1971: A Social Cinema Screening

Decades before the world knew the names of Edward Snowden or Julian Assange, there was the Citizens' Commission to Investigate the FBI. During the height of the Vietnam War, eight ordinary citizens covertly entered their local FBI office in Media, Pennsylvania with the objective of stealing potentially incriminating files and leaking them to the press. What they left with would unearth a highly classified civilian surveillance and intimidation program and change the protocol of government surveillance in America forever.

In 1971, director Johanna Hamilton skillfully splices together archival footage and confessions to reveal the methods and identities of the perpetrators for the first time. Created on the heels of the NSA scandal and in the era of WikiLeaks, the striking expose begs the question: who's watching the watchmen?

Join New America NYC and the Brennan Center for Justice for a screening of 1971 and a conversation with the film's director and key figures in the landmark heist that forever changes the conversation on the rights of privacy and dissent in the era of government surveillance.

Follow the discussion online using #NANYC and following @NewAmericaNYC.

Copies of Betty Medsger's The Burglary: The Discovery of J. Edgar Hoover's Secret FBI will be available for purchase.

Participants

Mike German
Fellow, Liberty and National Security Program, Brennan Center for Justice
Former Special Agent, FBI

Johanna Hamilton
Director and Screenwriter, 1971
@JHamilton71

Betty Medsger
Former reporter, The Washington Post
Author, The Burglary: The Discovery of J. Edgar Hoover's Secret FBI
@BettyMedsger

Bonnie Raines
Early childhood specialist
Former member, the Citizens' Commission to Investigate the FBI

John Raines
Professor of Religion, Temple University
Former member, the Citizens' Commission to Investigate the FBI

Frederick A. O. Schwarz, Jr.
Chief Counsel, the Brennan Center for Justice
Former Chief Counsel, the Church Committee