessive use of federal police power.

The political scene this week has been emblematic: Two full days after the Miami raid, the ACLU was still debating whether to issue a statement. Ultimately, an ACLU press release pronounced the group “troubled” by the action. Meanwhile, Americans for Tax Reform, a conservative group, had already printed up two protest posters featuring the now-ubiquitous photo of an armed federal agent reaching for the boy. One read: “Your tax dollars at work.” The other: “I’m from the federal government and I’m here to help you.”

And while traditional congressional champions of civil liberties were largely silent about the raid, hard-line conservatives such as Rep. Bob Barr (R-Ga.) were demanding hearings.

A Gallup Poll found 68% of those surveyed opposed a congressional inquiry. Despite that finding, Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.) announced Tuesday that Judiciary Committee hearings would be held early next week.

Most liberals view the backlash against the raid as reflexive GOP hostility toward President Clinton and Atty. Gen. Janet Reno more than an ingrained concern about civil liberties. “What we have is an opposition party which will attack whatever the president does,” said Herman Schwartz, a law professor at American University in Washington. “They don’t object very much when Haitian exiles and others are treated dreadfully.”

But many conservatives say their concerns reflect a transformation in their view of federal law enforcement agencies.

During the Cold War, while liberals often warned of eroding civil liberties, conservatives supported virtually every expansion of power by federal authorities--such as domestic surveillance or wiretapping of suspected subversives--as an indispensable weapon in the war against Communism. But since the Soviet Union’s fall, conservatives have frequently been quicker than the left to denounce federal law enforcement efforts as excessive.

In essence, the right now applies to federal police powers the same critique of intrusive “big government” that they have applied to such issues as taxation or environmental regulation.

Even before the uproar over the Miami raid, this was evident in the right’s reaction to the fatal confrontations with extremists near Waco, Texas, and Ruby Ridge, Idaho, as well as GOP-sponsored congressional investigations of the Internal Revenue Service.

Other examples include the sustained campaign by the National Rifle Assn. against alleged abuses by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms; the resistance among some conservatives to increased federal surveillance power over suspected terrorists; and the right’s support for a recently passed bill that would limit Washington’s capacity to seize assets in alleged drug cases.

“With the collapse of the Soviet Union, conservatives began to question police powers that were previously viewed as pointing outward [as part of the fight against Communism], not inward,” said Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform.

He added: “The FBI used to be what defended you against the Communists. Now they are the people who could kick your door down.”

Conservatives, Liberals Agreeing

This shift in attitude has produced several odd political coalitions in recent years. After the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, the ACLU and the NRA joined from opposite ends of the political spectrum to oppose key elements of anti-terrorism legislation that eventually passed.

Today, another odd couple--conservative Barr and liberal House Minority Whip David E. Bonior (D-Mich.)--both support an effort to repeal portions of that law that make it easier for the federal government to detain people based on evidence that has not been made available to the defendant.

But even as the two sides occasionally find common cause on civil liberties issues, each still harbors substantial skepticism about the other’s motives. Many liberal Democrats dismiss the conservative criticism of the Miami raid as hypocritical and opportunistic--noting that even Giuliani, a staunch defender of police powers, has jumped on the pile.

“Giuliani criticizing this seems odd,” said Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.). “This is a man who has defended the shooting of unarmed people” by New York police officers.

Civil libertarians note that conservative anxiety about excessive use of police power tends to increase when the enforcement targets are members of their political coalition, such as gun owners facing the ATF, small-business owners feuding with the IRS or Cuban Americans battling the Justice Department.

And analysts in both parties note that, for all of the GOP rhetoric criticizing the raid, Republicans failed to do what could have preempted the raid: pass legislation to grant Elian permanent residency status.

Conservatives, for their part, question why so few civil libertarians have raised qualms about the manner in which Elian was seized.

To be sure, the statement the ACLU eventually issued asked Reno to justify the use of force, while the New York Times editorial page--a historic bellwether of civil libertarian thinking--criticized the raid, as did some constitutional scholars. And some Democrats, such as Frank, have expressed reservations about the agents’ brandishing of automatic weapons in the house. But for the most part, few Democrats outside of Florida have raised major questions about the action.

“I am surprised you are not seeing more response just to the means here,” said Terry H. Eastland, a former aide in President Reagan’s Justice Department.

Another key factor fueling the conservative outrage over the raid is the lingering Cold War emotion evoked by Fidel Castro.

Most in U.S. Support Reunion, Polls Say

For many conservatives, it is immoral to send the boy back to live in a Communist country; it is not just the means but the end that angers them. By contrast, liberal critics of the raid are in a more complicated position because most support the underlying goal of reuniting Elian with his father.

Polls show most Americans supported the decision to remove Elian from the home of his Florida relatives--and few analysts believe the controversy will affect many votes outside the Cuban American community in the November election. But some conservatives believe the controversy will match the 1993 federal raid near Waco--in which more than 80 religious cultists perished--in galvanizing suspicion of Washington on the right.

“This is a milestone kind of event,” said Roger Pilon, vice president for legal affairs at the libertarian Cato Institute in Washington.

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Times staff writer Janet Hook contributed to this story.