ACLU Rejoins Combined Federal Campaign

The American Civil Liberties Union has rejoined the Combined Federal Campaign (CFC). The CFC is the employee giving campaign administered in federal workplaces. The ACLU withdrew from the CFC in 2003 when the program began requiring that participating charities check their employees and expenditures against several government watch lists for “terrorist activities” and that organizations certify that they do not contribute funds to organizations on those lists.

As a result of this change in policy, several other workplace-giving programs followed suit by placing similar requirements on charity participation, including the United Way. The ACLU lost more than $1 million dollars nationwide as a result of its withdrawal from workplace-giving programs that forced participants to certify that they did not support “terrorist activities.” The ACLU of Northern California withdrew from some local workplace-giving campaigns due to similar requirements.

The ACLU rejoined the CFC and local United Way campaigns after the ACLU and 12 other national nonprofit organizations successfully challenged the Office of Personnel Management’s CFC requirements. “This is a major victory for nonprofit organizations that refused to be subjected to vague government requirements forcing us to become law enforcement officers for the federal government,” said ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero. Participating organizations were surprised and confused by the change in CFC policy, which included no additional explanations or definitions to help them better understand the steps necessary to be in compliance.

For instance, the policy did not explain:

• How frequently participant organizations were required to check to see if employees’ (or prospective employees’) names were on the lists;

• How close a match between an employees’ (or prospective employees’) name and a name on a list was required to be considered a match (the lists contained names as inexact as “Ahmed the Tall” and “Ahmed the Egyptian.” With such lack of specificity, how was an organization to determine who was really on the list?);

• Whether participant organizations were required to take any steps to determine if employees (or prospective employees) belong to organizations named on the lists.

• “This policy was misguided and ineffective,” said Romero. “From ‘No Fly’ lists to the CFC watch list to many of the provisions of the Patriot Act, this administration uses the cloak of national security but they afford little protection to Americans.”

For more information about the case and the groups that challenged the policy, go to www.aclu.org/cfc

The good news is, the ACLU can once again receive funds via Combined Federal Campaign, United Way and other workplace giving campaigns. Just specify the ACLU Foundation of Northern California on the donor designation form at your workplace.