The city already has experience in violating the rights of its citizens in the name of security at major events and for massive manhunts
If the Olympics come to Boston – and the US Olympic Committee, having chosen it as their contender to host the 2024 Summer Olympics, hopes they will – the government will likely treat it as a National Security Special Event. That means the Boston Police Department and the Massachusetts State Police would fall under the authority of the US Secret Service, Department of Homeland Security, and Federal Bureau of Investigation, which would be in charge of security operations. All people within the NSSE “security” zone – possibly the entire Boston metro area and beyond – could lose a host of constitutional rights, including the right to protest on public land, and the right to not be searched or questioned absent any reasonable suspicion of wrongdoing.
Proponents have already said that the security at the Democratic National Convention in 2004 (an NSSE-designated event) provides a security model for a possible 2024 games. And Dave Zirin reported at The Nation in November that the International Olympic Committee was particularly interested in Boston “because of how the city was able to shut itself down after the Boston Marathon bombing”.
Protesters, demonstrators, and dissidents outside a national political convention are not meddling interlopers who are an irritant to the smooth functioning of politics. They are participants in our democratic life. The Constitution commands the government to treat their peaceful expression of dissent with great respect –respect equal to that of the invited delegates.
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