With Internext Expo and the Consumer Electronics Show both underway and Adult Entertainment Expo to piggyback the two events, a law enforcement official who did not want to be identified said January 4 that the FBI demanded Las Vegas hotels turn over their guest lists up to and including New Year's Eve, for checking against a federal "master list" of suspected terrorists.
According to Reuters, the demand went to all the major hotels in Las Vegas, which Nevada Gov. Kenny Guinn said was one of six or seven cities intelligence reports cited as possible terrorist targets during the holidays.
Reuters cited a second federal official as saying only one hotel balked at turning over the guest lists and, according to Newsweek, which broke the story about the guest list demand, was "slapped with a subpoena" promptly. The hotel wasn't identified, but both Reuters and Newsweek said the hotel in question wanted coverage against any privacy-related guest complaints.
The U.S. terrorist alert level was raised to Code Orange, the second highest level, on December 21. The government has said they feared terroriists might have planned to out-do the September 1, 2001 attacks which killed 3,000, when hijacked airliners crashed and destroyed the World Trade Center, a portion of the Pentagon, and - in one airliner's case - was overtaken by passengers to crash in a Pennsylvania field rather than another prominent American structure.
Airline pilots were barred from flying over New Year's Eve celebrations in Las Vegas and New York City as a precaution, Reuters said. The Justice Department wouldn't comment on specific efforts to block any such plots, but spokesman Mark Corallo told Reuters they would use "every legal tool we have to protect the American people from terrorist attacks."
The American Civil Liberties Union said demanding hotel guest lists without any individual suspicion amounted to infringing on as many as 300,000 people's privacy when their "leisure activities are no one's business but their own."
At least one federal lawmaker, Rep. Christopher Cox (R-California), told CNN January 4 that al-Qaeda - responsible for the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks - still wants to use hijacked airplanes as similar weapons. "There's no question that there's planning going on," Cox said, "and there's no question that the threats, as they've been assessed, are real."
